Micah 6-7

Contemporary English Version

The Lord's Challenge to His People

6 The Lord said to his people:
Come and present your case
    to the hills and mountains.
²Israel, I am bringing charges
    against you—
I call upon the mountains
and the earth's firm foundation
    to be my witnesses.

³My people, have I wronged you
in any way at all?
    Please tell me.
⁴^(A) I rescued you from Egypt,
    where you were slaves.
I sent Moses, Aaron, and Miriam
    to be your leaders.
⁵^(B) Don't forget the evil plans
    of King Balak of Moab
or what Balaam son of Beor^[a]
    said to him.
Remember how I, the Lord,
    saved you many times
on your way from Acacia
    to Gilgal.^[b]

True Obedience

⁶What offering should I bring
when I bow down to worship
    the Lord God Most High?
Should I try to please him^[c]
by sacrificing
    calves a year old?
⁷Will thousands of sheep
or rivers of olive oil
    make God satisfied with me?
Should I sacrifice to the Lord
my first-born child as payment
    for my terrible sins?
⁸The Lord God has told us
what is right
    and what he demands:
“See that justice is done,
let mercy be your first concern,
    and humbly obey your God.”

Cheating and Violence

⁹I am the Lord,
and you are wise to respect
    my power to punish.
So listen to my message
    for the city of Jerusalem:^[d]
¹⁰You store up stolen treasures
    and use dishonest scales.^[e]
¹¹But I, the Lord, will punish you
for cheating with weights
    and with measures.
¹²You rich people are violent,
    and everyone tells lies.

¹³Because of your sins,
I will wound you and leave you
    ruined and defenseless.
¹⁴You will eat,
    but still be hungry;
you will store up goods,
    but lose everything—
I, the Lord, will let it all
    be captured in war.
¹⁵You won't harvest what you plant
or use the oil
    from your olive trees
or drink the wine
    from grapes you grow.

¹⁶^(C) Jerusalem, this will happen
    because you followed
the sinful example
    of kings Omri and Ahab.^[f]
Now I will destroy you
    and your property.
Then the people of every nation
    will make fun and insult you.

Israel Is Corrupt

7 I feel so empty inside—
like someone starving
    for grapes or figs,
after the vines and trees
    have all been picked clean.
²No one is loyal to God;
    no one does right.
Everyone is brutal
and eager to deceive
    everyone else.
³People cooperate to commit crime.
Judges and leaders demand bribes,
    and rulers cheat in court.^[g]
⁴The most honest of them
    is worse than a thorn patch.

Your doom has come!
Lookouts sound the warning,
    and everyone panics.
⁵Don't trust anyone,
    not even your best friend,
and be careful what you say
    to the one you love.

⁶^(D) Sons refuse to respect
    their own fathers,
daughters rebel against
    their own mothers,
and daughters-in-law despise
    their mothers-in-law.
Your family is now your enemy.
⁷But I trust the Lord God
    to save me,
and I will wait for him
    to answer my prayer.

The Nation Turns to God

⁸My enemies, don't be glad
    because of my troubles!
I may have fallen,
    but I will get up;
I may be sitting in the dark,
    but the Lord is my light.
⁹I have sinned against the Lord.
And so I must endure his anger,
    until he comes to my defense.
But I know that I will see him
making things right for me
    and leading me to the light.

¹⁰You, my enemies, said,
    “The Lord God is helpless.”
Now each of you
will be disgraced
    and put to shame.
I will see you trampled
    like mud in the street.

A Bright Future

¹¹Towns of Judah, the day is coming
when your walls will be rebuilt,
    and your boundaries enlarged.
¹²People will flock to you
    from Assyria and Egypt,
from Babylonia^[h]
    and everywhere else.
¹³Those nations will suffer disaster
    because of what they did.

Micah's Prayer and the Lord's Answer

¹⁴Lead your people, Lord!
    Come and be our shepherd.
Grasslands surround us,
    but we live in a forest.
So lead us to Bashan and Gilead,^[i]
and let us find pasture
    as we did long ago.

