Old/New Testament

Ezekiel cuts his hair

5 ‘Son of man, take a sharp sword. Use it like a knife to cut off your hair and your beard. Then use some scales to weigh the hair. Put it into three separate parts that are the same weight.^[a]

² Wait until all the days when you are lying on your side have finished. Take one part of your hair and burn it on the brick which has the picture of Jerusalem. Take another part and use a sword to cut it into small pieces. Let the pieces fall all around the brick which shows the city. Then take the third part and throw the hairs into the wind. I will run after them with a sword. ³ But keep a few of your hairs. Tie them into the edge of your clothes. ⁴ Finally, take out some of these hairs. Throw them into the fire and burn them. This fire will grow so that it reaches all Israel's people.

⁵ I, the Almighty Lord, say this: This shows what will happen to Jerusalem. I have put the city in the centre of all the nations. It has countries all around it. ⁶ But Jerusalem's people have refused to obey my rules and my commands. They have become more wicked than the nations and countries around them. They have not obeyed my laws.

⁷ So this is what the Almighty Lord says: You people of Jerusalem have done worse things than any of the nations around you. You have not obeyed my rules or my laws. You have not even obeyed the laws of the nations around you.

⁸ So this is what the Almighty Lord says: I myself have become your enemy, people of Jerusalem. I will punish you while the other nations watch. ⁹ I will punish you for all the disgusting things that you have done. I have never punished anyone like that before. And I will never do it again. ¹⁰ When I punish you like that, you will have no food to eat. Parents will be so hungry that they will eat their children. Children will eat their parents. I will chase away those few people who are still alive. They will go to all parts of the earth.

¹¹ The Almighty Lord says this: I promise you as surely as I live that I will remove you. You have made my holy place unclean. You have put your disgusting idols in my house. You have done wicked things there. Because of that I will not be sorry for you. I will not save you. ¹² Illness or famine will kill one third of your people inside the city. The soldiers who are around the city will kill a third of your people. And I will chase away a third of them to all parts of the earth. I will cause their enemies to run after them with their swords.^[b]

¹³ When I have done all that to them, I will not be angry any longer. I will not punish them any more, because it is enough. When I have finished, they will know that I, the Lord, have spoken to them. I have been angry with them because they have not been faithful to me.

¹⁴ I will cause your city to become a heap of stones. People of the other nations around you will laugh at you when they see what has happened to you. ¹⁵ They will all laugh at you and insult you. They will see that I was very angry with you and I punished you. Then they will be afraid of my great anger. I, the Lord, say this!

¹⁶ I will take away your bread so that famine kills more and more of you. It will seem that I am shooting arrows at you to destroy you. ¹⁷ Famine or wild animals will kill you. Your children will no longer live. Illness and war will destroy you. I will send soldiers to attack you. I, the Lord, say this!’

6 The Lord gave this message to me: ² ‘Son of man, look towards the mountains of Israel. Tell them my message to warn them.^{[c] 3} Say, “You mountains of Israel, listen to this message from the Almighty Lord. This is what the Almighty Lord says to the mountains, the hills and the valleys: I am coming here to attack you. I will destroy the places where you worship false gods. ⁴ I will destroy your altars for sacrifices and your altars for incense. I will kill the people who worship there and put them in front of their idols.^{[d] 5} The dead bodies of you people of Israel will lie in front of your idols. I will cause soldiers to throw your bones on the ground around the altars.

⁶ In all the places that you live, soldiers will destroy your towns. They will also destroy the places where you worship false gods. They will break down the altars so that they become heaps of stones. They will break your idols into pieces. They will destroy the altars where you burn incense. They will remove all those things that you have made. ⁷ Dead bodies will lie on the ground everywhere that you live. Then you will know that I am the Lord.

⁸ But I will allow some of you to live. Those people will escape when the enemy army attacks. They will run away to live in foreign countries. ⁹ When they are living as prisoners among those other nations, they will remember me. They will realize that they made me very sad because they were not faithful to me. They stopped worshipping me. Instead, they chose to worship idols. Then they will be ashamed of themselves, because of all the disgusting things which they have done. ¹⁰ They will know that I am the Lord. They will know that it was true when I promised to bring this terrible trouble to them.” ’

¹¹ This is what I, the Almighty Lord, say to you, Ezekiel: ‘Clap your hands together. Stamp on the ground with your feet. Show that you are very upset because of all the disgusting, evil things that Israel's people have done. War, famine and disease will kill them. ¹² Illness will kill the people who live far away. Enemy soldiers will kill those who live near to the city. Famine will kill those people who are still alive. Because I am very angry with them, I will punish them very much.

