Today's Reading

¹The burden of Babylon, which Isaiah the son of Amoz saw:

²Set up a banner on the bare mountain! Lift up your voice to them! Wave your hand, that they may go into the gates of the nobles.

³I have commanded my consecrated ones; yes, I have called my mighty men for my anger, even my proudly exulting ones.

⁴The noise of a multitude is in the mountains, as of a great people; the noise of an uproar of the kingdoms of the nations gathered together! The Lord of hosts is mustering the army for the battle.

⁵They come from a far country, from the uttermost part of heaven, even the Lord, and the weapons of his indignation, to destroy the whole land.

⁶Wail; for the day of the Lord is at hand! It will come as destruction from the Almighty.

⁷Therefore all hands will be feeble, and everyone's heart will melt.

⁸They will be dismayed. Pangs and sorrows will seize them. They will be in pain like a woman in labor. They will look in amazement one at another. Their faces will be faces of flame.

⁹Behold, the day of the Lord comes, cruel, with wrath and fierce anger; to make the land a desolation, and to destroy its sinners out of it.

¹⁰For the stars of the sky and its constellations will not give their light. The sun will be darkened in its going forth, and the moon will not cause its light to shine.

¹¹I will punish the world for their evil, and the wicked for their iniquity. I will cause the arrogance of the proud to cease, and will humble the haughtiness of the terrible.

¹²I will make people more rare than fine gold, even a person than the pure gold of Ophir.

¹³Therefore I will make the heavens tremble, and the earth will be shaken out of its place in the wrath of the Lord of hosts, and in the day of his fierce anger.

¹⁴It will happen that like a hunted gazelle, and like sheep that no one gathers, they will each turn to their own people, and will each flee to their own land.

¹⁵Everyone who is found will be thrust through. Everyone who is captured will fall by the sword.

¹⁶Their infants also will be dashed in pieces before their eyes. Their houses will be ransacked, and their wives raped.

¹⁷Behold, I will stir up the Medes against them, who will not value silver, and as for gold, they will not delight in it.

¹⁸Their bows will dash the young men in pieces; and they shall have no pity on the fruit of the womb. Their eyes will not spare children.

¹⁹Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the Chaldeans' pride, will be like when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah.

²⁰It will never be inhabited, neither will it be lived in from generation to generation. The Arabian will not pitch a tent there, neither will shepherds make their flocks lie down there.

²¹But wild animals of the desert will lie there, and their houses will be full of jackals. Ostriches will dwell there, and wild goats will frolic there.

²²Wolves will cry in their castles, and jackals in the pleasant palaces. Her time is near to come, and her days will not be prolonged.

¹For the Lord will have compassion on Jacob, and will yet choose Israel, and set them in their own land. The foreigner will join himself with them, and they will unite with the house of Jacob.

²The peoples will take them, and bring them to their place. The house of Israel will possess them in the Lord's land for servants and for handmaids. They will take as captives those whose captives they were; and they shall rule over their oppressors.

³It will happen in the day that the Lord will give you rest from your sorrow, from your trouble, and from the hard service in which you were made to serve,

⁴that you will take up this parable against the king of Babylon, and say, "How the oppressor has ceased! How the attacker has ceased!"

⁵The Lord has broken the staff of the wicked, the scepter of the rulers,

⁶who struck the peoples in wrath with a continual stroke, who ruled the nations in anger, with a persecution that none restrained.

⁷The whole earth is at rest, and is quiet. They break out song.

⁸Yes, the fir trees rejoice with you, with the cedars of Lebanon, saying, "Since you are humbled, no lumberjack has come up against us."

⁹Sheol from beneath has moved for you to meet you at your coming. It stirs up the dead for you, even all the rulers of the earth. It has raised up from their thrones all the kings of the nations.

¹⁰They all will answer and ask you, "Have you also become as weak as we are? Have you become like us?"

