To The Word – Day 97

₁A day is coming when the people will sing this song in the land of Judah:

₂₀Go into your houses, my people, and shut the door behind you. Hide yourselves for a little while until God's anger is over. ₂₁The LORD is coming from his heavenly dwelling place to punish the people of the earth for their sins. The murders that were secretly committed on the earth will be revealed, and the ground will no longer hide those who have been killed.

₁On that day the LORD will use his powerful and deadly sword to punish Leviathan, that wriggling, twisting dragon, and to kill the monster that lives in the sea.

₂On that day the LORD will say of his pleasant vineyard, ₃“I watch over it and water it continually. I guard it night and day so that no one will harm it. ₄I am no longer angry with the vineyard. If only there were thorns and briars to fight against, then I would burn them up completely. ₅But if the enemies of my people want my protection, let them make peace with me. Yes, let them make peace with me.”

₆In days to come the people of Israel, the descendants of Jacob, will take root like a tree, and they will blossom and bud. The earth will be covered with the fruit they produce.

₇Israel has not been punished by the LORD as severely as its enemies, nor lost as many people. ₈The LORD punished his people by sending them into exile. He took them away with a cruel wind from the east. ₉But Israel's sins will be forgiven only when the stones of pagan altars are ground up like chalk, and no more incense altars or symbols of the goddess Asherah are left.

₁₀The fortified city lies in ruins. It is deserted like an empty wilderness. It has become a pasture for cattle, where they can rest and graze. ₁₁The branches of the trees are withered and broken, and women gather them for firewood. Because the people have understood nothing, God their Creator will not pity them or show them any mercy.

₁₂On that day, from the Euphrates to the Egyptian border, the LORD will gather his people one by one, like someone separating the wheat from the chaff.

₁₃When that day comes, a trumpet will be blown to call back from Assyria and Egypt all the Israelites who are in exile there. They will come and worship the LORD in Jerusalem, on his sacred hill.

₁The kingdom of Israel is doomed! Its glory is fading like the crowns of flowers on the heads of its drunken leaders. Their proud heads are well perfumed, but there they lie, dead drunk. ₂The Lord has someone strong and powerful ready to attack them, someone who will come like a hailstorm, like a torrent of rain, like a rushing, overpowering flood, and will overwhelm the land. ₃The pride of those drunken leaders will be trampled underfoot. ₄The fading glory of those proud leaders will disappear like the first figs of the season, picked and eaten as soon as they are ripe.

₅A day is coming when the LORD Almighty will be like a glorious crown of flowers for his people who survive. ₆He will give a sense of justice to those who serve as judges, and courage to those who defend the city gates from attack.

₇Even the prophets and the priests are so drunk that they stagger. They have drunk so much wine and liquor that they stumble in confusion. The prophets are too drunk to understand the visions that God sends, and the priests are too drunk to decide the cases that are brought to them. ₈The tables where they sit are all covered with vomit, and not a clean spot is left.

₉They complain about me. They say, “Who does that man think he's teaching? Who needs his message? It's only good for babies that have just been weaned! ₁₀He is trying to teach us letter by letter, line by line, lesson by lesson.”

₁₁If you won't listen to me, then God will use foreigners speaking some strange-sounding language to teach you a lesson. ₁₂He offered rest and comfort to all of you, but you refused to listen to him. ₁₃That is why the LORD is going to teach you letter by letter, line by line, lesson by lesson. Then you will stumble with every step you take. You will be wounded, trapped, and taken prisoner.

₁₄Now you arrogant ones who rule here in Jerusalem over this people, listen to what the LORD is saying. ₁₅You boast that you have made a treaty with death and reached an agreement with the world of the dead. You are certain that disaster will spare you when it comes, because you depend on lies and deceit to keep you safe. ₁₆This, now, is what the Sovereign LORD says: “I am placing in Zion a foundation that is firm and strong. In it I am putting a solid cornerstone on which are written the words, ‘Faith that is firm is also patient.’ ₁₇Justice will be the measuring line for the foundation, and honesty will be its plumb line.”

