Old/New Testament

Isaiah Is Sent to King Ahaz

7 In the days of Ahaz the son of Jotham, son of Uzziah, king of Judah, King Rezin of Syria and Pekah the son of Remaliah, king of Israel, went up to make war against Jerusalem. But they could not win the battle. ² When the family of David was told, “Syria has joined with Ephraim,” his heart and the hearts of his people shook as trees shake with the wind.

³ Then the Lord said to Isaiah, “Now you and your son Shear-jashub go out to meet Ahaz at the end of the ditch of the upper pool on the road to the Fuller’s Field. ⁴ Say to him, ‘Be careful and quiet. Do not be afraid or weak in your heart because of these two pieces of burnt and smoking wood. Do not be afraid of the burning anger of Rezin and Syria and the son of Remaliah. ⁵ Syria, with Ephraim and the son of Remaliah, have made sinful plans against you, saying, ⁶ “Let us go up against Judah and make the people very afraid. Let us break open its walls, and make the son of Tabeel its king.” ⁷ But the Lord God says, “This plan will not work. It will not happen. ⁸ For the head of Syria is Damascus and the head of Damascus is Rezin. (Within another sixty-five years Ephraim will be destroyed so that it is no longer a people.) ⁹ The head of Ephraim is Samaria. And the head of Samaria is the son of Remaliah. If you will not believe, for sure you will not last.”’”

Word about Immanuel

¹⁰ Then the Lord spoke again to Ahaz, saying, ¹¹ “Ask for something special to see from the Lord your God. Ask for it to be as deep as the place of the dead or as high as heaven.” ¹² But Ahaz said, “I will not ask. I will not test the Lord.” ¹³ Then Isaiah said, “Listen now, O people of David! Is it too small a thing for you to test men, that you will test my God as well? ¹⁴ So the Lord Himself will give you a special thing to see: A young woman, who has never had a man, will give birth to a son. She will give Him the name Immanuel. ¹⁵ He will eat milk and honey when He knows enough to have nothing to do with wrong-doing and chooses good. ¹⁶ For before the boy knows to turn away from what is bad and choose good, the land whose two kings you are afraid of will be left empty.” ¹⁷ The Lord will bring upon you and your people and your father’s house such days as have never come since the day that Ephraim was divided from Judah. He is going to bring the king of Assyria on you. ¹⁸ In that day the Lord will call for flies that are in the farthest part of the rivers of Egypt, and for bees that are in the land of Assyria. ¹⁹ They will all come and stay in the narrow valleys, on the hill-sides, on the thorn bushes, and in the fields.

²⁰ In that day the Lord will use the king of Assyria from the other side of the Euphrates to cut off the hair from your head, your legs, and your face.

²¹ In that day a man will keep alive a young cow and two sheep. ²² And because they give much milk, he will have all he can use. For everyone who is left in the land will have milk and honey to eat. ²³ In that day, every place where there used to be a thousand vines, worth a thousand pieces of silver, will be thistles and thorns. ²⁴ Men will go there with bows and arrows because all the land will be covered with thistles and thorns. ²⁵ As for all the hills which used to be cared for as a garden, you will not go there for fear of thistles and thorns. They will become a place where cattle feed and where sheep will run.

Assyria Will Take the Land

8 Then the Lord said to me, “Take a large piece of stone and write on it in easy-to-read letters: ‘They hurry to get what they can. They run to pick up what is left.’” ² And I took men who could be trusted to watch the writing, Uriah the religious leader and Zechariah the son of Jeberechiah. ³ Then I went to the woman who spoke for God, and she was able to have a child, and gave birth to a son. Then the Lord said to me, “Name him Maher-shalal-hashbaz. ⁴ For before the boy knows how to cry out ‘My father’ or ‘My mother,’ the riches of Damascus and everything of any worth in Samaria will be carried away by the king of Assyria.”

⁵ The Lord spoke to me again, saying, ⁶ “These people have turned away from the gentle, flowing waters of Shiloah, and find joy in Rezin and the son of Remaliah. ⁷ So now, see, the Lord is ready to bring on them the strong and powerful waters of the Euphrates, the king of Assyria and all his greatness. It will rise up high and cause a flood. ⁸ Then it will flow into Judah. It will flood and pass through, and come up even to the neck. And the spread of its wings will cover the width of your land, O Immanuel.