¹⁵I, the Lord, will work miracles
just as I did when I led you
    out of Egypt.
¹⁶Nations will see this
and be ashamed because
    of their helpless armies.
They will be in shock,
    unable to speak or hear,
¹⁷because of their fear of me,
    your Lord and God.
Then they will come trembling,
crawling out of their fortresses
    like insects or snakes,
    lapping up the dust.

No One Is Like God

The people said:

¹⁸Our God, no one is like you.
We are all that is left
    of your chosen people,
and you freely forgive
    our sin and guilt.
You don't stay angry forever;
you're glad to have pity
¹⁹    and pleased to be merciful.
You will trample on our sins
    and throw them in the sea.
²⁰You will keep your word
and be faithful to Jacob
    and to Abraham,
as you promised our ancestors
    many years ago.

Footnotes

6.5 Balak … Beor: See Numbers 22-24.
6.5 Acacia to Gilgal: Acacia was where the Israelites camped after the experience with Balaam (see Numbers 25.1; Joshua 2.1; 3.1); Gilgal was where they camped while waiting to attack Jericho (see Joshua 4.19—5.12).
6.6 try to please him: This refers to what are traditionally called “burnt sacrifices,” which were offered as a way of pleasing the Lord.
6.9 Jerusalem: One possible meaning for the difficult Hebrew text of verse 9.
6.10 scales: One possible meaning for the difficult Hebrew text of verse 10.
6.16 Omri and Ahab: King Ahab was the son of Omri and the husband of the evil Jezebel. Almost two centuries before Micah, the prophet Elijah had spoken against the idolatry and the other sinful practices that Ahab had encouraged in Israel (see 1 Kings 16.21-34; 18.1-18; 21.1-26).
7.3 court: One possible meaning for the difficult Hebrew text of verse 3.
7.12 Babylonia: The Hebrew text has “the river,” meaning the Euphrates River, which stood for Babylonia.
7.14 Bashan and Gilead: Two regions east of the Jordan River, known for their fertile pasturelands.

Revelation 13

Contemporary English Version

The Two Beasts

13 ^(A) I looked and saw a beast coming up from the sea. This one had ten horns and seven heads, and a crown was on each of its ten horns. On each of its heads were names that were an insult to God. ²^(B) The beast I saw had the body of a leopard, the feet of a bear, and the mouth of a lion. The dragon handed over its own power and throne and great authority to this beast. ³One of its heads seemed to have been fatally wounded, but now it was well. Everyone on earth marveled at this beast, ⁴and they worshiped the dragon who had given its authority to the beast. They also worshiped the beast and said, “No one is like this beast! No one can fight against it.”

⁵^(C) The beast was allowed to brag and claim to be God, and for 42 months it was allowed to rule. ⁶The beast cursed God, and it cursed the name of God. It even cursed the place where God lives, as well as everyone who lives in heaven with God. ⁷^(D) It was allowed to fight against God's people and defeat them. It was also given authority over the people of every tribe, nation, language, and race. ⁸^(E) The beast was worshiped by everyone whose name wasn't written before the time of creation in the book of the Lamb who was killed.^[a]

⁹If you have ears,
    then listen!
¹⁰^(F) If you are doomed
to be captured,
    you will be captured.
If you are doomed
    to be killed by a sword,
you will be killed
    by a sword.

This means God's people must learn to endure and be faithful!

¹¹I now saw another beast. This one came out of the ground. It had two horns like a lamb, but spoke like a dragon. ¹²It worked for the beast whose fatal wound had been healed. And it used all its authority to force the earth and its people to worship that beast. ¹³It worked mighty miracles, and while people watched, it even made fire come down from the sky.

¹⁴This second beast fooled people on earth by working miracles for the first one. Then it talked them into making an idol in the form of the beast that did not die after being wounded by a sword. ¹⁵It was allowed to put breath into the idol, so it could speak. Everyone who refused to worship the idol of the beast was put to death. ¹⁶^(G) All people were forced to put a mark on their right hand or forehead. Whether they were powerful or weak, rich or poor, free people or slaves, ¹⁷they all had to have this mark, or else they could not buy or sell anything. This mark stood for the name of the beast and for the number of its name.

¹⁸You need wisdom to understand the number of the beast! But if you are smart enough, you can figure this out. Its number is 666, and it stands for a person.