Old/New Testament
God's mountain
4 In the last days,
the mountain where the Lord's house is will be the highest mountain.
It will be the most important of all the mountains.
It will be higher than the hills,
and people from many countries will go to it.
2 Many people will speak about it.
‘Come! We will go up to the Lord's mountain,’ they will say.
‘We will go to the Lord's house because he is the God of Jacob's people.
He will teach us what he wants us to do.
He will show us the right way; so then we will be able to obey him.
The Lord will speak his rules from Zion.
He will send out his message from Jerusalem.’
3 He will judge between the people of many nations
When they argue together, he will decide who is right.
He will cause strong nations everywhere to stop fighting each other.
They fight with swords and spears.[a]
But at that time, they will make their swords into ploughs.
They will make their spears into knives to cut their vines.
Nations will no longer need weapons to fight each other.
They will never prepare to fight wars again.
4 Everyone will sit under his own vine and his own fig tree.[b]
Nobody will make them afraid any longer.[c]
The Lord Almighty has promised this.
5 People from other countries may be the servants of other gods.
But we will be servants of the Lord our God.
We will obey him always.
God will make Israel and Jerusalem strong again
6 The Lord speaks again:
‘At that time I will bring together the people who cannot walk well.
I will bring back the people that I sent away.
I caused trouble for those people,
but I will bring them back together.
7 I will make a new beginning with those people who cannot walk well.
Together with some of those people that I sent far away,
I will make them my own special people.
They will be strong,
and I will rule over them from Mount Zion.
I will be their king from that time and always.
8 And as for Jerusalem,
it was a strong, safe place for Zion's people.
It was like a tall building,
from which a man can watch over his sheep.
Then it will again be a place where a king rules with great authority.’
9 You people in Jerusalem,
you are crying aloud like people who have no king.
You cry like people who have no wise leader.[d]
You have bad pains like a woman who is giving birth to a baby.
10 People in Zion, you will have a lot of pain,
like a woman who is giving birth to a baby.
She rolls about and she screams with pain.
Soon you will have to leave your city and you will have to live in the fields.
You will have to go to Babylon,
but there the Lord will save you.
He will make you free again from the authority of your enemies.
11 But now, at this time, many countries have come together to attack your city.
They say: ‘We will destroy Jerusalem and we will enjoy ourselves.
We want to see Zion's people in trouble.’
12 But they do not know the Lord's thoughts.
They do not understand how he will punish them.
He will bring them together,
as people bring bundles of wheat together at harvest time.[e]
He will punish them,
as people thresh wheat to get the seeds out.[f]
13 ‘People in Zion, get up and fight your enemies,’ God says to you.
‘Hit them like people thresh the wheat.
I will make you very strong.
Then you will be like dangerous animals with iron horns and metal feet.[g]
You will beat enemies from many countries,
as men crush things into small pieces.
The people from those countries became rich,
because they did bad things.
But you will bring their riches to me,
because I am the Lord of all the earth.’[h]
The ruler that God chooses will be born in Bethlehem
5 Soldiers in Jerusalem, come together!
Get ready, because your enemies are attacking you.
They are all round the city, ready to fight.
They will hit Israel's ruler on his face with a stick.[i]
2 But God tells us this:
‘Bethlehem Ephrathah is only a little town,
among all the many towns in Judah,’ God says.
‘But I will choose someone who is born there.[j]
He will rule Israel for me.
Long, long ago, I prepared for him to come.’
3 So God will turn away from his people,
until the time that the woman gives birth to this baby in Bethlehem.
Then this ruler's own people who are still alive will return to Israel.
4 And this ruler will stay strong because the Lord will make him strong.
He will supply what his people need.
He will be like a man who supplies everything for his sheep.
He will rule with authority from the Lord his God,
and his people will be safe.
So then, all over the world, people will know that he is great.
5 And he will cause the people to rest,
so that they have no trouble.
Assyria's soldiers will come to attack our country.
They will march through our large, strong buildings.
