Beginning
Judgment on Edom(A)
The vision of Obadiah.
Thus says the Lord God concerning Edom
(We have heard a report from the Lord
and a messenger has been sent among the nations, saying:
“Rise up! Let us rise up against it for battle!”):
2 See, I will make you small among the nations;
you will be greatly despised.
3 The pride of your heart has deceived you,
you who live in the clefts of the rock,
whose dwelling is high;
you say in your heart,
“Who will bring me down to the ground?”
4 Though you ascend high like the eagle,
and though you set your nest among the stars,
I will bring you down from there,
says the Lord.
5 If thieves came to you,
if robbers by night—
how you have been destroyed!—
would they not steal only what they want?
If grape gatherers come to you,
would they not leave gleanings?
6 How the things of Esau have been ransacked!
How his hidden treasures hunted out!
7 All your confederates have driven you to the border;
your allies have deceived and prevailed against you.
Those who eat your bread have set a trap for you.
You will not detect it.
8 On that day, says the Lord,
I will destroy the wise out of Edom,
and understanding out of Mount Esau.
9 Your mighty men shall be shattered, O Teman,
so that everyone from Mount Esau will be cut off.
Edom’s Violence Against Jacob
10 For the slaughter and the violence done to your brother Jacob,
shame shall cover you,
and you shall be cut off forever.
11 On the day that you stood aside,
on the day that strangers carried off his wealth,
and foreigners entered his gates
and cast lots on Jerusalem,
you also were like one of them.
12 But you should not have gloated
on the day of your brother,
on the day of his misfortune;
you should not have rejoiced over the children of Judah
on the day of their destruction;
you should not have boasted
on the day of distress.
13 You should not have entered the gate of My people
on the day of their calamity.
You should not have gloated over the disaster of Judah[a]
on the day of his calamity;
you should not have seized his wealth
on the day of his calamity.
14 You should not have stood at the crossroads
to cut off his fugitives;
you should not have handed over his survivors,
on the day of distress.
The Day of the Lord Is Near
15 For the day of the Lord is near
upon all the nations;
as you have done, it shall be done to you;
your deeds shall return on your own head.
16 For as you have drunk on My holy mountain,
all the nations shall drink continually;
they shall drink and swallow
and shall be as though they had never been.
17 But on Mount Zion there shall be deliverance,
and it shall be holy;
and the house of Jacob shall possess
those who dispossessed them.[b]
18 The house of Jacob shall be a fire,
the house of Joseph a flame,
but the house of Esau stubble;
they shall burn them and consume them,
and there shall be no survivors
from the house of Esau,
for the Lord has spoken.
The Restoration of Israel
19 Those of the Negev shall possess
Mount Esau,
and those of the Shephelah the land
of the Philistines.
They shall possess the fields of Ephraim and the fields of Samaria,
and Benjamin shall possess Gilead.
20 The exiles of this army of the sons of Israel,
shall inherit the land of the Canaanites as far as Zarephath,
and the exiles of Jerusalem who are in Sepharad
shall inherit the cities of the Negev.
21 Saviors shall go up to Mount Zion
to rule Mount Esau,
and the kingdom shall be the Lord’s.
The Call of Jonah
1 Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah son of Amittai, saying, 2 “Get up, go to Nineveh, the great city, and cry out against it, because their wickedness has come up before Me.”
3 But Jonah got up to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord. He went down to Joppa and found there a ship going to Tarshish. He paid its fare and went down into it to go with them to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord.
4 But the Lord hurled a great wind upon the sea, and a mighty storm came upon the sea, so that the ship was in danger of breaking up. 5 Then the sailors were afraid, and each cried to his god. They tossed the ship’s cargo into the sea in order to lighten the load.
But Jonah had gone down into the hold of the ship, had lain down, and was fast asleep. 6 The captain came to him and said, “What are you doing asleep? Get up, call to your god! Perhaps your god will consider us, so that we will not perish.”
7 The sailors said to one another, “Come, let us cast lots that we may know on whose account this disaster has come upon us.” So they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah.
8 Then the sailors said to Jonah, “Tell us why this disaster has come upon us. What is your occupation? Where do you come from? What is your country? And from what people are you?”
9 Jonah replied, “I am a Hebrew, and I fear the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land.”
10 Then the men were very afraid and said to him, “What is this you have done?” For the men knew that he was fleeing from the presence of the Lord because he had told them.
