Bible in 90 Days Plan

¹Then I looked up again and saw four chariots coming from between two bronze mountains.

²The first chariot was pulled by red horses, the second by black horses,

³the third by white horses, and the fourth by powerful dappled-gray horses.

⁴“And what are these, my lord?” I asked the angel who was talking with me.

⁵The angel replied, “These are the four spirits of heaven who stand before the Lord of all the earth. They are going out to do his work.

⁶The chariot with black horses is going north, the chariot with white horses is going west, and the chariot with dappled-gray horses is going south.”

⁷The powerful horses were eager to set out to patrol the earth. And the LORD said, “Go and patrol the earth!” So they left at once on their patrol.

⁸Then the LORD summoned me and said, “Look, those who went north have vented the anger of my Spirit there in the land of the north.”

⁹Then I received another message from the LORD:

¹⁰“Heldai, Tobijah, and Jedaiah will bring gifts of silver and gold from the Jews exiled in Babylon. As soon as they arrive, meet them at the home of Josiah son of Zephaniah.

¹¹Accept their gifts, and make a crown from the silver and gold. Then put the crown on the head of Jeshua son of Jehozadak, the high priest.

¹²Tell him, ‘This is what the LORD of Heaven’s Armies says: Here is the man called the Branch. He will branch out from where he is and build the Temple of the LORD.

¹³Yes, he will build the Temple of the LORD. Then he will receive royal honor and will rule as king from his throne. He will also serve as priest from his throne, and there will be perfect harmony between his two roles.’

¹⁴“The crown will be a memorial in the Temple of the LORD to honor those who gave it — Heldai, Tobijah, Jedaiah, and Josiah son of Zephaniah.”

¹⁵People will come from distant lands to rebuild the Temple of the LORD. And when this happens, you will know that my messages have been from the LORD of Heaven’s Armies. All this will happen if you carefully obey what the LORD your God says.

¹On December 7 of the fourth year of King Darius’s reign, another message came to Zechariah from the LORD.

²The people of Bethel had sent Sharezer and Regemmelech, along with their attendants, to seek the LORD’s favor.

³They were to ask this question of the prophets and the priests at the Temple of the LORD of Heaven’s Armies: “Should we continue to mourn and fast each summer on the anniversary of the Temple’s destruction, as we have done for so many years?”

⁴The LORD of Heaven’s Armies sent me this message in reply:

⁵“Say to all your people and your priests, ‘During these seventy years of exile, when you fasted and mourned in the summer and in early autumn, was it really for me that you were fasting?

⁶And even now in your holy festivals, aren’t you eating and drinking just to please yourselves?

⁷Isn’t this the same message the LORD proclaimed through the prophets in years past when Jerusalem and the towns of Judah were bustling with people, and the Negev and the foothills of Judah were well populated?’”

⁸Then this message came to Zechariah from the LORD:

⁹“This is what the LORD of Heaven’s Armies says: Judge fairly, and show mercy and kindness to one another.

¹⁰Do not oppress widows, orphans, foreigners, and the poor. And do not scheme against each other.

¹¹“Your ancestors refused to listen to this message. They stubbornly turned away and put their fingers in their ears to keep from hearing.

¹²They made their hearts as hard as stone, so they could not hear the instructions or the messages that the LORD of Heaven’s Armies had sent them by his Spirit through the earlier prophets. That is why the LORD of Heaven’s Armies was so angry with them.

¹³“Since they refused to listen when I called to them, I would not listen when they called to me, says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

¹⁴As with a whirlwind, I scattered them among the distant nations, where they lived as strangers. Their land became so desolate that no one even traveled through it. They turned their pleasant land into a desert.”

¹Then another message came to me from the LORD of Heaven’s Armies:

²“This is what the LORD of Heaven’s Armies says: My love for Mount Zion is passionate and strong; I am consumed with passion for Jerusalem!

³“And now the LORD says: I am returning to Mount Zion, and I will live in Jerusalem. Then Jerusalem will be called the Faithful City; the mountain of the LORD of Heaven’s Armies will be called the Holy Mountain.

