Old/New Testament
Judgment on the Women of Israel
4 “Listen to this message, you fat cows from Bashan,
who live on the Samaritan mountains,
who oppress the poor,
who rob the needy,
and who constantly ask your husbands for one more drink!”
2 The Lord God has taken a sacred oath:[a]
“The day is coming when they[b] will take you away on fishhooks,
every last one of you on fishhooks.
3 Each of you will go out through the breaches of the walls[c]
straight to Mt. Hermon,”[d]
declares the Lord.
The Lord’s Rebuke to Israel
4 “Come to Bethel and sin,
to Gilgal and sin even more!
Bring along your morning sacrifices,
and pay your tithes every other day.[e]
5 While you’re at it,[f] present a thank offering with leaven,
and publicize your freewill offerings,
letting everyone hear about it,
because this is what you really love to do, you Israelis,”
declares the Lord God.
Israel’s Refusal to Return to God
6 “I also have scheduled[g] food shortages[h] for you in all of your cities,
and lack of bread in all of your settlements,
but you haven’t returned to me,”
declares the Lord.
7 “I therefore have withheld the rain from you
three months before the harvest,
causing rain to come upon one city,
but not upon another,
and upon one field
but not upon another,
so that it would wither.
8 So the people of[i] two or three cities staggered away to another[j] city
in order to obtain drinking water,
but you have not returned to me,”
declares the Lord.
9 “I afflicted you with blight and fungus;
and the locust swarm devoured the harvest
of your gardens, your vineyards, your fig trees, and your olive trees,
but you have not returned to me,”
declares the Lord.
10 “I sent plagues among you as I did with Egypt.
I killed your choicest young men with the sword.
I took your horses away from you.
I filled your noses with the stench of your encampments,
but you have not returned to me,”
declares the Lord.
11 “I overthrew your cities,[k]
as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah.
You’ve become like a burning ember, snatched from the fire,
but you have not returned to me,”
declares the Lord.
12 “Therefore this is what I will do to you, Israel.
Because I am about to do this,
prepare to be summoned to your God, Israel!”
13 Look! The one who crafts mountains,
who creates the wind,
who reveals what he is thinking to mankind,
who darkens the morning light,
who tramples down the high places of the land—
the Lord, the God of the Heavenly Armies is his name.
A Lament for Israel
5 “Hear this accusation[l] that I am bringing against you:
‘A dirge, house of Israel:
2 Fallen is Israel the virgin—never to rise again!
She is abandoned on her own land,
with no one to raise her up.’
3 “For this is what the Lord God says:
‘The city that is sending out a thousand
will have a hundred left;
The city[m] that is sending out a hundred
will have ten left of the house of Israel.’”
Seek God, and Live
4 “For this is what the Lord says to the house of Israel:
‘Seek me and live,
5 but don’t seek Bethel.
Don’t go to Gilgal,
and don’t pass over to Beer-sheba.
Because Gilgal will surely go into captivity,[n]
and Bethel will come to nothing.
6 ‘Seek the Lord and live!
Otherwise, he may break out like a fire in the house of Joseph
and devour Bethel,[o]
and there will be no one to extinguish it.
7 Those of you who are making justice taste bitter,[p]
and who have thrown righteousness to the ground:
8 Seek[q] the one who fashions the Pleiades and Orion,
who turns the deep darkness[r] into morning,
who darkens day into night,
who calls out to the waters of the sea,
pouring them out onto the surface of the earth—
the Lord is his name.
9 It is he who is raining sudden destruction
upon the strong like lightning,[s]
so that ruin comes upon the fortress.
10 They have hated those who are presenting their cases in court,[t]
detesting the one who speaks truthfully.
11 ‘Therefore, since you trample the poor continuously,
taxing his grain,
building houses of stone in which you won’t live
and planting fine vineyards from which you won’t drink—
12 and because I know that your transgressions are many,
and your sins are numerous
as you oppose the righteous,
taking bribes as a ransom,
and turning away the poor in court[u]—
13 therefore the prudent person remains silent at such a time,
for the time is evil.
14 ‘Pursue good and not evil,
so that you may live,
and this is what will happen:[v]
The Lord God of the Heavenly Armies will be with you,
as you have been claiming.
15 Hate evil and love good,
and establish justice in court—[w]
perhaps the Lord, the God of the Heavenly Armies,
will be gracious to the survivors of Joseph.’”
16 Therefore this is what the Lord, the God of the Heavenly Armies, the Lord, says:
‘There will be dirges in all of the streets;
and in all of the highways they will cry out in anguish.[x]
They will call the farmer to mourning
and those who lament[y] to grieve.
17 And in all of the vineyards there will be mourning
when I pass through your midst,’
says the Lord.”
The Fearful Day of the Lord
18 “Woe to those who are craving the Day of the Lord!
How is it to your benefit, this Day of the Lord?
It’s a day of[z] darkness to you, and not light.
19 It will be like a man who runs from a lion,
only to encounter a bear;
or who comes home, leans his hand against a wall,
and a serpent bites him!
20 Will not the Day of the Lord be darkness, and not light—
pitch black at that, without a ray of sunshine?”
