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The Davidic monarchy is the vine, and the branches are the strong monarchs. Zedekiah is the tallest branch. His failures will consume the dynasty, leaving nothing but charred remains.
20 During the seventh year of King Jehoiachin’s exile, on the tenth day of the fifth month, some of the elders of Israel approached me and sat down in front of me, wanting good news from the Eternal One. 2 The word of the Eternal came to me with a message for them.
Eternal One: 3 Son of man, talk to the elders of Israel, and tell them I have a question: “Have you come to ask questions of Me? As surely as I, the Eternal Lord live, I will not allow you to question Me.”
4 Will you pass judgment on them, son of man? Will you judge whether they have been serving other gods? Confront them about the shocking acts of their fathers, 5 and tell them the Eternal Lord says that on the day I selected Israel, made an oath to the descendants of Jacob’s family, and revealed Myself to them in Egypt, I lifted My hand and swore to them, “I am the Eternal your God.” 6 On the same day, I swore to them that I would rescue them from the land of Egypt and take them to another land I had looked for and found just for them—a land flowing with milk and honey, the most splendid of all lands. 7 And I said to them, “Get rid of all the vile images that captivate your eyes, and do not degrade yourselves with the idols of Egypt! I am the Eternal your God.” 8 But they rebelled against Me and refused to heed My warnings. They kept staring at the vile images and worshiping the idols of Egypt.
I was just about to pour out My anger upon them and express My wrath while they were still in Egypt, 9-10 but for the sake of My good name and reputation, I decided against it. I thought it better not to profane My name in the eyes of those nations around where My people lived. After all, I had revealed Myself to them when I brought My people out of the land of Egypt and into the wilderness. 11 I gave them My laws and commandments so that if they would follow them, they might live. 12 I also gave them My Sabbaths as a sign that they would know that I, the Eternal One, have made them holy. 13 But the Israelites rebelled against Me in the wilderness. They refused to follow My laws and ignored My commandments, even though they knew the one who follows them will live. They also polluted My Sabbaths and treated them like any other day.
So I said I would pour out My anger upon them and destroy them in the wilderness. 14 For the sake of My good name and reputation, however, I chose not to profane My name in the eyes of those nations who had witnessed Me bringing the Israelites out of Egypt. 15 Also, I raised My hand and swore to them in the wilderness that I would not bring them into the land I had given them—a land flowing with milk and honey, the most splendid of all lands! 16 I swore this to them because they ignored My rules and strayed from My laws and polluted My Sabbaths; for they were completely devoted to their idols. 17 I looked on them with mercy, and I did not destroy them in the wilderness.
18 I told their children in the wilderness, “Do not follow the example set by your fathers. Do not live by their standards or degrade yourselves with their idols. 19 I, the Eternal One, am your God. Follow My laws and remember to obey My rules. 20 Keep My Sabbaths holy as signs between us so you will know I, the Eternal, am your God.” 21 But the children also rebelled against Me. They strayed from My laws and ignored My commandments, even though they knew that one who follows My rules will live. They polluted My Sabbaths, and they were not careful to keep My rules. So I told them that I would pour out My anger upon them and express My wrath against them in the wilderness. 22 But for the sake of My good name and reputation, I suspended their punishment. I chose not to profane My name in the eyes of those nations who had witnessed Me bringing the Israelites out of Egypt. 23 Also, I swore to them in the wilderness that I would scatter them among those nations and cast them out into unfamiliar lands 24 because they had refused to obey My rules and rejected My laws. Instead, their eyes were devoted to their fathers’ breathless idols, and they polluted My Sabbaths. 25 I handed them over to bad laws and rules that could not lead to life. 26 I declared them ritually impure because they were giving every firstborn child as a burnt sacrifice to pagan gods. I did this to horrify them, so that they would know I am the Eternal One.
27 Therefore, son of man, confront the people of Israel and tell them the Eternal Lord says, “Your fathers showed their contempt for Me and betrayed Me. 28 When I brought them into the land I had solemnly promised to give them, they offered their sacrifices on every high hill and under every shade tree they saw. In the land I gave them, they irritated Me with their offerings. They burned fragrant incense and poured out their drink offerings there. 29 I asked them, ‘What is this shrine you visit?’”
To this day, a shrine is called a “high place.”[a]
Eternal One: 30 Therefore, tell the people of Israel that the Eternal Lord says if you degrade yourselves in the same ways your fathers did—prostituting yourselves to the same foul, breathless images, 31 giving your children to them as burnt offerings, and degrading yourselves with those idols still today—do you think I should allow you to ask questions of Me, Israel? As surely as I live, I, the Eternal, say I will not allow you to ask Me anything.
32 You entertain thoughts such as, “We want to be like the other nations, like the other people of the world who serve idols made of wood and stone.” But your secret thoughts will never become a reality.
33-34 As surely as I live, I, the Eternal Lord, proclaim I will rule as your king with a fierce and mighty hand, an outstretched arm, and an overflowing wrath. With My power, I will bring you out of the nations and gather you from the unfamiliar lands where you have been scattered. 35 I will bring you into the wilderness of nations, and I will personally render My judgment upon you. 36 I will judge you in the same way I judged your fathers in the wilderness that lies east of the land of Egypt.