⁴“This is what the LORD of Heaven’s Armies says: Once again old men and women will walk Jerusalem’s streets with their canes and will sit together in the city squares.

⁵And the streets of the city will be filled with boys and girls at play.

⁶“This is what the LORD of Heaven’s Armies says: All this may seem impossible to you now, a small remnant of God’s people. But is it impossible for me? says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

⁷“This is what the LORD of Heaven’s Armies says: You can be sure that I will rescue my people from the east and from the west.

⁸I will bring them home again to live safely in Jerusalem. They will be my people, and I will be faithful and just toward them as their God.

⁹“This is what the LORD of Heaven’s Armies says: Be strong and finish the task! Ever since the laying of the foundation of the Temple of the LORD of Heaven’s Armies, you have heard what the prophets have been saying about completing the building.

¹⁰Before the work on the Temple began, there were no jobs and no money to hire people or animals. No traveler was safe from the enemy, for there were enemies on all sides. I had turned everyone against each other.

¹¹“But now I will not treat the remnant of my people as I treated them before, says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

¹²For I am planting seeds of peace and prosperity among you. The grapevines will be heavy with fruit. The earth will produce its crops, and the heavens will release the dew. Once more I will cause the remnant in Judah and Israel to inherit these blessings.

¹³Among the other nations, Judah and Israel became symbols of a cursed nation. But no longer! Now I will rescue you and make you both a symbol and a source of blessing. So don’t be afraid. Be strong, and get on with rebuilding the Temple!

¹⁴“For this is what the LORD of Heaven’s Armies says: I was determined to punish you when your ancestors angered me, and I did not change my mind, says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

¹⁵But now I am determined to bless Jerusalem and the people of Judah. So don’t be afraid.

¹⁶But this is what you must do: Tell the truth to each other. Render verdicts in your courts that are just and that lead to peace.

¹⁷Don’t scheme against each other. Stop your love of telling lies that you swear are the truth. I hate all these things, says the LORD.”

¹⁸Here is another message that came to me from the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

¹⁹“This is what the LORD of Heaven’s Armies says: The traditional fasts and times of mourning you have kept in early summer, midsummer, autumn, and winter are now ended. They will become festivals of joy and celebration for the people of Judah. So love truth and peace.

²⁰“This is what the LORD of Heaven’s Armies says: People from nations and cities around the world will travel to Jerusalem.

²¹The people of one city will say to the people of another, ‘Come with us to Jerusalem to ask the LORD to bless us. Let’s worship the LORD of Heaven’s Armies. I’m determined to go.’

²²Many peoples and powerful nations will come to Jerusalem to seek the LORD of Heaven’s Armies and to ask for his blessing.

²³“This is what the LORD of Heaven’s Armies says: In those days ten men from different nations and languages of the world will clutch at the sleeve of one Jew. And they will say, ‘Please let us walk with you, for we have heard that God is with you.’”

¹This is the message from the LORD against the land of Aram and the city of Damascus, for the eyes of humanity, including all the tribes of Israel, are on the LORD.

²Doom is certain for Hamath, near Damascus, and for the cities of Tyre and Sidon, though they are so clever.

³Tyre has built a strong fortress and has made silver and gold as plentiful as dust in the streets!

⁴But now the Lord will strip away Tyre’s possessions and hurl its fortifications into the sea, and it will be burned to the ground.

⁵The city of Ashkelon will see Tyre fall and will be filled with fear. Gaza will shake with terror, as will Ekron, for their hopes will be dashed. Gaza’s king will be killed, and Ashkelon will be deserted.

⁶Foreigners will occupy the city of Ashdod. I will destroy the pride of the Philistines.

⁷I will grab the bloody meat from their mouths and snatch the detestable sacrifices from their teeth. Then the surviving Philistines will worship our God and become like a clan in Judah. The Philistines of Ekron will join my people, as the ancient Jebusites once did.

⁸I will guard my Temple and protect it from invading armies. I am watching closely to ensure that no more foreign oppressors overrun my people’s land.