¹¹Your pomp is brought down to Sheol, with the sound of your stringed instruments. Maggots are spread out under you, and worms cover you.

¹²How you have fallen from heaven, morning star, son of the dawn! How you are cut down to the ground, who laid the nations low!

¹³You said in your heart, "I will ascend into heaven! I will exalt my throne above the stars of God! I will sit on the mountain of assembly, in the far north!

¹⁴I will ascend above the heights of the clouds! I will make myself like the Most High!"

¹⁵Yet you shall be brought down to Sheol, to the depths of the pit.

¹⁶Those who see you will stare at you. They will ponder you, saying, "Is this the man who made the earth to tremble, who shook kingdoms;

¹⁷who made the world like a wilderness, and overthrew its cities; who did not release his prisoners to their home?"

¹⁸All the kings of the nations, sleep in glory, everyone in his own house.

¹⁹But you are cast away from your tomb like an abominable branch, clothed with the slain, who are thrust through with the sword, who go down to the stones of the pit; like a dead body trodden under foot.

²⁰You will not join them in burial, because you have destroyed your land. You have killed your people. The seed of evildoers will not be named forever.

²¹Prepare for slaughter of his children because of the iniquity of their fathers, that they not rise up and possess the earth, and fill the surface of the world with cities.

²²"I will rise up against them," says the Lord of hosts, "and cut off from Babylon name and remnant, and son and son's son," says the Lord.

²³"I will also make it a possession for the porcupine, and pools of water. I will sweep it with the broom of destruction," says the Lord of hosts.

²⁴The Lord of hosts has sworn, saying, "Surely, as I have thought, so shall it happen; and as I have purposed, so shall it stand:

²⁵that I will break the Assyrian in my land, and tread him under foot on my mountains. Then his yoke will leave them, and his burden leave their shoulders.

²⁶This is the plan that is determined for the whole earth. This is the hand that is stretched out over all the nations.

²⁷For the Lord of hosts has planned, and who can stop it? His hand is stretched out, and who can turn it back?"

²⁸This burden was in the year that king Ahaz died.

²⁹Do not rejoice, O Philistia, all of you, because the rod that struck you is broken; for out of the serpent's root an adder will emerge, and his fruit will be a fiery flying serpent.

³⁰The firstborn of the poor will eat, and the needy will lie down in safety; and I will kill your root with famine, and your remnant will be killed.

³¹Howl, gate! Cry, city! You are melted away, Philistia, all of you; for smoke comes out of the north, and there is no straggler in his ranks.

³²What will they answer the messengers of the nation? That the Lord has founded Zion, and in her the afflicted of his people will take refuge.

¹The burden of Moab: for in a night, Ar of Moab is laid waste, and brought to nothing; for in a night Kir of Moab is laid waste, and brought to nothing.

²They have gone up to Bayith, and to Dibon, to the high places, to weep. Moab wails over Nebo and over Medeba. Baldness is on all of their heads. Every beard is cut off.

³In their streets, they dress themselves in sackcloth. In their streets and on their housetops, everyone wails, weeping abundantly.

⁴Heshbon cries out with Elealeh. Their voice is heard even to Jahaz. Therefore the armed men of Moab cry aloud. Their souls tremble within them.

⁵My heart cries out for Moab! Her Nazirites flee to Zoar, to Eglath Shelishiyah; for they go up by the ascent of Luhith with weeping; for in the way of Horonaim, they raise up a cry of destruction.

⁶For the waters of Nimrim will be desolate; for the grass has withered away, the tender grass fails, there is no green thing.

⁷Therefore they will carry away the abundance they have gotten, and that which they have stored up, over the brook of the willows.

⁸For the cry has gone around the borders of Moab; its wailing to Eglaim, and its wailing to Beer Elim.

⁹For the waters of Dimon are full of blood; for I will bring yet more on Dimon, a lion on those of Moab who escape, and on the remnant of the land.

