Old/New Testament
14 For the Eternal will extend mercy to Jacob, this family of God’s people. God will choose Israel all over again, and He will settle them in comfort and rest back on their land. Others who are unrelated will want to join them and stick close to the house of Jacob, God’s promise people, 2 who will take them in. These others will work for and among Israel. Whoever used to hold Israel captive—controlling the people’s every moment and every move—will in turn be controlled by Israel; and whoever used to oppress Israel will instead be subject to Israel.
3 Ah, Israel, there will be a time when the Eternal will give you rest from the burden of your labor, the pain of your servitude. 4 And then you will take up this chant against the fallen king of Babylon:
People: How silent and still the oppressor;
the pressure is gone; the raging is done!
5 The Eternal has broken the hold of the wicked,
snapped the staff and the scepter of tyrannical rulers.
6 They would stop at nothing to beat, batter, and bruise the nations,
constantly raging as they hunted down and tyrannized the peoples.
7 The whole earth, mountains to sea, breathes a sigh of relief;
the peace and quiet erupts into a lively, joyful song.
8 The cypresses and cedars of Lebanon rejoice at his demise, singing:
“You can’t hurt us anymore. Now that you’ve been cut down,
No one comes to cut us down!”
9 O Babylon, the land of the dead is excited to greet you at its door.
Your king will enter the grave with ghastly pomp.
It stirs the shadows and spirits of the dead—all long forgotten leaders—
it arouses all the dethroned kings of the nations to welcome your arrival.
10 These departed souls will respond to you with rattling voices,
Departed Souls: Even you, who were so powerful and unstoppable in life,
have been weakened just like us!
11 All of your pomp and power and the music of your harps join you here
where the dead abide,
Where maggots squirm beneath you,
where worms cover you like a blanket.
12 My, how you’ve fallen from the heights of heaven!
O morning star, son of the dawn!
What a star you were, as you menaced and weakened the nations,
but now you’ve been cut down, fallen to earth.
13 Remember how you said to yourself,
“I will ascend to heaven—reach higher and with more power—
and set my throne high above God’s own stars?”
Remember how you thought you could be a god, saying:
“I will sit among them at the mount of assembly in the northern heights.
14 I will rise above the highest clouds and
make myself like the Most High”?
15 Hah! Instead, you have sunk like a stone to where the dead abide.
You’ve hit bottom of the bottommost pit.
16 People peer down at you from above,
and their curiosity overflows.
People: Wow, is this the man who once terrorized the world?
Is he the one who rocked the earth’s kingdoms and threatened us with disaster?
17 Is he the one who turned the bustling cities of the world into a wasteland,
and never let the prisoners of war go home?
18 While all the other world leaders are memorialized with honor,
and each occupies his own elaborate tomb,
19 You will be reviled and disgraced—your tomb desecrated,
your corpse thrown aside like a worthless branch.
Those slain in battle, pierced by swords, will cover you;
you’ll go down to the pit like a corpse left on the battlefield.
20 Because you wrecked your own land and killed your own people,
your corpse will not share in the honor of a proper burial.
May the offspring of such evil never be mentioned again;
don’t speak their names or hear their tales.
21 Let them be obliterated because of their fathers’ wicked deeds
so that they never have a chance to follow in their steps,
Terrorizing and possessing the earth,
filling up the world with their cities!
Then people can live in normalcy and peace.
Eternal One: 22-24 I will move against Babylon and put an end to her future generations. I will cut them off—leaving no survivors—so that your oppressors will become nameless and faceless shadows. I’ll sweep that city with My broom of destruction and turn its pools into stagnant marshes and leave its ruins to be ruled by wild animals.
God swears that our oppressors will be punished. The Eternal, Commander of heavenly armies, makes this pledge.
Eternal One: Things will happen as I plan.
Things will be as I determine.
25 I will break Assyria’s hold on My land;
on mountain after mountain I will trample over them.