¹³ Then they will know that I am the Lord. They will see the dead bodies of their own people. The bodies will be lying among the idols that they worshipped. They will be lying around the altars of their false gods, on every high hill and mountain. The dead bodies will lie under the big trees where they offered incense to all their idols. ¹⁴ I will punish them very much. I will destroy their land from the desert in the south as far as Diblah. I will make it a place where nobody can live. Then they will know that I am the Lord.’

The day has come for the Lord to punish Israel

7 The Lord gave this message to me: ² ‘Son of man, this is what I, the Almighty Lord, say to the land of Israel: The end is now here! I will soon destroy the whole land. ³ The time has come for your final punishment! You will know that I am very angry with you. I will punish you because of the bad way that you have lived. You will receive the punishment that you deserve for all the disgusting things that you have done. ⁴ I will not be sorry for you. I will not be kind to you. I will punish you as you deserve. You have done disgusting things. So I will punish you and you will know that I am the Lord.

⁵ This is what the Almighty Lord says: Terrible trouble is coming to you! It will be worse than any other trouble. ⁶ The end has now come! It is finally here to destroy you! Look out! ⁷ You people who live in the land will now receive terrible punishment. The day for that to happen is very near. There will be no more sound of happy parties on the mountains. Instead there will be shouts of fear. ⁸ Very soon, I will punish you because of my great anger. You will know how angry I am. I will judge you for the way that you have lived. I will punish you as you deserve for the disgusting things that you have done. ⁹ I will not be sorry for you. I will not be kind to you. I will punish you as you deserve, because of the disgusting things that you have done. Then you will know that I, the Lord, am causing you pain.

¹⁰ Yes, the day of your punishment is here! Terrible trouble is coming to you! Like a tree that is ready to make flowers, your proud and wicked acts are ready for punishment. ¹¹ You use violence to help you to do wicked things. None of all those people will escape. None of their riches or valuable things will remain. ¹² The day of punishment has now come! The person who buys things will no longer be happy. Nor will the person who sells things. My anger will bring pain to all of them. ¹³ Any man who sells his land will never get it back as long as he lives. God has shown what he will do to all those people. He will not change his mind. Each one will lose his life because of their sins.

¹⁴ The soldiers make a noise with trumpets to prepare for war. But nobody goes out to fight a battle because my anger has brought punishment for all the people.

¹⁵ The enemy is ready to attack outside the city. Inside the city, there is disease and famine. Enemy soldiers will kill the people who are in the country. Famine and disease will kill everyone who is in the city. ¹⁶ Those who remain alive will escape. They will run to the mountains. They will be like doves that hunters have chased out of the valleys. They will cry aloud because of their sins. ¹⁷ Their hands will be weak. Their knees will shake. ¹⁸ They will wear sackcloth. They will be very afraid. Their faces will show that they are ashamed. They will cut all the hair from their heads. ¹⁹ They will throw their silver away in the streets. They will think that their gold has no value, like dirt. Their silver and their gold will not be able to save them on the day of the Lord's great anger. When they are hungry, their money will not buy them any food. It is their riches that have caused them to do wicked things. ²⁰ They were proud of their beautiful jewels. They used them to make disgusting idols and images. That is why I, the Lord, have made them hate their valuable things. ²¹ I will allow foreigners and wicked people to take those things from them. They will use those valuable things in a disgusting way. ²² Those foreigners and robbers will go into my holy temple. They will cause it to become unclean. But I will look away and I will allow them to do that.

²³ Prepare chains to tie my people. The whole land is full of murder and violence. ²⁴ I will bring the most wicked people from other nations to attack. They will take the houses of my people and they will live in them. The strong men among my people will no longer boast. Enemies will spoil the holy places where my people worshipped.

²⁵ Terrible trouble is coming to my people! When they are afraid, they will look for peace. But they will not find it. ²⁶ Many troubles will happen, one after another. There will be lots of news about terrible things. People will ask the prophets to tell them what will happen. The priests will not have anything to teach the people. The leaders will not have any good advice. ²⁷ The king will be very sad. His son will not hope for anything good to happen. The people will shake with fear.

I will punish them as they deserve for the way that they have lived. I will judge them in the same way that they have judged other people. Then they will know that I am the Lord.’

Be strong as servants of God

12 So we have learned about many people who trusted God long ago. They are like a very big crowd all round us and we should copy their example. We must be like people who run in a race.^[a] We must throw away everything that stops us from running well. The sins that we do make us fall down very easily. We must not let those sins rule us. God has prepared the way that is in front of us. We must continue to be strong while we run along that way. We must choose to run that race well. ² As we run, we must always look towards Jesus. He is the one who trusted God completely. Our faith starts with him, and he will help us to trust God all the way to the end. Jesus accepted punishment on the cross. He chose to receive much pain. He did not think about being ashamed to die like that. He knew that God had prepared something very good for him that would make him happy. Now he has sat down at the right side of God to rule with him in heaven.

