Old/New Testament
Second Pronouncement of Punishment
4 Hear this word, you cows of Bashan, who are on the mountain of Samaria,
who oppress the poor and crush the needy,
who say to their husbands, “Bring us something to drink!”
2 The Lord God has sworn by His holiness:
Indeed the days are coming upon you
when they will take you away with hooks,
the last one of you with fishhooks.
3 You will go out through breached walls,
every one straight ahead of her;
you will be exiled to Harmon,
says the Lord.
4 Come to Bethel and transgress,
to Gilgal and multiply transgression;
bring your sacrifices every morning
and your tithes every three days.
5 Burn leavened bread as a thank offering;
announce your voluntary offerings loudly,
for so you love to do, O children of Israel,
says the Lord God.
6 Though I gave you cleanness of teeth in all your cities
and lack of food in all your places,
yet you did not return to Me,
says the Lord.
7 I also withheld the rain from you,
when there were still three months to the harvest.
I would send rain on one town,
and send no rain on another town.
One field would receive rain,
but another field without rain would wither.
8 So two or three towns wandered to one town to drink water,
but they were not satisfied;
yet you did not return to Me,
says the Lord.
9 I struck you with blight and mildew.
Locusts devoured your many gardens and vineyards,
your fig trees and olive trees;
yet you did not return to Me,
says the Lord.
10 Pestilence like that of Egypt
I sent against you.
By the sword I killed your young men;
your horses were taken captive.
The stench of your camps I brought up into your nostrils;
yet you did not return to Me,
says the Lord.
11 I destroyed some of you,
as God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah.
You were like a firebrand plucked out of the fire;
yet you did not return to Me,
says the Lord.
12 Therefore thus will I do to you, O Israel,
and because I will do this to you,
prepare to meet your God, O Israel!
13 The One who forms the mountains
and creates the wind,
who reveals His thoughts to man,
who turns the darkness into dawn
and strides on the heights of the earth—
the Lord, the God of Hosts, is His name.
Third Pronouncement of Punishment
5 Hear this word which I take up as a dirge against you, O house of Israel:
2 Fallen, no more to rise
is maiden Israel;
forsaken on her land,
with no one to raise her up.
3 For thus says the Lord God:
The city that went out with a thousand
will be left with a hundred,
and the one that went out with a hundred
will be left with ten for the house of Israel.
4 Indeed, thus says the Lord to the house of Israel:
Seek Me and live!
5 But do not seek Bethel,
and do not enter into Gilgal
or cross over to Beersheba;
for Gilgal will surely go into captivity,
and Bethel shall be no more.
6 Seek the Lord and live,
or He will break out like fire in the house of Joseph,
and it will devour Bethel,
with no one to quench it.
7 You who turn justice into bitterness
and cast righteousness down to the ground!
8 The One who made the Pleiades and Orion,
who turns the deep darkness into dawn
and darkens the day into night,
who summons the waters of the sea
and pours them out on the surface of the earth—
the Lord is His name,
9 the One who flashes destruction against the strong,
so that destruction comes against the fortress.
10 They hate the one who prosecutes at the gate,
and abhor the one who speaks with integrity.
11 Therefore, because you trample on the poor
and take from him a levy of wheat,
though you have built houses of hewn stone,
you will not dwell in them;
though you have planted pleasant vineyards,
you will not drink their wine.
12 For I know your transgressions are many
and your sins are grievous,
you who oppress the just,
who take a bribe and subvert the needy at the gate.
13 Therefore the prudent are silent at such a time,
for it is an evil time.
14 Seek good and not evil,
so that you may live;
then the Lord, the God of Hosts, will truly be with you,
as you claim.
15 Hate evil and love good,
and establish justice at the gate.
It may then be that the Lord God of Hosts will be gracious
to the remnant of Joseph.
16 Therefore thus says the Lord, the God of Hosts, the Lord:
Wailing will be in all the squares,
and in all the streets they will say, “Alas! Alas!”
They shall call the farmer to mourning,
and to wailing those skilled in lamentation.
17 In all vineyards there shall be wailing,
for I will pass through you,
says the Lord.
The Day of the Lord Is Darkness
18 Woe to you that desire
the day of the Lord!
Why do you want the day of the Lord?
It is darkness, and not light,
19 as if someone fled away from a lion,
but a bear attacked him,
or got into the house
and rested his hand on the wall,
but a snake bit him.
20 Will not the day of the Lord be darkness, and not light?
Will it not be deep darkness, with no brightness in it?
21 I hate, I despise your festivals,
and I am not pleased by your solemn assemblies.
