Zephaniah 3:1-7

Living Bible

3 Woe to filthy, sinful Jerusalem, city of violence and crime. ² In her pride she won’t listen even to the voice of God. No one can tell her anything; she refuses all correction. She does not trust the Lord nor seek for God.

³ Her leaders are like roaring lions hunting for their victims—out for everything that they can get. Her judges are like ravenous wolves at evening time, who by dawn have left no trace of their prey.

⁴ Her “prophets” are liars seeking their own gain; her priests defile the Temple by their disobedience to God’s laws.

⁵ But the Lord is there within the city, and he does no wrong. Day by day his justice is more evident, but no one heeds—the wicked know no shame.

⁶ “I have cut off many nations, laying them waste to their farthest borders; I have left their streets in silent ruin and their cities deserted without a single survivor to remember what happened. ⁷ I thought, ‘Surely they will listen to me now—surely they will heed my warnings, so that I’ll not need to strike again.’ But no; however much I punish them, they continue all their evil ways from dawn to dusk and dusk to dawn.”