⁹Rejoice, O people of Zion! Shout in triumph, O people of Jerusalem! Look, your king is coming to you. He is righteous and victorious, yet he is humble, riding on a donkey — riding on a donkey’s colt.

¹⁰I will remove the battle chariots from Israel and the warhorses from Jerusalem. I will destroy all the weapons used in battle, and your king will bring peace to the nations. His realm will stretch from sea to sea and from the Euphrates River to the ends of the earth.

¹¹Because of the covenant I made with you, sealed with blood, I will free your prisoners from death in a waterless dungeon.

¹²Come back to the place of safety, all you prisoners who still have hope! I promise this very day that I will repay two blessings for each of your troubles.

¹³Judah is my bow, and Israel is my arrow. Jerusalem is my sword, and like a warrior, I will brandish it against the Greeks.

¹⁴The LORD will appear above his people; his arrows will fly like lightning! The Sovereign LORD will sound the ram’s horn and attack like a whirlwind from the southern desert.

¹⁵The LORD of Heaven’s Armies will protect his people, and they will defeat their enemies by hurling great stones. They will shout in battle as though drunk with wine. They will be filled with blood like a bowl, drenched with blood like the corners of the altar.

¹⁶On that day the LORD their God will rescue his people, just as a shepherd rescues his sheep. They will sparkle in his land like jewels in a crown.

¹⁷How wonderful and beautiful they will be! The young men will thrive on abundant grain, and the young women will flourish on new wine.

¹Ask the LORD for rain in the spring, for he makes the storm clouds. And he will send showers of rain so every field becomes a lush pasture.

²Household gods give worthless advice, fortune-tellers predict only lies, and interpreters of dreams pronounce falsehoods that give no comfort. So my people are wandering like lost sheep; they are attacked because they have no shepherd.

³“My anger burns against your shepherds, and I will punish these leaders. For the LORD of Heaven’s Armies has arrived to look after Judah, his flock. He will make them strong and glorious, like a proud warhorse in battle.

⁴From Judah will come the cornerstone, the tent peg, the bow for battle, and all the rulers.

⁵They will be like mighty warriors in battle, trampling their enemies in the mud under their feet. Since the LORD is with them as they fight, they will overthrow even the enemy’s horsemen.

⁶“I will strengthen Judah and save Israel ; I will restore them because of my compassion. It will be as though I had never rejected them, for I am the LORD their God, who will hear their cries.

⁷The people of Israel will become like mighty warriors, and their hearts will be made happy as if by wine. Their children, too, will see it and be glad; their hearts will rejoice in the LORD.

⁸When I whistle to them, they will come running, for I have redeemed them. From the few who are left, they will grow as numerous as they were before.

⁹Though I have scattered them like seeds among the nations, they will still remember me in distant lands. They and their children will survive and return again to Israel.

¹⁰I will bring them back from Egypt and gather them from Assyria. I will resettle them in Gilead and Lebanon until there is no more room for them all.

¹¹They will pass safely through the sea of distress, for the waves of the sea will be held back, and the waters of the Nile will dry up. The pride of Assyria will be crushed, and the rule of Egypt will end.

¹²By my power I will make my people strong, and by my authority they will go wherever they wish. I, the LORD, have spoken!”

¹Open your doors, Lebanon, so that fire may devour your cedar forests.

²Weep, you cypress trees, for all the ruined cedars; the most majestic ones have fallen. Weep, you oaks of Bashan, for the thick forests have been cut down.

³Listen to the wailing of the shepherds, for their rich pastures are destroyed. Hear the young lions roaring, for their thickets in the Jordan Valley are ruined.

⁴This is what the LORD my God says: “Go and care for the flock that is intended for slaughter.

⁵The buyers slaughter their sheep without remorse. The sellers say, ‘Praise the LORD! Now I’m rich!’ Even the shepherds have no compassion for them.

⁶Likewise, I will no longer have pity on the people of the land,” says the LORD. “I will let them fall into each other’s hands and into the hands of their king. They will turn the land into a wilderness, and I will not rescue them.”