37 I will have you pass under My rod, and I will make you live up to the terms of the covenant. 38 I will get rid of the rebels and traitors among you. I may bring them out of the lands where they are exiled, but I will not allow them back to the land of Israel. Then you will know that I am the Eternal One.
39 (to the people of Israel) Go ahead and worship your idols—all of you! Eventually, you will see that what you are doing is pointless. Then you will start listening to Me and stop profaning My sacred name with your gifts and false gods. 40 There upon the high mountain of Israel, which is My holy mountain residence, all the people of Israel will worship and serve Me when they return to the land. There I will accept them. There I will expect your gifts and your firstfruit offerings, with all of your other sacred duties to Me. 41 When I bring you out from the nations and gather you from the unfamiliar lands where you have been scattered, I will accept you as a pleasant aroma. I will put My holiness on display by the way you live as all the world watches! 42 You will know that I am the Eternal One when I bring you into the land of Israel—the splendid land I solemnly promised to give your ancestors. 43 Then and there, you will remember your wrong turns and all of the wicked things you have done to degrade yourselves, and you will hate yourselves every time you see your reflection because of all the evil things you have done. 44 You will know, O people of Israel, that I am the Eternal when I deal fairly with you in order to protect My good name and reputation, and not out of My frustration toward your wickedness and mindless corruption.
So said the Eternal One.
45 The word of the Eternal came to me with a parable.
Eternal One: 46 Son of man, look south! Preach against the south, and prophesy against forests in the Negev. 47 Tell the southern forest to listen to the word of the Eternal. The Eternal Lord says, “I am about to set you on fire, and it will spread and devour all of your trees—both green and dry. The raging fire will not be put out! Everything and everyone from south to north will be scorched by it. 48 Then everyone will see that I, the Eternal One, started the unquenchable fire!”
Ezekiel: 49 Eternal Lord, they are all talking about me, saying, “He’s just speaking in parables.”
11 When the Anointed One arrived as High Priest of the good things that are to come, He entered through a greater and more perfect sanctuary that was not part of the earthly creation or made by human hands. 12 He entered once for all time into the most holy place—entering, not with the blood of goats or calves or some other prescribed animal, but offering His own blood and thus obtaining redemption for us for all time. 13 Think about it: if the blood of bulls or of goats, or the sprinkling of ashes from a heifer, restores the defiled to bodily cleanliness and wholeness; 14 then how much more powerful is the blood of the Anointed One, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself as a spotless sacrifice to God, purifying your conscience from the dead things of the world to the service of the living God?
15 This is why Jesus is the mediator of the new covenant: through His death, He delivered us from the sins that we had built up under the first covenant, and His death has made it possible for all who are called to receive God’s promised inheritance. 16 For whenever there is a testament—a will—the death of the one who made it must be confirmed 17 because a will takes effect only at the death of its maker; it has no validity as long as the maker is still alive. 18 Even the first testament—the first covenant—required blood to be put into action. 19 When Moses had given all the laws of God to the people, he took the blood of calves and of goats, water, hyssop, and scarlet wool; and he sprinkled the scroll and all the people, 20 telling them, “This is the blood of the covenant that God has commanded for us.”[a] 21 In the same way, he also sprinkled blood upon the sanctuary and upon the vessels used in worship. 22 Under the law, it’s almost the case that everything is purified in connection with blood; without the shedding of blood, sin cannot be forgiven.
In chapter 9 we are reminded that what is most real, what is most true, is the unseen reality. The writer tells us that the temple in Jerusalem, the holiest place on earth, was merely a copy or shadow of another place, the heavenly temple. Whatever took place in this shadowy temple could not change the realities of alienation from God, sin, and death.
Every year on the Day of Atonement, the high priest would don his priestly garb and enter the most holy place in the temple. His task was profound, his duty dangerous: he must appear before God carrying the sins of his people. All the sins of Israel were concentrated in him as he carried the blood of the sacrifice into the divine presence. But there was another day, a Day of Atonement unlike any other, when Jesus concentrated in Himself the sins of the world, hanging on a cross not far from the temple’s holiest chamber. Indeed, for a time, He became sin (2 Corinthians 5:21). But unlike the high priest, the crucified and risen Jesus entered the true temple of heaven and was ushered into the divine presence. At that moment, everything changed.
23 Since what was given in the old covenant was the earthly sketch of the heavenly reality, this was sufficient to cleanse the earthly sanctuary; but in heaven, a more perfect sacrifice was needed. 24 The Anointed One did not enter into handcrafted sacred spaces—imperfect copies of heavenly originals—but into heaven itself, where He stands in the presence of God on our behalf. 25 There He does not offer Himself over and over as a sacrifice (as the high priest on earth does when he enters the most holy place each year with blood other than his own) 26 because that would require His repeated suffering since the beginning of the world. No, He has appeared once now, at the end of the age, to put away sin forever by offering Himself as a sacrifice.