Let Justice Roll On
21 “I hate—I despise—your festival days,
and your solemn convocations stink.[aa]
22 And[ab] if you send up burnt offerings to me
as well as your grain offerings,
I will not accept them,
nor will I consider your peace offerings of fattened cattle.
23 Spare me your noisy singing—
I will not listen to your musical instruments.[ac]
24 “But let justice roll on like many[ad] waters,
and righteousness like an ever-flowing river.
25 “Was it to me that you brought offerings and gifts
in the desert for 40 years, house of Israel?
26 And you carried the tent of your king[ae]—
and Saturn,[af] your star god idols[ag] that you crafted for yourselves.
27 So I will cause you to be taken captive beyond Damascus,”
says the Lord,
whose name is God of the Heavenly Armies.
Mourning for the House of Israel
6 “Woe to those who are at ease in Zion,
to those who rest on the mountain of Samaria—
the famous men of the nations
to whom the house of Israel came!
2 Cross over to Calneh[ah] and look around,
then go on to that great city of[ai] Hamath,
and from there go down to Gath of the Philistines.
Are you better than these kingdoms?
Or is their territory more extensive than yours?
3 “Disbelieving that a day of evil will come,[aj]
embracing opportunities to commit violence,[ak]
4 lying on ivory beds,
stretching out on your couches,
eating lambs from the flock,
and fattened calves from the stall,
5 chanting to the sound of stringed instruments as if they were David,
composing songs to themselves as if they were musicians,
6 drinking wine from bowls,
anointing themselves with the choicest of oils,
but not grieving on the occasion of Joseph’s ruin—
7 therefore you will be the first to go into exile,
and the celebrations of those who are lounging will end.”
The Lord Swears an Oath
8 “The Lord God has sworn by himself,”
declares the Lord, the God of the Heavenly Armies,
“I utterly detest the arrogance of Jacob;
I hate his fortresses;
and I will deliver up the city,
along with everyone in it.
9 “And if there are ten men remaining in one house,
they will die.
10 One’s relative will pick up the corpse[al]
to carry them from the house for burning,[am]
saying to whomever remains inside the house,
‘Is there anyone still with you?’
And he will say, ‘No.’
He will respond, ‘Be quiet,
because we do not mention the name “Lord”.’
11 For indeed, the Lord is giving the command—
and he will smash the large house to rubble
and the small house into bits.
12 “Horses don’t run over bare rock, do they?
One doesn’t plow rock[an] with oxen, does he?
But you have turned justice to gall,
and the fruit of righteousness into bitterness.[ao]
13 You rejoice in nothing worth mentioning—
that is, you keep on saying,
‘We captured Karnaim by our own strength of will
and by our own effort, didn’t we?’
14 “So look, house of Israel! I will raise up a nation against you,”
declares the Lord, the God of the Heavenly Armies,
“and they will harass you from the entrance of Hamath
to the wadi[ap] of the wilderness.”
The Vision of the Sealing of 144,000 People
7 After this, I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth. They were holding back the four winds of the earth so that no wind could blow on the land, on the sea, or on any tree. 2 I saw another angel coming from the east having the seal of the living God. He cried out in a loud voice to the four angels who had been permitted to harm the land and sea, 3 “Don’t harm the land, the sea, or the trees until we have marked the servants of our God with a seal on their foreheads.”
4 I heard the number of those who were sealed: 144,000. Those who were sealed were from every tribe of Israel: 5 12,000 from the tribe of Judah were sealed, 12,000 from the tribe of Reuben, 12,000 from the tribe of Gad, 6 12,000 from the tribe of Asher, 12,000 from the tribe of Naphtali, 12,000 from the tribe of Manasseh, 7 12,000 from the tribe of Simeon, 12,000 from the tribe of Levi, 12,000 from the tribe of Issachar, 8 12,000 from the tribe of Zebulun, 12,000 from the tribe of Joseph, and 12,000 from the tribe of Benjamin were sealed.
The Vision of Tribulation Saints
9 After these things, I looked, and there was a crowd so large that no one was able to count it! They were from every nation, tribe, people, and language. They were standing in front of the throne and the lamb and were wearing white robes, with palm branches in their hands. 10 They cried out in a loud voice,
“Salvation belongs to our God,
who sits on the throne,
and to the lamb!”
11 All the angels stood around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures. They fell on their faces in front of the throne and worshipped God, 12 saying,
“Amen! Praise, glory, wisdom, thanks, honor, power, and strength
be to our God forever and ever! Amen!”
13 “Who are these people wearing white robes,” one of the elders asked me, “and where did they come from?”
14 I told him, “Sir, you know.”
Then he told me, “These are the people who are coming out of the terrible suffering.[a] They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the lamb. 15 That is why:
“They are in front of the throne of God
and worship[b] him night and day in his Temple.
The one who sits on the throne will shelter them.
16 They will never be hungry or thirsty again.
Neither the sun nor its heat will ever beat down on them,
17 because the lamb in the center of the throne will be their shepherd.
He will lead them to springs filled with the water of life,
and God will wipe every tear from their eyes.”[c]
Copyright © 1995-2014 by ISV Foundation. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED INTERNATIONALLY. Used by permission of Davidson Press, LLC.