⁹ “Be broken, O people, and be afraid. Listen, all you far places of the earth. Get ready, yet be afraid. Get ready, yet be afraid. ¹⁰ Make a plan, but it will come to nothing. Give your plan, but it will not be done. For God is with us.”

The People Are Told to Obey

¹¹ For the Lord said this to me with great power, and told me not to walk in the way of these people. He said, ¹² “Do not call holy all that these people call holy. Do not fear what they fear, or be afraid of it. ¹³ It is the Lord of All Whom you should think of as holy. Let Him be the One you fear. He is the One to be afraid of. ¹⁴ Then He will become a holy place. But He will be a stone of trouble and a rock to fall over for both houses of Israel. He will be a net and a trap for the people of Jerusalem. ¹⁵ Many will fall over them. They will fall and be broken. They will be trapped and caught.”

¹⁶ Put together what I have said. Hold to my teachings among my followers. ¹⁷ I will wait for the Lord Who is hiding His face from the family of Jacob. I trust Him and hope in Him. ¹⁸ See, I and the children the Lord has given me are something special to see and a wonder in Israel from the Lord of All, Who lives on Mount Zion.

¹⁹ When they say to you, “Ask those who speak in secret with the spirits of the dead and who use their secret ways,” should not a people ask their God? Should they speak to the dead for the living? ²⁰ Tell them to put their faith in the teaching and the Law. If they do not speak what this word says, it is because they have no light in them. ²¹ They will pass through the land troubled and hungry. And when they are hungry, they will be angry and curse their king and their God as they look up. ²² Then they will look to the earth and see trouble and darkness and suffering and will be driven out into darkness.

God Saved Us from Sin

2 At one time you were dead because of your sins. ² You followed the sinful ways of the world and obeyed the leader of the power of darkness. He is the devil who is now working in the people who do not obey God. ³ At one time all of us lived to please our old selves. We gave in to what our bodies and minds wanted. We were sinful from birth like all other people and would suffer from the anger of God.

⁴ But God had so much loving-kindness. He loved us with such a great love. ⁵ Even when we were dead because of our sins, He made us alive by what Christ did for us. You have been saved from the punishment of sin by His loving-favor. ⁶ God raised us up from death when He raised up Christ Jesus. He has given us a place with Christ in the heavens. ⁷ He did this to show us through all the time to come the great riches of His loving-favor. He has shown us His kindness through Christ Jesus.

⁸ For by His loving-favor you have been saved from the punishment of sin through faith. It is not by anything you have done. It is a gift of God. ⁹ It is not given to you because you worked for it. If you could work for it, you would be proud. ¹⁰ We are His work. He has made us to belong to Christ Jesus so we can work for Him. He planned that we should do this.

Followers Now Become the Body of Christ

¹¹ Do not forget that at one time you did not know God. The Jews, who had gone through the religious act of becoming a Jew by man’s hands, said you were people who do not know God. ¹² You were living without Christ then. The Jewish people who belonged to God had nothing to do with you. The promises He gave to them were not for you. You had nothing in this world to hope for. You were without God.

¹³ But now you belong to Christ Jesus. At one time you were far away from God. Now you have been brought close to Him. Christ did this for you when He gave His blood on the cross. ¹⁴ We have peace because of Christ. He has made the Jews and those who are not Jews one people. He broke down the wall that divided them. ¹⁵ He stopped the fighting between them by His death on the cross. He put an end to the Law. Then He made of the two people one new kind of people like Himself. In this way, He made peace. ¹⁶ He brought both groups together to God. Christ finished the fighting between them by His death on the cross. ¹⁷ Then Christ came and preached the Good News of peace to you who were far away from God. And He preached it to us who were near God. ¹⁸ Now all of us can go to the Father through Christ by way of the one Holy Spirit. ¹⁹ From now on you are not strangers and people who are not citizens. You are citizens together with those who belong to God. You belong in God’s family. ²⁰ This family is built on the teachings of the missionaries and the early preachers. Jesus Christ Himself is the cornerstone, which is the most important part of the building. ²¹ Christ keeps this building together and it is growing into a holy building for the Lord. ²² You are also being put together as a part of this building because God lives in you by His Spirit.