Hailstorms will sweep away all the lies you depend on, and floods will destroy your security. ₁₈The treaty you have made with death will be abolished, and your agreement with the world of the dead will be cancelled. When disaster sweeps down, you will be overcome. ₁₉It will strike you again and again, morning after morning. You will have to bear it day and night. Each new message from God will bring new terror! ₂₀You will be like the person in the proverb, who tries to sleep in a bed too short to stretch out on, with a blanket too narrow to wrap himself in. ₂₁The LORD will fight as he did at Mount Perazim and in the valley of Gibeon, in order to do what he intends to do — strange as his actions may seem. He will complete his work, his mysterious work.

₂₂Don't laugh at the warning I am giving you! If you do, it will be even harder for you to escape. I have heard the LORD Almighty's decision to destroy the whole country.

₂₃Listen to what I am saying; pay attention to what I am telling you. ₂₄No farmer goes on constantly ploughing his fields and getting them ready for sowing. ₂₅Once he has prepared the soil, he sows the seeds of herbs such as dill and cumin. He sows rows of wheat and barley, and at the edges of his fields he sows other grain. ₂₆He knows how to do his work, because God has taught him. ₂₇He never uses a heavy club to beat out dill seeds or cumin seeds; instead he uses light sticks of the proper size. ₂₈He does not ruin the wheat by threshing it endlessly, and he knows how to thresh it by driving a cart over it without bruising the grains. ₂₉All this wisdom comes from the LORD Almighty. The plans God makes are wise, and they always succeed!

₁This is the list of the ancestors of Jesus Christ, a descendant of David, who was a descendant of Abraham.

_2-6aFrom Abraham to King David, the following ancestors are listed: Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Judah and his brothers; then Perez and Zerah (their mother was Tamar), Hezron, Ram, Amminadab, Nahshon, Salmon, Boaz (his mother was Rahab), Obed (his mother was Ruth), Jesse, and King David.

_6b-11From David to the time when the people of Israel were taken into exile in Babylon, the following ancestors are listed: David, Solomon (his mother was the woman who had been Uriah's wife), Rehoboam, Abijah, Asa, Jehoshaphat, Jehoram, Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, Hezekiah, Manasseh, Amon, Josiah, and Jehoiachin and his brothers.

_12-16From the time after the exile in Babylon to the birth of Jesus, the following ancestors are listed: Jehoiachin, Shealtiel, Zerubbabel, Abiud, Eliakim, Azor, Zadok, Achim, Eliud, Eleazar, Matthan, Jacob, and Joseph, who married Mary, the mother of Jesus, who was called the Messiah.

₁₇So then, there were fourteen generations from Abraham to David, and fourteen from David to the exile in Babylon, and fourteen from then to the birth of the Messiah.

₁₈This was how the birth of Jesus Christ took place. His mother Mary was engaged to Joseph, but before they were married, she found out that she was going to have a baby by the Holy Spirit. ₁₉Joseph was a man who always did what was right, but he did not want to disgrace Mary publicly; so he made plans to break the engagement privately. ₂₀While he was thinking about this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, descendant of David, do not be afraid to take Mary to be your wife. For it is by the Holy Spirit that she has conceived. ₂₁She will have a son, and you will name him Jesus — because he will save his people from their sins.”

₂₂Now all this happened in order to make what the Lord had said through the prophet come true, ₂₃“A virgin will become pregnant and have a son, and he will be called Immanuel” (which means, “God is with us”).

₂₄So when Joseph woke up, he married Mary, as the angel of the Lord had told him to do. ₂₅But he had no sexual relations with her before she gave birth to her son. And Joseph named him Jesus.