Then My people will no longer have to bow beneath the Assyrian yoke
or bear up under its heavy burden.
26 Because I, God of earth and heaven,
have devised a plan for the whole earth;
I have reached out and am ready to effect change among the nations.
27 And who can argue with that or stand in God’s way?
The Eternal, Commander of heavenly armies, has determined
That this is how it should be.
And so it will be.
While most of Isaiah’s messages are directed to the people of Judah, he pronounces other oracles against neighboring nations and empires. This is typical of most prophets. Chapters 13–23 contain a number of oracles (or prophetic messages) addressed to the nations and cities such as Assyria, Philistia, Moab, Damascus, Cush, Egypt, Babylon, and others. Each message is distinct, for the sins of their citizens and the threats they face are unique to them. Still each message contains an overriding, dominant claim: God is sovereign over all the earth; and although He has a special relationship with Israel and Judah, all the nations must ultimately bow before God.
28 When our king, Ahaz, died having endured and survived Assyria’s attacks against us, the prophet received this message.
29 Don’t get too excited, Philistia, because your enemy is dead.
The rod that struck you may be broken,
But from the root of the serpent, a viper will come out;
the offspring of that viper will be a flying cobra.
30 The poor among us will have enough to eat;
the needy and most vulnerable will sleep in peace.
But I will go after your key people with famine,
and then wipe out any who remain.
31 Look out, Philistia; you will soon vanish!
Let your gates and your city walls cry out!
It’ll be bad for you soon, because an army from the north
Is bearing down on you, burning cities in its wake;
and there is not a straggler in its ranks.
32 So, how do we answer the ambassadors of the nations?
The Eternal has made Zion what it is—
And His humbled and afflicted people will find shelter there.
15 A message about Moab:
In the cover of night, Moab was attacked and decimated.
Both Ar and Kir were decimated in a single night.
2 The whole community traipses up to the temple, to Dibon
to weep and cry out to the gods.
Moab weeps and wails over the dead in Nebo and Medeba,
every head and beard shaved in mourning.
3 They wander the streets dressed in sackcloth;
on roofs and public places people wail, collapsing in abundance of tears.
4 The cries of Heshbon in the north and Elealeh nearby
reach to Jahaz in the east.
Moab is shaken to the core, wracked with terror, sadness, and grief;
even its bravest soldiers cry out.
5 It breaks my heart to hear Moab.
Refugees make for Zoar at Edom’s border to Eglath-shelishiyah.
They climb, weeping, to the heights of Luhith and along roads to Horonaim.
They go with shattering cries.
The land itself is destroyed, dead.
6 Where it had been green and rippling with tall grasses, now it’s brown and dusty.
Where sweet water glistened all along Nimrim, now it’s dry and desolate.
7 So the people are carting away all their belongings.
Whatever they’ve gathered, they carry along the brook lined with poplars.
8 And Moab cries; the whole country wails.
From Eglaim to Beer-elim, you can hear the crying.
9 The waters of Dimon run red with blood.
Eternal One: I will bring more disaster to Dimon: those fugitives of Moab will fare even worse—I’ll send predators upon the remnant of the land to hunt them down.
16 A Refugee (to the Moabites): Bring tender lambs to the ruler of the land.
From Sela through the desert
to the beautiful mountain called Zion, maybe they’ll let us in.
2 And indeed like birds whose homes were demolished,
like baby birds torn from their nests,
Moab’s daughters, scattered and fluttering, arrive at the fords,
ready to cross the Arnon River.
3 (to Jerusalem) Give us your best advice and do what is right.
When the day is at its fiercest, hide us in your cool shade.
Shield the trammeled and abused.
Keep your mouth shut when our enemy comes looking, seeking us out.
4 Let these refugees of Moab come in and stay.
Protect these tempest-tossed; be their hiding place,
a shelter safe from the destroyer.