22 Though you offer Me burnt offerings or your grain offerings,
I will not accept them,
nor will I regard the offerings
of your fattened animals.
23 Take away from Me the noise of your songs;
I will not listen to the melody of your harps.
24 But let justice roll down like water,
and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.
25 Did you bring Me sacrifices and offerings
those forty years in the wilderness, O house of Israel?
26 But you will carry away Sukuth your king
and Kaiwan your star-images,
your gods that you made for yourselves,
27 as I drive you away into exile beyond Damascus,
says the Lord, whose name is the God of Hosts.
Woe to the Complacent
6 Woe to those who are at ease in Zion,
and to those confident on the mount of Samaria,
nobles of the first of the nations,
to whom the house of Israel comes!
2 Cross over to Kalneh and see,
and go from there to Hamath the great;
then go down to Gath of the Philistines—
are you better than these kingdoms?
Or is their territory greater than your territory?
3 You who brush off the day of disaster,
but bring on a session of lawlessness;
4 who lie upon beds of ivory, and lounge on their couches,
eating lambs from the flock and calves from the stall;
5 who sing to the sound of the harp
and invent musical instruments for themselves like David;
6 who drink from bowls of wine
and anoint themselves with the finest oils,
but are not grieved over the destruction of Joseph.
7 Therefore now they will go at the head of the captives into exile,
and the revelry of those who are lounging will vanish.
8 The Lord God hath sworn by Himself, an oracle of the Lord the God of Hosts:
I abhor the pride of Jacob
and hate his palaces,
so I will deliver up the city
with all that is in it.
9 If there remain ten people in one house, they will die. 10 And when a relative or one who prepares the bodies picks them up to carry them out of the house, and says to someone in the recesses of the house, “Is anyone else with you?” and he says, “No,” he will say, “Hush!”—not to pronounce the name of the Lord.
11 But indeed the Lord gives a command,
and He will shatter the great house to bits,
and the small house to pieces.
12 Can horses run on a rocky crag?
Can one plow the sea with oxen?
But you have turned justice into poison,
and the fruit of righteousness into wormwood,
13 you who rejoice in Lo Debar, who say,
“Is it not by our own strength that we captured Karnaim?”
14 Watch: I will raise up against you a nation, O house of Israel,
says the Lord, the God of Hosts,
and they will oppress you
from Lebo Hamath to the Wadi Arabah.
The 144,000 of Israel Sealed
7 Then I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding the four winds of the earth, that the wind would not blow on the earth or on the sea or on any tree. 2 And I saw another angel ascending from the east, having the seal of the living God. He cried out with a loud voice to the four angels who had been given power to harm the earth and the sea, 3 saying, “Do not harm the earth or the sea or the trees, until we have sealed the servants of our God on their foreheads.” 4 Then I heard the number of those who were sealed, one hundred and forty-four thousand out of every tribe of the children of Israel:
5 Twelve thousand from the tribe of Judah were sealed,
twelve throusand from the tribe of Reuben were sealed,
twelve thousand from the tribe of Gad were sealed,
6 twelve thousand from the tribe of Asher were sealed,
twelve thousand from the tribe of Naphtali were sealed,
twelve thousand from the tribe of Manasseh were sealed,
7 twelve thousand from the tribe of Simeon were sealed,
twelve thousand from the tribe of Levi were sealed,
twelve thousand from the tribe of Issachar were sealed,
8 twelve thousand from the tribe of Zebulun were sealed,
twelve thousand from the tribe of Joseph were sealed,
and twelve thousand from the tribe of Benjamin were sealed.
The Multitude From Every Nation
9 Then I looked. And there was a great multitude which no one could count, from all nations and tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, with palm branches in their hands. 10 They cried out with 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 the elders and the four living creatures and fell on their faces before the throne and worshipped God, 12 saying:
“Amen!
Blessing and glory
and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor
and power and might
be to our God forever and ever!
Amen.”
13 Then one of the elders asked me, “Who are these clothed in white robes, and where did they come from?”
14 I said to him, “Sir, you know.”
He said to me, “These are those who came out of great tribulation and washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. 15 Therefore,
they are before the throne of God,
and serve Him day and night in His temple.
And He who sits on the throne
will dwell among them.
16 ‘They shall neither hunger any more,
nor shall they thirst any more;
the sun shall not strike them,’[a]
nor any scorching heat;
17 for the Lamb who is in the midst of the throne
will shepherd them
and ‘He will lead them to springs of living water.’[b]
‘And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.’[c]”
The Holy Bible, Modern English Version. Copyright © 2014 by Military Bible Association. Published and distributed by Charisma House.