₁Jesus was born in the town of Bethlehem in Judea, during the time when Herod was king. Soon afterwards, some men who studied the stars came from the east to Jerusalem ₂and asked, “Where is the baby born to be the king of the Jews? We saw his star when it came up in the east, and we have come to worship him.”

₃When King Herod heard about this, he was very upset, and so was everyone else in Jerusalem. ₄He called together all the chief priests and the teachers of the Law and asked them, “Where will the Messiah be born?”

₅“In the town of Bethlehem in Judea,” they answered. “For this is what the prophet wrote:

₇So Herod called the visitors from the east to a secret meeting and found out from them the exact time the star had appeared. ₈Then he sent them to Bethlehem with these instructions: “Go and make a careful search for the child, and when you find him, let me know, so that I too may go and worship him.”

_9-10And so they left, and on their way they saw the same star they had seen in the east. When they saw it, how happy they were, what joy was theirs! It went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was. ₁₁They went into the house, and when they saw the child with his mother Mary, they knelt down and worshipped him. They brought out their gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh, and presented them to him.

₁₂Then they returned to their country by another road, since God had warned them in a dream not to go back to Herod.

₁₃After they had left, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph and said, “Herod will be looking for the child in order to kill him. So get up, take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt, and stay there until I tell you to leave.”

₁₄Joseph got up, took the child and his mother, and left during the night for Egypt, ₁₅where he stayed until Herod died. This was done to make what the Lord had said through the prophet come true, “I called my Son out of Egypt.”

₁₆When Herod realized that the visitors from the east had tricked him, he was furious. He gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its neighbourhood who were two years old and younger — this was done in accordance with what he had learned from the visitors about the time when the star had appeared.

₁₇In this way what the prophet Jeremiah had said came true:

₁₉After Herod died, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt ₂₀and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother, and go back to the land of Israel, because those who tried to kill the child are dead.” ₂₁So Joseph got up, took the child and his mother, and went back to Israel.

₂₂But when Joseph heard that Archelaus had succeeded his father Herod as king of Judea, he was afraid to go there. He was given more instructions in a dream, so he went to the province of Galilee ₂₃and made his home in a town named Nazareth. And so what the prophets had said came true: “He will be called a Nazarene.”

₁At that time John the Baptist came to the desert of Judah and started preaching. ₂“Turn away from your sins,” he said, “because the Kingdom of heaven is near!” ₃John was the man the prophet Isaiah was talking about when he said:

₄John's clothes were made of camel's hair; he wore a leather belt round his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey. ₅People came to him from Jerusalem, from the whole province of Judea, and from all the country near the River Jordan. ₆They confessed their sins, and he baptized them in the Jordan.

₇When John saw many Pharisees and Sadducees coming to him to be baptized, he said to them, “You snakes — who told you that you could escape from the punishment God is about to send? ₈Do those things that will show that you have turned from your sins. ₉And don't think you can escape punishment by saying that Abraham is your ancestor. I tell you that God can take these stones and make descendants for Abraham! ₁₀The axe is ready to cut down the trees at the roots; every tree that does not bear good fruit will be cut down and thrown in the fire. ₁₁I baptize you with water to show that you have repented, but the one who will come after me will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. He is much greater than I am; and I am not good enough even to carry his sandals. ₁₂He has his winnowing shovel with him to thresh out all the grain. He will gather his wheat into his barn, but he will burn the chaff in a fire that never goes out.”

₁₃At that time Jesus arrived from Galilee and came to John at the Jordan to be baptized by him. ₁₄But John tried to make him change his mind. “I ought to be baptized by you,” John said, “and yet you have come to me!”

₁₅But Jesus answered him, “Let it be so for now. For in this way we shall do all that God requires.” So John agreed.

₁₆As soon as Jesus was baptized, he came up out of the water. Then heaven was opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God coming down like a dove and alighting on him. ₁₇Then a voice said from heaven, “This is my own dear Son, with whom I am pleased.”