See, when the one who has squeezed and oppressed you is gone
and the forces of crushing violence wane in the land,
5 Then God will establish a royal throne, in loyal love—
the One who rules there will be utterly reliable,
With absolute integrity under the auspices of David.
With a passion for justice, He will be quick to decide and do what is right.
God’s answer to Moab’s plea for help is none other than the Messiah. One day David’s son will take the throne and rule with absolute justice.
6 Oh yes, we’ve heard of Moab, how much they think of themselves—
so important, so valuable, so hot-tempered;
But we know it’s just idle boasts.
7 Let them bemoan their destruction and fall—every last one of them.
Go ahead, mourn, all you who were struck down;
Cry for the raisin cakes of Kir-hareseth.
8 The productive fields of Heshbon are withering in the heat;
the choice vines of Sibmah are decimated.
The rulers of the nations are wreaking havoc across the land,
crushing its grape clusters and leveling its old stout vines.
Moab’s tender shoots spread from Jazer to the desert,
then right down to the sea[a] and even across it.
9 This is why I cry salty tears over Jazer,
over the vines of Sibmah and over the fields of Heshbon.
And God’s-Ascent, Elealeh, I weep for you—over your branches,
once so green and strong, now broken and brown with death.
No one rejoices anymore over your fruits and harvest.
10 What joy these fields and orchards brought, what pleasure and delight,
with their beauty, with their bounty.
But no more cheerful shouts accompany the harvest of the vineyards.
No one is left to press the grapes into wine.
I have silenced all your joyous shouting.
11 My heart hums like a harp with grief for you, Moab.
I ache with soul-sadness for Kir-hareseth.
12 When the people of Moab present themselves to their gods, when they weary themselves with frequent journeys to their high places, when they enter their sanctuary to pray, then they will find none of their gods are able to help them. 13 This is the message the Eternal gave Isaiah earlier about Moab. 14 But now He has another message.
Eternal One: In just three years—as a hired hand might count them—the power and prestige of Moab will come to an end. Its population will be killed and scattered; only a few, the poor and powerless, will survive the onslaught.
We come to God as sinners; but He wants to transform our habits, attitudes, and practices into the ways of Jesus: to live, forgive, and love as He did.
5 So imitate God. Follow Him like adored children, 2 and live in love as the Anointed One loved you—so much that He gave Himself as a fragrant sacrifice, pleasing God.
3 Listen, don’t let any kind of immorality be breathed among you. Any demoralizing behaviors (perverse sexual acts, uncleanliness, greediness, and the like) are inappropriate topics of conversation for those set apart as God’s people. 4 Don’t swear or spurt nonsense. Don’t make harsh jokes or clown around. Make proper use of your words, and offer them thankfully in praise. 5 This is what we know for certain: no one who engages in loose sex, impure actions, and greed—which is just a form of idolatry—has any inheritance in the kingdom of God and His Anointed.
6 Don’t be fooled by people whose sentences are compounded with useless words, empty words—they just show they are empty souls. For, in His wrath, God will judge all the children of disobedience for these kinds of sins. 7 So don’t be persuaded into their ignorance; and don’t cast your lot with them 8 because, although you were once the personification of darkness, you are now light in the Lord. So act like children of the light. 9 For the fruit of the light is all that is good, right, and true. 10 Make it your aim to learn what pleases our Lord. 11 Don’t get involved with the fruitless works of darkness; instead, expose them to the light of God. 12 You see, it’s a disgrace to speak of their secrets (so don’t even talk about what they do when no one is looking). 13-14 When the light shines, it exposes even the dark and shadowy things and turns them into pure reflections of light. This is why they sing,
Awake, you sleeper!
Rise from your grave,
And the Anointed One will shine on you.
15 So be careful how you live; be mindful of your steps. Don’t run around like idiots as the rest of the world does. Instead, walk as the wise! 16 Make the most of every living and breathing moment because these are evil times.
The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.