⁷So I cared for the flock intended for slaughter — the flock that was oppressed. Then I took two shepherd’s staffs and named one Favor and the other Union.

⁸I got rid of their three evil shepherds in a single month. But I became impatient with these sheep, and they hated me, too.

⁹So I told them, “I won’t be your shepherd any longer. If you die, you die. If you are killed, you are killed. And let those who remain devour each other!”

¹⁰Then I took my staff called Favor and cut it in two, showing that I had revoked the covenant I had made with all the nations.

¹¹That was the end of my covenant with them. The suffering flock was watching me, and they knew that the LORD was speaking through my actions.

¹²And I said to them, “If you like, give me my wages, whatever I am worth; but only if you want to.” So they counted out for my wages thirty pieces of silver.

¹³And the LORD said to me, “Throw it to the potter ” — this magnificent sum at which they valued me! So I took the thirty coins and threw them to the potter in the Temple of the LORD.

¹⁴Then I took my other staff, Union, and cut it in two, showing that the bond of unity between Judah and Israel was broken.

¹⁵Then the LORD said to me, “Go again and play the part of a worthless shepherd.

¹⁶This illustrates how I will give this nation a shepherd who will not care for those who are dying, nor look after the young, nor heal the injured, nor feed the healthy. Instead, this shepherd will eat the meat of the fattest sheep and tear off their hooves.

¹⁷“What sorrow awaits this worthless shepherd who abandons the flock! The sword will cut his arm and pierce his right eye. His arm will become useless, and his right eye completely blind.”

¹This message concerning the fate of Israel came from the LORD: “This message is from the LORD, who stretched out the heavens, laid the foundations of the earth, and formed the human spirit.

²I will make Jerusalem like an intoxicating drink that makes the nearby nations stagger when they send their armies to besiege Jerusalem and Judah.

³On that day I will make Jerusalem an immovable rock. All the nations will gather against it to try to move it, but they will only hurt themselves.

⁴“On that day,” says the LORD, “I will cause every horse to panic and every rider to lose his nerve. I will watch over the people of Judah, but I will blind all the horses of their enemies.

⁵And the clans of Judah will say to themselves, ‘The people of Jerusalem have found strength in the LORD of Heaven’s Armies, their God.’

⁶“On that day I will make the clans of Judah like a flame that sets a woodpile ablaze or like a burning torch among sheaves of grain. They will burn up all the neighboring nations right and left, while the people living in Jerusalem remain secure.

⁷“The LORD will give victory to the rest of Judah first, before Jerusalem, so that the people of Jerusalem and the royal line of David will not have greater honor than the rest of Judah.

⁸On that day the LORD will defend the people of Jerusalem; the weakest among them will be as mighty as King David! And the royal descendants will be like God, like the angel of the LORD who goes before them!

⁹For on that day I will begin to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.

¹⁰“Then I will pour out a spirit of grace and prayer on the family of David and on the people of Jerusalem. They will look on me whom they have pierced and mourn for him as for an only son. They will grieve bitterly for him as for a firstborn son who has died.

¹¹The sorrow and mourning in Jerusalem on that day will be like the great mourning for Hadad-rimmon in the valley of Megiddo.

¹²“All Israel will mourn, each clan by itself, and with the husbands separate from their wives. The clan of David will mourn alone, as will the clan of Nathan,

¹³the clan of Levi, and the clan of Shimei.

¹⁴Each of the surviving clans from Judah will mourn separately, and with the husbands separate from their wives.

¹“On that day a fountain will be opened for the dynasty of David and for the people of Jerusalem, a fountain to cleanse them from all their sins and impurity.

²“And on that day,” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies, “I will erase idol worship throughout the land, so that even the names of the idols will be forgotten. I will remove from the land both the false prophets and the spirit of impurity that came with them.

³If anyone continues to prophesy, his own father and mother will tell him, ‘You must die, for you have prophesied lies in the name of the LORD.’ And as he prophesies, his own father and mother will stab him.

⁴“On that day people will be ashamed to claim the prophetic gift. No one will pretend to be a prophet by wearing prophet’s clothes.

