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¹O LORD, I will honor and praise your name, for you are my God. You do such wonderful things! You planned them long ago, and now you have accomplished them.

²You turn mighty cities into heaps of ruins. Cities with strong walls are turned to rubble. Beautiful palaces in distant lands disappear and will never be rebuilt.

³Therefore, strong nations will declare your glory; ruthless nations will fear you.

⁴But you are a tower of refuge to the poor, O LORD, a tower of refuge to the needy in distress. You are a refuge from the storm and a shelter from the heat. For the oppressive acts of ruthless people are like a storm beating against a wall,

⁵or like the relentless heat of the desert. But you silence the roar of foreign nations. As the shade of a cloud cools relentless heat, so the boastful songs of ruthless people are stilled.

⁶In Jerusalem, the LORD of Heaven’s Armies will spread a wonderful feast for all the people of the world. It will be a delicious banquet with clear, well-aged wine and choice meat.

⁷There he will remove the cloud of gloom, the shadow of death that hangs over the earth.

⁸He will swallow up death forever! The Sovereign LORD will wipe away all tears. He will remove forever all insults and mockery against his land and people. The LORD has spoken!

⁹In that day the people will proclaim, “This is our God! We trusted in him, and he saved us! This is the LORD, in whom we trusted. Let us rejoice in the salvation he brings!”

¹⁰For the LORD’s hand of blessing will rest on Jerusalem. But Moab will be crushed. It will be like straw trampled down and left to rot.

¹¹God will push down Moab’s people as a swimmer pushes down water with his hands. He will end their pride and all their evil works.

¹²The high walls of Moab will be demolished. They will be brought down to the ground, down into the dust.

¹In that day, everyone in the land of Judah will sing this song: Our city is strong! We are surrounded by the walls of God’s salvation.

²Open the gates to all who are righteous; allow the faithful to enter.

³You will keep in perfect peace all who trust in you, all whose thoughts are fixed on you!

⁴Trust in the LORD always, for the LORD GOD is the eternal Rock.

⁵He humbles the proud and brings down the arrogant city. He brings it down to the dust.

⁶The poor and oppressed trample it underfoot, and the needy walk all over it.

⁷But for those who are righteous, the way is not steep and rough. You are a God who does what is right, and you smooth out the path ahead of them.

⁸LORD, we show our trust in you by obeying your laws; our heart’s desire is to glorify your name.

⁹In the night I search for you; in the morning I earnestly seek you. For only when you come to judge the earth will people learn what is right.

¹⁰Your kindness to the wicked does not make them do good. Although others do right, the wicked keep doing wrong and take no notice of the LORD’s majesty.

¹¹O LORD, they pay no attention to your upraised fist. Show them your eagerness to defend your people. Then they will be ashamed. Let your fire consume your enemies.

¹²LORD, you will grant us peace; all we have accomplished is really from you.

¹³O LORD our God, others have ruled us, but you alone are the one we worship.

¹⁴Those we served before are dead and gone. Their departed spirits will never return! You attacked them and destroyed them, and they are long forgotten.

¹⁵O LORD, you have made our nation great; yes, you have made us great. You have extended our borders, and we give you the glory!

¹⁶LORD, in distress we searched for you. We prayed beneath the burden of your discipline.

¹⁷Just as a pregnant woman writhes and cries out in pain as she gives birth, so were we in your presence, LORD.

¹⁸We, too, writhe in agony, but nothing comes of our suffering. We have not given salvation to the earth, nor brought life into the world.

¹⁹But those who die in the LORD will live; their bodies will rise again! Those who sleep in the earth will rise up and sing for joy! For your life-giving light will fall like dew on your people in the place of the dead!

²⁰Go home, my people, and lock your doors! Hide yourselves for a little while until the LORD’s anger has passed.

²¹Look! The LORD is coming from heaven to punish the people of the earth for their sins. The earth will no longer hide those who have been killed. They will be brought out for all to see.

¹In that day the LORD will take his terrible, swift sword and punish Leviathan, the swiftly moving serpent, the coiling, writhing serpent. He will kill the dragon of the sea.

²“In that day, sing about the fruitful vineyard.

³I, the LORD, will watch over it, watering it carefully. Day and night I will watch so no one can harm it.

⁴My anger will be gone. If I find briers and thorns growing, I will attack them; I will burn them up —

⁵unless they turn to me for help. Let them make peace with me; yes, let them make peace with me.”

