The Living Bible (219 page)

Isaiah
3

The Lord will cut off Jerusalem’s and Judah’s food and water supplies
²
 and kill her leaders; he will destroy her armies, judges, prophets, elders,
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 army officers, businessmen, lawyers, magicians, and politicians.
⁴
 Israel’s kings will be like babies, ruling childishly.
⁵
 And the worst sort of anarchy will prevail—everyone stepping on someone else, neighbors fighting neighbors, youths revolting against authority, criminals sneering at honorable men.

    
⁶
 In those days a man will say to his brother, “You have some extra clothing, so you be our king and take care of this mess.”

    
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 “No!” he will reply. “I cannot be of any help! I have no extra food or clothes. Don’t get me involved!”

    
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 Israel’s civil government will be in utter ruin because the Jews have spoken out against their Lord and will not worship him; they offend his glory.
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 The very look on their faces gives them away and shows their guilt. And they boast that their sin is equal to the sin of Sodom; they are not even ashamed. What a catastrophe! They have doomed themselves.

    
¹⁰
 But all is well for the godly man. Tell him, “What a reward you are going to get!”
¹¹
 But say to the wicked, “Your doom is sure. You too shall get your just deserts. Your well-earned punishment is on the way.”

    
¹²
 O my people! Can’t you see what fools your rulers are? Weak as women! Foolish as little children playing king. True leaders? No, misleaders! Leading you down the garden path to destruction.

    
¹³
 The Lord stands up! He is the great Prosecuting Attorney presenting his case against his people!
¹⁴
 First to feel his wrath will be the elders and the princes, for they have defrauded the poor. They have filled their barns with grain extorted from the helpless peasants.

    
¹⁵
 “How dare you grind my people in the dust like that?” the Lord Almighty will demand of them.

    
¹⁶
 Next he will judge the haughty Jewish women, who mince along, noses in the air, tinkling bracelets on their ankles, with wanton eyes that rove among the crowds to catch the glances of the men.
¹⁷
 The Lord will send a plague of scabs to ornament their heads! He will expose their nakedness for all to see.
¹⁸
 No longer shall they tinkle with self-assurance as they walk. For the Lord will strip away their artful beauty and their ornaments,
¹⁹
 their necklaces and bracelets and veils of shimmering gauze.
²⁰
 Gone shall be their scarves and ankle chains, headbands, earrings, and perfumes;
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 their rings, jewels,
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 party clothes, negligees, capes, ornate combs, and purses;
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 their mirrors, lovely lingerie, beautiful dresses, and veils.
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 Instead of smelling of sweet perfume, they’ll stink; for sashes they’ll use ropes; their well-set hair will all fall out; they’ll wear sacks instead of robes.

    
All their beauty will be gone; all that will be left to them is shame and disgrace.
^25-26
 Their husbands shall die in battle; the women, ravaged, shall sit crying on the ground.

Isaiah
4

At that time so few men will be left alive that seven women will fight over each of them and say, “Let us all marry you! We will furnish our own food and clothing; only let us be called by your name so that we won’t be mocked as old maids.”

    
^2-4
 Those whose names are written down to escape the destruction of Jerusalem will be washed and rinsed of all their moral filth by the horrors and the fire. They will be God’s holy people.
*
And the land will produce for them its lushest bounty and its richest fruit.
⁵
 Then the Lord will provide shade on all Jerusalem—over every home and all its public grounds—a canopy of smoke and cloud throughout the day, and clouds of fire at night, covering the Glorious Land,
⁶
 protecting it from daytime heat and from rains and storms.

Isaiah
5

Now I will sing a song about his vineyard to the one I love.
My Beloved has a vineyard on a very fertile hill.
²
 
He plowed it and took out all the rocks and planted his vineyard with the choicest vines. He built a watchtower and cut a winepress in the rocks. Then he waited for the harvest, but the grapes that grew were wild and sour and not at all the sweet ones he expected.

    
³
 Now, men of Jerusalem and Judah, you have heard the case! You be the judges!
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 What more could I have done? Why did my vineyard give me wild grapes instead of sweet?
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 I will tear down the fences and let my vineyard go to pasture to be trampled by cattle and sheep.
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 I won’t prune it or hoe it, but let it be overgrown with briars and thorns. I will command the clouds not to rain on it anymore.

    
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 I have given you the story of God’s people. They are the vineyard that I spoke about. Israel and Judah are his pleasant acreage! He expected them to yield a crop of justice, but found bloodshed instead. He expected righteousness, but the cries of deep oppression met his ears.
*
⁸
 You buy up property so others have no place to live. Your homes are built on great estates so you can be alone in the midst of the earth!
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 But the Lord Almighty has sworn your awful fate—with my own ears I heard him say, “Many a beautiful home will lie deserted, their owners killed or gone.
¹⁰
 An acre of vineyard will not produce a gallon of juice! Ten bushels of seed will yield a one-bushel crop!”

    
¹¹
 Woe to you who get up early in the morning to go on long drinking bouts that last till late at night—woe to you drunken bums.
¹²
 You furnish lovely music at your grand parties; the orchestras are superb! But for the Lord you have no thought or care.
¹³
 Therefore I will send you into exile far away because you neither know nor care that I have done so much for you. Your great and honored men will starve, and the common people will die of thirst.

    
¹⁴
 Hell is licking its chops in anticipation of this delicious morsel, Jerusalem. Her great and small shall be swallowed up, and all her drunken throngs.
¹⁵
 In that day the haughty shall be brought down to the dust; the proud shall be humbled;
¹⁶
 but the Lord Almighty is exalted above all, for he alone is holy, just, and good.
¹⁷
 In those days flocks will feed among the ruins. Lambs and calves and kids will pasture there!

    
¹⁸
 Woe to those who drag their sins behind them like a bullock on a rope.
*
¹⁹
 They even mock the Holy One of Israel and dare the Lord to punish them.
*
“Hurry up and punish us, O Lord,” they say. “We want to see what you can do!”
²⁰
 They say that what is right is wrong and what is wrong is right; that black is white and white is black; bitter is sweet and sweet is bitter.

    
²¹
 Woe to those who are wise and shrewd in their own eyes!
²²
 Woe to those who are “heroes” when it comes to drinking and boast about the liquor they can hold.
²³
 They take bribes to pervert justice, letting the wicked go free and putting innocent men in jail.
²⁴
 Therefore God will deal with them and burn them. They will disappear like straw on fire. Their roots will rot and their flowers wither, for they have thrown away the laws of God and despised the word of the Holy One of Israel.
²⁵
 That is why the anger of the Lord is hot against his people; that is why he has reached out his hand to smash them. The hills will tremble, and the rotting bodies of his people will be thrown as refuse in the streets. But even so, his anger is not ended; his hand is heavy on them still.

    
²⁶
 He will send a signal to the nations far away, whistling to those at the ends of the earth, and they will come racing toward Jerusalem.
²⁷
 They never weary, never stumble, never stop; their belts are tight, their bootstraps strong; they run without stopping for rest or for sleep.
²⁸
 Their arrows are sharp; their bows are bent; sparks fly from their horses’ hoofs, and the wheels of their chariots spin like the wind.
²⁹
 They roar like lions and pounce upon the prey. They seize my people and carry them off into captivity with none to rescue them.
³⁰
 They growl over their victims like the roaring of the sea. Over all Israel lies a pall of darkness and sorrow, and the heavens are black.