⁵He will say, ‘I’m no prophet; I’m a farmer. I began working for a farmer as a boy.’

⁶And if someone asks, ‘Then what about those wounds on your chest? ’ he will say, ‘I was wounded at my friends’ house!’

⁷“Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, the man who is my partner,” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies. “Strike down the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered, and I will turn against the lambs.

⁸Two-thirds of the people in the land will be cut off and die,” says the LORD. “But one-third will be left in the land.

⁹I will bring that group through the fire and make them pure. I will refine them like silver and purify them like gold. They will call on my name, and I will answer them. I will say, ‘These are my people,’ and they will say, ‘The LORD is our God.’”

¹Watch, for the day of the LORD is coming when your possessions will be plundered right in front of you!

²I will gather all the nations to fight against Jerusalem. The city will be taken, the houses looted, and the women raped. Half the population will be taken into captivity, and the rest will be left among the ruins of the city.

³Then the LORD will go out to fight against those nations, as he has fought in times past.

⁴On that day his feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, east of Jerusalem. And the Mount of Olives will split apart, making a wide valley running from east to west. Half the mountain will move toward the north and half toward the south.

⁵You will flee through this valley, for it will reach across to Azal. Yes, you will flee as you did from the earthquake in the days of King Uzziah of Judah. Then the LORD my God will come, and all his holy ones with him.

⁶On that day the sources of light will no longer shine,

⁷yet there will be continuous day! Only the LORD knows how this could happen. There will be no normal day and night, for at evening time it will still be light.

⁸On that day life-giving waters will flow out from Jerusalem, half toward the Dead Sea and half toward the Mediterranean, flowing continuously in both summer and winter.

⁹And the LORD will be king over all the earth. On that day there will be one LORD — his name alone will be worshiped.

¹⁰All the land from Geba, north of Judah, to Rimmon, south of Jerusalem, will become one vast plain. But Jerusalem will be raised up in its original place and will be inhabited all the way from the Benjamin Gate over to the site of the old gate, then to the Corner Gate, and from the Tower of Hananel to the king’s winepresses.

¹¹And Jerusalem will be filled, safe at last, never again to be cursed and destroyed.

¹²And the LORD will send a plague on all the nations that fought against Jerusalem. Their people will become like walking corpses, their flesh rotting away. Their eyes will rot in their sockets, and their tongues will rot in their mouths.

¹³On that day they will be terrified, stricken by the LORD with great panic. They will fight their neighbors hand to hand.

¹⁴Judah, too, will be fighting at Jerusalem. The wealth of all the neighboring nations will be captured — great quantities of gold and silver and fine clothing.

¹⁵This same plague will strike the horses, mules, camels, donkeys, and all the other animals in the enemy camps.

¹⁶In the end, the enemies of Jerusalem who survive the plague will go up to Jerusalem each year to worship the King, the LORD of Heaven’s Armies, and to celebrate the Festival of Shelters.

¹⁷Any nation in the world that refuses to come to Jerusalem to worship the King, the LORD of Heaven’s Armies, will have no rain.

¹⁸If the people of Egypt refuse to attend the festival, the LORD will punish them with the same plague that he sends on the other nations who refuse to go.

¹⁹Egypt and the other nations will all be punished if they don’t go to celebrate the Festival of Shelters.

²⁰On that day even the harness bells of the horses will be inscribed with these words: HOLY TO THE LORD. And the cooking pots in the Temple of the LORD will be as sacred as the basins used beside the altar.

²¹In fact, every cooking pot in Jerusalem and Judah will be holy to the LORD of Heaven’s Armies. All who come to worship will be free to use any of these pots to boil their sacrifices. And on that day there will no longer be traders in the Temple of the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

¹This is the message that the LORD gave to Israel through the prophet Malachi.

²“I have always loved you,” says the LORD. But you retort, “Really? How have you loved us?” And the LORD replies, “This is how I showed my love for you: I loved your ancestor Jacob,

³but I rejected his brother, Esau, and devastated his hill country. I turned Esau’s inheritance into a desert for jackals.”