³ So think carefully about how Jesus lived on earth. Bad people did very bad things against him, but he continued to be strong. Think about him, and then you will not become weak as Christians. You will not stop trusting God.

⁴ You have been fighting against sin in your lives. But you have not yet had to fight like that until someone killed you. ⁵ God speaks to you as his children. Do not ever forget these words in the Bible that will make you strong:^[b]

⁷ When you have troubles in your life, you must be patient and strong. Remember that God is teaching you what is right because you are his children. There has never been any son whose father did not punish him. ⁸ God teaches all his children not to do wrong things. So if he does not punish you, it shows that you are not really his children. Instead, you are like children who do not really belong to him. ⁹ Also, we have all had human fathers who punished us. As a result, we respected them. So think about our Father that our spirits belong to. We must surely obey him, and then he will give us true life.

¹⁰ Our human fathers punished us for a few years. They did this in a way that they thought was good. But God punishes us in a way that will really help us. As a result, we can become completely good, like he is. ¹¹ Punishment never makes us happy at the time when we receive it. No, the pain makes us sad. But later we know that the punishment has taught us good things. It helps us to live in a right way that gives us peace in our minds.

¹² So be strong as servants of God! If your hands feel weak, lift them up! If your knees are not strong, stand up straight! ¹³ Walk straight in front of you, step by step! Your example will help other Christians to serve God well. People who cannot walk well will not become worse and fall down. Instead, their legs will become strong again.^[c]

We must not refuse to do what God says

¹⁴ Do everything that you can to live in peace with other people. Make yourself separate from bad things. Nobody will see the Lord unless their life is good and clean. ¹⁵ Remember that God is very kind. Nobody should refuse to let God help them. Make sure that nobody among you causes trouble so that people turn against God. A person who is angry against God is like poison. He spoils many other people's lives so that God does not accept them.

¹⁶ Make sure that nobody among you has sex in a wrong way. Be careful that nobody is careless about God's rules, like Esau was long ago.^[d] He gave away everything that he would have received as his father's first son. He gave it all away so that he could get only one meal. ¹⁷ As you know, after that, he still wanted to receive those good things from his father. He wanted his father to ask God to bless him. But his father refused to do that. Esau cried very much when he asked his father to give him those good things. But there was no way that Esau could change what he had done.

A picture of two mountains

¹⁸ You have come near to God. But you have not come to a place that you can touch, like Sinai mountain.^[e] That mountain burned with fire. But where the people stood, it was completely dark. They could not see at all. There was also a very strong wind and a storm. ¹⁹ There was the loud sound of a trumpet. There was a powerful voice that spoke to them. When the people heard that voice, they were very afraid. So they asked that the voice would not speak to them any more. ²⁰ They were very afraid of what God had told them. God had said, ‘If even an animal touches the mountain, you must kill it with stones.’ ²¹ Even Moses was very afraid when he saw God's great power. He said, ‘I am full of fear!’

²² But as believers in Christ, you have not come to God in that way. You have come to Mount Zion.^[f] You have come to the city of the true God who lives. You have come to the city of Jerusalem that is in heaven. There are many thousands of happy angels all together in that place. ²³ All God's people meet together there. They are like his most important sons. They belong in heaven because God has written down their names. You have come to God himself, who will judge all people. You have come to the place where the spirits of God's people are. Those people have become right with God. God has now finished his work in them. ²⁴ You have come to Jesus, who brought the new agreement from God to his people. In that agreement, the blood of Jesus' death makes us clean from our sins. It tells us that God has forgiven us. When Cain killed his brother Abel, Abel's blood brought God's punishment. So we see that Jesus' blood brought us something much better than that.^[g]

²⁵ So be careful! Always be ready to listen when God speaks. God used Moses as his servant on the earth to speak to Israel's people. When they refused to obey, God punished them. They could not get away. As for us, God speaks to us from heaven. So we will certainly not get away from God's punishment if we turn away from him. ²⁶ At Sinai mountain many years ago, God's voice caused the earth to shake. But now God has promised this: ‘Once again I will cause the earth to shake. But this time I will also cause heaven to shake.’ ²⁷ These words, ‘once again,’ show us that God will take away the things that he has made. All things on the earth that he causes to shake will finish. After that, everything that nobody can shake will continue to be there.^[h]

²⁸ But we are receiving a place where we will rule with God. We belong to God's kingdom, and nobody can ever shake that! So we should thank God. We should worship him in a way that makes him happy. He is great, and we should serve him well and respect him. ²⁹ Remember that our God is like a fire. He destroys everything that is not good.