¹For this cause I, Paul, am the prisoner of Christ Jesus on behalf of you Gentiles,

²if it is so that you have heard of the administration of that grace of God which was given me toward you;

³how that by revelation the mystery was made known to me, as I wrote before in few words,

⁴by which, when you read, you can perceive my understanding in the mystery of Christ;

⁵which in other generations was not made known to the children of men, as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets in the Spirit;

⁶that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, and fellow members of the body, and fellow partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the Good News,

⁷of which I was made a servant, according to the gift of that grace of God which was given me according to the working of his power.

⁸To me, the very least of all saints, was this grace given, to proclaim to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ,

⁹and to make all men see what is the administration of the mystery which for ages has been hidden in God, who created all things;

¹⁰to the intent that now through the church the manifold wisdom of God might be made known to the principalities and the powers in the heavenly places,

¹¹according to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord;

¹²in whom we have boldness and access in confidence through our faith in him.

¹³Therefore I ask that you may not lose heart at my troubles for you, which are your glory.

¹⁴For this cause, I bow my knees before the Father,

¹⁵from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named,

¹⁶that he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, that you may be strengthened with power through his Spirit in the inward man;

¹⁷that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; to the end that you, being rooted and grounded in love,

¹⁸may be strengthened to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth,

¹⁹and to know Christ's love which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

²⁰Now to him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us,

²¹to him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen.

¹The plans of the heart belong to man, but the answer of the tongue is from the Lord.

²All the ways of a man are clean in his own eyes; but the Lord weighs the motives.

³Commit your deeds to the Lord, and your plans shall succeed.

⁴The Lord has made everything for its own end- yes, even the wicked for the day of evil.

⁵Everyone who is proud in heart is an abomination to the Lord: they shall certainly not be unpunished.

⁶By mercy and truth iniquity is atoned for. By the fear of the Lord men depart from evil.

⁷When a man's ways please the Lord, he makes even his enemies to be at peace with him.

⁸Better is a little with righteousness, than great revenues with injustice.

⁹A man's heart plans his course, but the Lord directs his steps.

¹⁰Inspired judgments are on the lips of the king. He shall not betray his mouth.

¹¹Honest balances and scales are the Lord's; all the weights in the bag are his work.

¹²It is an abomination for kings to do wrong, for the throne is established by righteousness.

¹³Righteous lips are the delight of kings. They value one who speaks the truth.

¹⁴The king's wrath is a messenger of death, but a wise man will pacify it.

¹⁵In the light of the king's face is life. His favor is like a cloud of the spring rain.

¹⁶How much better it is to get wisdom than gold! Yes, to get understanding is to be chosen rather than silver.

¹⁷The highway of the upright is to depart from evil. He who keeps his way preserves his soul.

¹⁸Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.

¹⁹It is better to be of a lowly spirit with the poor, than to divide the plunder with the proud.

²⁰He who heeds the Word finds prosperity. Whoever trusts in the Lord is blessed.

²¹The wise in heart shall be called prudent. Pleasantness of the lips promotes instruction.

²²Understanding is a fountain of life to one who has it, but the punishment of fools is their folly.

²³The heart of the wise instructs his mouth, and adds learning to his lips.

²⁴Pleasant words are a honeycomb, sweet to the soul, and health to the bones.

²⁵There is a way which seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death.

²⁶The appetite of the laboring man labors for him; for his mouth urges him on.

²⁷A worthless man devises mischief. His speech is like a scorching fire.

²⁸A perverse man stirs up strife. A whisperer separates close friends.

²⁹A man of violence entices his neighbor, and leads him in a way that is not good.

³⁰One who winks his eyes to plot perversities, one who compresses his lips, is bent on evil.

³¹Gray hair is a crown of glory. It is attained by a life of righteousness.

³²One who is slow to anger is better than the mighty; one who rules his spirit, than he who takes a city.

³³The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the Lord.