⁴Esau’s descendants in Edom may say, “We have been shattered, but we will rebuild the ruins.” But the LORD of Heaven’s Armies replies, “They may try to rebuild, but I will demolish them again. Their country will be known as ‘The Land of Wickedness,’ and their people will be called ‘The People with Whom the LORD Is Forever Angry.’

⁵When you see the destruction for yourselves, you will say, ‘Truly, the LORD’s greatness reaches far beyond Israel’s borders!’”

⁶The LORD of Heaven’s Armies says to the priests: “A son honors his father, and a servant respects his master. If I am your father and master, where are the honor and respect I deserve? You have shown contempt for my name! “But you ask, ‘How have we ever shown contempt for your name?’

⁷“You have shown contempt by offering defiled sacrifices on my altar. “Then you ask, ‘How have we defiled the sacrifices? ’ “You defile them by saying the altar of the LORD deserves no respect.

⁸When you give blind animals as sacrifices, isn’t that wrong? And isn’t it wrong to offer animals that are crippled and diseased? Try giving gifts like that to your governor, and see how pleased he is!” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

⁹“Go ahead, beg God to be merciful to you! But when you bring that kind of offering, why should he show you any favor at all?” asks the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

¹⁰“How I wish one of you would shut the Temple doors so that these worthless sacrifices could not be offered! I am not pleased with you,” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies, “and I will not accept your offerings.

¹¹But my name is honored by people of other nations from morning till night. All around the world they offer sweet incense and pure offerings in honor of my name. For my name is great among the nations,” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

¹²“But you dishonor my name with your actions. By bringing contemptible food, you are saying it’s all right to defile the Lord’s table.

¹³You say, ‘It’s too hard to serve the LORD,’ and you turn up your noses at my commands,” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies. “Think of it! Animals that are stolen and crippled and sick are being presented as offerings! Should I accept from you such offerings as these?” asks the LORD.

¹⁴“Cursed is the cheat who promises to give a fine ram from his flock but then sacrifices a defective one to the Lord. For I am a great king,” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies, “and my name is feared among the nations!

¹“Listen, you priests — this command is for you!

²Listen to me and make up your minds to honor my name,” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies, “or I will bring a terrible curse against you. I will curse even the blessings you receive. Indeed, I have already cursed them, because you have not taken my warning to heart.

³I will punish your descendants and splatter your faces with the manure from your festival sacrifices, and I will throw you on the manure pile.

⁴Then at last you will know it was I who sent you this warning so that my covenant with the Levites can continue,” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

⁵“The purpose of my covenant with the Levites was to bring life and peace, and that is what I gave them. This required reverence from them, and they greatly revered me and stood in awe of my name.

⁶They passed on to the people the truth of the instructions they received from me. They did not lie or cheat; they walked with me, living good and righteous lives, and they turned many from lives of sin.

⁷“The words of a priest’s lips should preserve knowledge of God, and people should go to him for instruction, for the priest is the messenger of the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

⁸But you priests have left God’s paths. Your instructions have caused many to stumble into sin. You have corrupted the covenant I made with the Levites,” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

⁹“So I have made you despised and humiliated in the eyes of all the people. For you have not obeyed me but have shown favoritism in the way you carry out my instructions.”

¹⁰Are we not all children of the same Father? Are we not all created by the same God? Then why do we betray each other, violating the covenant of our ancestors?

¹¹Judah has been unfaithful, and a detestable thing has been done in Israel and in Jerusalem. The men of Judah have defiled the LORD’s beloved sanctuary by marrying women who worship idols.

¹²May the LORD cut off from the nation of Israel every last man who has done this and yet brings an offering to the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

¹³Here is another thing you do. You cover the LORD’s altar with tears, weeping and groaning because he pays no attention to your offerings and doesn’t accept them with pleasure.

¹⁴You cry out, “Why doesn’t the LORD accept my worship?” I’ll tell you why! Because the LORD witnessed the vows you and your wife made when you were young. But you have been unfaithful to her, though she remained your faithful partner, the wife of your marriage vows.