27 Just as mortals are appointed to die once and then to experience a judgment, 28 so the Anointed One, our Liberating King, was offered once in death to bear the sins of many and will appear a second time, not to deal again with sin, but to rescue those who eagerly await His return.
Book Five
Book Five (Psalms 107–150) succinctly presents many of the major themes of the previous psalms. It tracks along Israel’s history as God’s nation, from the united monarchy, through the exile, to the restoration. Psalm 107 is a song of thanksgiving composed by those who survived exile and made their way home. As in Isaiah, the return from exile is described as a new exodus. Three Davidic psalms toward the beginning of Book Five represent the monarchy and recall Israel’s golden age. The Songs for the Journey to Worship (Psalm 120–134) are composed for use by God’s people as they traveled from their homes up to Zion to worship God at the temple. Representing their time in exile are songs of lament, heartbreaking testimonies to individuals’ pain when they are crushed by their enemies and separated from God’s blessings. Finally, Book Five concludes the collection by offering praise and thanks to God, for the story of Israel does not end with its exile and separation; rather, it ends in restoration and hope. Those who edited and compiled the Book of Psalms were relieved to be back in the land of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—rebuilding their temple and reestablishing their connection with God.
Psalm 107
1 Erupt with thanks to the Eternal, for He is good
and His loyal love lasts forever.
2 Let all those redeemed by the Eternal—
those rescued from times of deep trouble—join in giving thanks.
3 He has gathered them across the earth,
from east and west,
from [north and south].[a]
4 Some drifted around in the desert
and found no place where they could live.
5 Their bellies growled with hunger; their mouths were dry with thirst;
their souls grew weak and weary.
6 In their distress, they called out to the Eternal,
and He saved them from their misery.
7 He showed them the best path; then He led them down the right road
until they arrived at an inhabited town.
8 May they erupt with praise and give thanks to the Eternal
in honor of His loyal love
And all the wonders He has performed for humankind!
9 He has quenched their thirst,
and He has satisfied their hunger with what is good.
10 Some people were locked up in dark prisons, confined in gloom as bleak as death.
They were captives bound by iron chains and misery,
11 All because they had rebelled against the directives of the True God
and had rejected the wisdom of the Most High.
12 So they suffered the heaviness of slave labor;
when they stumbled and fell, there was no one to help them up.
13 In their distress, they called out to the Eternal;
He saved them from their misery.
14 He rescued them from the darkness, delivered them from the deepest gloom of death;
He shattered their iron chains.
15 May they erupt with praise and give thanks to the Eternal
in honor of His loyal love
And all the wonders He has performed for humankind!
16 He has broken down the bronze gates
and severed the iron bars that imprisoned them.
17 Some people became fools infected by their rebellious ways,
and sickness followed because of their sins.
18 Afflicted and weak, they refused any sort of food
as they approached the gates of death.
19 In their distress, they called out to the Eternal,
and He saved them from their misery.
20 He gave the order and healed them
and rescued them from certain death.
21 May they erupt with praise and give thanks to the Eternal
in honor of His loyal love
And all the wonders He has performed for humankind!
22 Let them present to Him thanksgiving sacrifices
and tell stories of His great deeds through songs of joy.
23 Some set out to sea in ships,
traveling across mighty seas in order to trade in foreign lands.
24 They witnessed the powerful acts of the Eternal,
marveled at the great wonders He revealed over the deep waters.
25 For He spoke and summoned a violent wind
that whipped up the waves of the sea.
26 Relentless waves lifted the ships high in the sky, then drove them down to the depths;
the sailors’ courage dissolved into misery.
27 They staggered and stumbled around like drunkards,
and they had no idea what to do.
28 In their distress, they called out to the Eternal,
and He saved them from their misery.
29 He commanded the storm to calm down, and it became still.
A hush came over the waves of the sea,
30 The sailors were delighted at the quiet,
and He guided them to their port.
31 May they erupt with praise and give thanks to the Eternal
in honor of His loyal love
And all the wonders He has performed for humankind!
32 Let them glorify Him in the assembly of His people
and worship Him in the presence of the elders.
33 God transforms wild, flowing rivers into dry, lonely deserts,
lively springs of water into thirsty ground.
34 He turns lush gardens into lifeless wastelands,
all because of the wickedness of those who reside there.
35 Yet He transforms a dry, lonely desert into pools of living water,
parched ground into lively springs.
36 And He allows those who are hungry to live there
so that they might build a livable city.
37 There they sow fields and plant vineyards
and gather up an abundant harvest.
38 He anoints them with His blessings, and they greatly increase in number.
He does not allow their herds to dwindle.
39 When His people lessen in number and are humbled
through persecution, suffering, and brokenheartedness,
40 He pours out contempt on those responsible leaders
and then makes them drift around in an uncharted wasteland.
41 But He raises the poor away from their suffering
and multiplies their families like a flock.
42 The righteous see God’s actions, and they take delight in what He does,
but the unrighteous don’t dare to speak.
43 Is there anyone wise? If so, may the wise take notice of these things
and reflect upon the loyal love of the Eternal.
11 Study to be wise, my son, and make my heart glad,
for then your life will be my answer to anyone who hurls insults.
The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.