Then we will choose seven or eight leaders to fight against them.[k]
6 These leaders will use their swords to destroy Assyria.
They will beat the people in the country called Nimrod with swords in their hands.[l]
Assyria's soldiers will come into our country.
They will march across our borders,
but our ruler will save us from them.
God's people will be strong again
7 And later, Jacob's people who are still alive will be in many countries.
They will be everywhere,
like water on the ground in the early morning,
or rain on the grass.
The Lord sends the water to help the plants,
but no human can make it stay.
8 Jacob's people who are still alive will be living among people in many other countries.
They will become like a dangerous lion among the other animals in the forest.[m]
They will become like a young lion among people's sheep.
The lion attacks other animals.
It knocks them down and it tears them in pieces.
Nobody can save them.[n]
9 You will be strong like that and so you will beat your enemies.
You will kill all of them.
God wants people to obey him
10 ‘At that time,’ the Lord says, ‘I will take your horses away from you.
I will destroy your chariots.
11 I will destroy the cities in your country.
I will knock down all your strong buildings.
12 You make bad spirits help you.
But I will destroy the things that you use to talk to them.
You will have nobody to tell you about future times.
13 You bend down to worship tall stones and idols.[o]
But I will destroy all of them.
You will stop worshipping things that you have made with your own hands.
14 You worship the false god Asherah,[p]
but I will pull her poles from the ground.
I will even destroy your cities.
15 Also I will punish all the people in other countries who refuse to obey me.
I will show them that I am very angry with them.’
The woman and the great red snake
12 A very wonderful thing then appeared in the sky. I saw a woman who was wearing the sun like her clothes. The moon was under her feet. A crown of 12 stars was on her head. 2 She was pregnant. She screamed with pain as she tried to give birth to her baby.
3 Then another wonderful thing appeared in the sky. It was a very big red dragon. It had seven heads and ten horns. There was a crown on each head. 4 Its tail beat away a third of the stars from the sky. It threw them down on the earth. Then the dragon stood in front of the woman who would soon give birth to her baby. He was waiting there to eat her child as soon as he was born. 5 The woman gave birth to a son. He was a man who would rule all the nations of the world with strong authority. Then someone quickly took her child away. He went up to God and to his throne. 6 The woman ran away into the wilderness. God had prepared a special place to keep her safe there for 1,260 days.
7 Then a war started in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon. The dragon and his army of angels fought against Michael and his angels.[a] 8 But the dragon and his army were not strong enough to win the battle. They no longer had a place for themselves in heaven. 9 Michael and his angels threw the great dragon out of heaven. The dragon is called the Devil or Satan. He is the snake who has been there since long ago. He tells lies to deceive the whole world. They threw him down to the earth, together with all his angels. 10 Then I heard a loud voice in heaven that said:
‘Now God has saved his people from Satan's power!
God has shown his great power as King.
His Messiah has authority to rule.
Satan said bad things against our people.
He never stopped telling our God that our brothers and sisters are guilty.
But now God has thrown him out of heaven.
11 Our brothers and sisters fought against him and they won.
They could do this because of the death of the Lamb as a sacrifice.
They continued to speak God's true message.
They were also ready to die as God's servants.
That is why they were able to win against Satan.
12 So be happy, everyone who lives in heaven!
But terrible trouble will happen to the earth and the sea.
The Devil has come down to you now and he is very angry.
He knows that he has only a short time to hurt people.’
13 The dragon realized that they had thrown him down to the earth. So he chased after the woman who had given birth to the baby boy. He wanted to catch her. 14 But the woman received the two wings of a very big eagle. Then she could fly to the place in the wilderness that God had prepared for her. In that place God would keep her safe from the big snake. God would take care of her there for a time, times and half a time.[b]
15 Then the dragon poured lots of water out of his mouth like a river. He wanted the river of water to carry the woman away. 16 But a big hole opened in the ground. The river that poured from the dragon's mouth went down into the hole. That helped the woman to escape. 17 As a result, the dragon was very angry with the woman. So he went away to fight a war against her other descendants. Those are the people who obey God's commands. They continue to trust Jesus and to speak his message.[c]
18 After that, the dragon stood on the shore of the sea.
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