¹⁵Didn’t the LORD make you one with your wife? In body and spirit you are his. And what does he want? Godly children from your union. So guard your heart; remain loyal to the wife of your youth.

¹⁶“For I hate divorce!” says the LORD, the God of Israel. “To divorce your wife is to overwhelm her with cruelty, ” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies. “So guard your heart; do not be unfaithful to your wife.”

¹⁷You have wearied the LORD with your words. “How have we wearied him?” you ask. You have wearied him by saying that all who do evil are good in the LORD’s sight, and he is pleased with them. You have wearied him by asking, “Where is the God of justice?”

¹“Look! I am sending my messenger, and he will prepare the way before me. Then the Lord you are seeking will suddenly come to his Temple. The messenger of the covenant, whom you look for so eagerly, is surely coming,” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

²“But who will be able to endure it when he comes? Who will be able to stand and face him when he appears? For he will be like a blazing fire that refines metal, or like a strong soap that bleaches clothes.

³He will sit like a refiner of silver, burning away the dross. He will purify the Levites, refining them like gold and silver, so that they may once again offer acceptable sacrifices to the LORD.

⁴Then once more the LORD will accept the offerings brought to him by the people of Judah and Jerusalem, as he did in the past.

⁵“At that time I will put you on trial. I am eager to witness against all sorcerers and adulterers and liars. I will speak against those who cheat employees of their wages, who oppress widows and orphans, or who deprive the foreigners living among you of justice, for these people do not fear me,” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

⁶“I am the LORD, and I do not change. That is why you descendants of Jacob are not already destroyed.

⁷Ever since the days of your ancestors, you have scorned my decrees and failed to obey them. Now return to me, and I will return to you,” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies. “But you ask, ‘How can we return when we have never gone away?’

⁸“Should people cheat God? Yet you have cheated me! “But you ask, ‘What do you mean? When did we ever cheat you?’ “You have cheated me of the tithes and offerings due to me.

⁹You are under a curse, for your whole nation has been cheating me.

¹⁰Bring all the tithes into the storehouse so there will be enough food in my Temple. If you do,” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies, “I will open the windows of heaven for you. I will pour out a blessing so great you won’t have enough room to take it in! Try it! Put me to the test!

¹¹Your crops will be abundant, for I will guard them from insects and disease. Your grapes will not fall from the vine before they are ripe,” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

¹²“Then all nations will call you blessed, for your land will be such a delight,” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

¹³“You have said terrible things about me,” says the LORD. “But you say, ‘What do you mean? What have we said against you?’

¹⁴“You have said, ‘What’s the use of serving God? What have we gained by obeying his commands or by trying to show the LORD of Heaven’s Armies that we are sorry for our sins?

¹⁵From now on we will call the arrogant blessed. For those who do evil get rich, and those who dare God to punish them suffer no harm.’”

¹⁶Then those who feared the LORD spoke with each other, and the LORD listened to what they said. In his presence, a scroll of remembrance was written to record the names of those who feared him and always thought about the honor of his name.

¹⁷“They will be my people,” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies. “On the day when I act in judgment, they will be my own special treasure. I will spare them as a father spares an obedient child.

¹⁸Then you will again see the difference between the righteous and the wicked, between those who serve God and those who do not.”

¹The LORD of Heaven’s Armies says, “The day of judgment is coming, burning like a furnace. On that day the arrogant and the wicked will be burned up like straw. They will be consumed — roots, branches, and all.

²“But for you who fear my name, the Sun of Righteousness will rise with healing in his wings. And you will go free, leaping with joy like calves let out to pasture.

³On the day when I act, you will tread upon the wicked as if they were dust under your feet,” says the LORD of Heaven’s Armies.

⁴“Remember to obey the Law of Moses, my servant — all the decrees and regulations that I gave him on Mount Sinai for all Israel.

⁵“Look, I am sending you the prophet Elijah before the great and dreadful day of the LORD arrives.

⁶His preaching will turn the hearts of fathers to their children, and the hearts of children to their fathers. Otherwise I will come and strike the land with a curse.”