11 Then they said to Jonah, “What shall we do to you, so that the sea may quiet down for us?” For the sea was growing stormier.
12 So Jonah said to them, “Pick me up and toss me into the sea. Then the sea will quiet down for you. For I know that it is on my account this great storm has come upon you.”
13 Nevertheless, the men rowed hard to bring the ship to land, but they could not do it, for the sea grew more tempestuous against them. 14 Then they cried to the Lord and said, “Please, Lord, do not let us perish for this man’s life, and do not make us guilty for innocent blood, for You, Lord, have done as it pleased You.” 15 So they picked up Jonah and tossed him into the sea. Then the sea ceased from its raging. 16 Therefore the men were very afraid of the Lord, and they offered a sacrifice to the Lord and made vows.
The Prayer and Deliverance of Jonah
17 Now the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.
2 Then Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the belly of the fish. 2 He said:
“I called to the Lord out of my distress,
and He answered me.
Out of the belly of Sheol I cried,
and You heard my voice.
3 You cast me into the deep,
into the heart of the seas,
and the flood surrounded me.
All Your billows and Your waves
passed over me.
4 Then I said, ‘I am cast away
from Your sight;
yet I will look again
to Your holy temple.’
5 The waters encompassed me; even to my soul
the deep surrounded me;
weeds were wrapped around my head.
6 I went down to the foundations of the mountains;
the earth with its bars was around me forever;
yet You have brought up my life from the pit,
O Lord my God.
7 “When my life was ebbing away,
I remembered the Lord;
and my prayer came to You,
into Your holy temple.
8 “Those who follow vain idols
forsake their true loyalty.
9 But I will sacrifice to You
with the voice of thanksgiving;
I will pay what I have vowed.
Salvation is of the Lord!”
10 Then the Lord spoke to the fish, and it vomited Jonah out upon dry land.
Jonah Preaches at Nineveh
3 The word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time, saying, 2 “Get up, go to Nineveh, the great city, and proclaim to it the message that I tell you.”
3 So Jonah got up and went to Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly large city, a three-day journey across. 4 Jonah began to enter the city, going a day’s walk. And he cried out, “In forty days’ time, Nineveh will be overthrown!” 5 So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast. And everyone, great and small, put on sackcloth.
6 When the news reached the king of Nineveh, he arose from his throne, removed his robe, covered himself in sackcloth, and sat in ashes. 7 Then he made a proclamation in Nineveh:
“By decree of the king and his nobles:
No man or animal, no herd or flock, shall taste anything. They shall not eat or drink water. 8 Both man and animals shall cover themselves with sackcloth and cry mightily to God. All shall turn from their evil ways and from the violence that is in their hands. 9 Who knows? God may relent and change His mind. He may turn from His fierce anger, so that we will not perish.”
10 When God saw their actions, that they turned from their evil ways, He changed His mind about the disaster that He had said He would bring upon them, and He did not do it.
Jonah’s Anger and the Lord’s Compassion
4 Now this greatly displeased Jonah, and he became angry. 2 He prayed to the Lord and said, “O Lord! Is this not what I said while I was still in my own land? This is the reason that I fled before to Tarshish, because I knew that You are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger, abundant in faithfulness, and ready to relent from punishment. 3 Therefore, Lord, take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live.”
4 Then the Lord said, “Is it right for you to be angry?”
5 So Jonah went out of the city and sat down east of the city and made for himself a booth there. He sat under it in the shade, waiting to see what would happen to the city. 6 Then the Lord God appointed a plant, and it grew up over Jonah to provide shade over his head, to provide comfort from his grief. And Jonah was very happy about the plant. 7 But at dawn the next day, God appointed a worm to attack the plant so that it withered. 8 When the sun rose, God appointed a scorching east wind, and the sun beat upon the head of Jonah so that he became faint and asked that he might die. He said, “It is better for me to die than to live.”
9 Then God said to Jonah, “Is it right for you to be angry about the plant?”
And Jonah replied, “It is right for me to be angry, even to death.”
10 The Lord said, “You are troubled about the plant for which you did not labor and did not grow. It came up in a night and perished in a night. 11 Should I not, therefore, be concerned about Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people, who do not know their right hand from their left, and also many animals?”
The Holy Bible, Modern English Version. Copyright © 2014 by Military Bible Association. Published and distributed by Charisma House.