⁶The time is coming when Jacob’s descendants will take root. Israel will bud and blossom and fill the whole earth with fruit!

⁷Has the LORD struck Israel as he struck her enemies? Has he punished her as he punished them?

⁸No, but he exiled Israel to call her to account. She was exiled from her land as though blown away in a storm from the east.

⁹The LORD did this to purge Israel’s wickedness, to take away all her sin. As a result, all the pagan altars will be crushed to dust. No Asherah pole or pagan shrine will be left standing.

¹⁰The fortified towns will be silent and empty, the houses abandoned, the streets overgrown with weeds. Calves will graze there, chewing on twigs and branches.

¹¹The people are like the dead branches of a tree, broken off and used for kindling beneath the cooking pots. Israel is a foolish and stupid nation, for its people have turned away from God. Therefore, the one who made them will show them no pity or mercy.

¹²Yet the time will come when the LORD will gather them together like handpicked grain. One by one he will gather them — from the Euphrates River in the east to the Brook of Egypt in the west.

¹³In that day the great trumpet will sound. Many who were dying in exile in Assyria and Egypt will return to Jerusalem to worship the LORD on his holy mountain.

¹What sorrow awaits the proud city of Samaria — the glorious crown of the drunks of Israel. It sits at the head of a fertile valley, but its glorious beauty will fade like a flower. It is the pride of a people brought down by wine.

²For the Lord will send a mighty army against it. Like a mighty hailstorm and a torrential rain, they will burst upon it like a surging flood and smash it to the ground.

³The proud city of Samaria — the glorious crown of the drunks of Israel — will be trampled beneath its enemies’ feet.

⁴It sits at the head of a fertile valley, but its glorious beauty will fade like a flower. Whoever sees it will snatch it up, as an early fig is quickly picked and eaten.

⁵Then at last the LORD of Heaven’s Armies will himself be Israel’s glorious crown. He will be the pride and joy of the remnant of his people.

⁶He will give a longing for justice to their judges. He will give great courage to their warriors who stand at the gates.

⁷Now, however, Israel is led by drunks who reel with wine and stagger with alcohol. The priests and prophets stagger with alcohol and lose themselves in wine. They reel when they see visions and stagger as they render decisions.

⁸Their tables are covered with vomit; filth is everywhere.

⁹“Who does the LORD think we are?” they ask. “Why does he speak to us like this? Are we little children, just recently weaned?

¹⁰He tells us everything over and over — one line at a time, one line at a time, a little here, and a little there!”

¹¹So now God will have to speak to his people through foreign oppressors who speak a strange language!

¹²God has told his people, “Here is a place of rest; let the weary rest here. This is a place of quiet rest.” But they would not listen.

¹³So the LORD will spell out his message for them again, one line at a time, one line at a time, a little here, and a little there, so that they will stumble and fall. They will be injured, trapped, and captured.

¹⁴Therefore, listen to this message from the LORD, you scoffing rulers in Jerusalem.

¹⁵You boast, “We have struck a bargain to cheat death and have made a deal to dodge the grave. The coming destruction can never touch us, for we have built a strong refuge made of lies and deception.”

¹⁶Therefore, this is what the Sovereign LORD says: “Look! I am placing a foundation stone in Jerusalem, a firm and tested stone. It is a precious cornerstone that is safe to build on. Whoever believes need never be shaken.

¹⁷I will test you with the measuring line of justice and the plumb line of righteousness. Since your refuge is made of lies, a hailstorm will knock it down. Since it is made of deception, a flood will sweep it away.

¹⁸I will cancel the bargain you made to cheat death, and I will overturn your deal to dodge the grave. When the terrible enemy sweeps through, you will be trampled into the ground.

¹⁹Again and again that flood will come, morning after morning, day and night, until you are carried away.” This message will bring terror to your people.

²⁰The bed you have made is too short to lie on. The blankets are too narrow to cover you.

²¹The LORD will come as he did against the Philistines at Mount Perazim and against the Amorites at Gibeon. He will come to do a strange thing; he will come to do an unusual deed:

²²For the Lord, the LORD of Heaven’s Armies, has plainly said that he is determined to crush the whole land. So scoff no more, or your punishment will be even greater.

²³Listen to me; listen, and pay close attention.

²⁴Does a farmer always plow and never sow? Is he forever cultivating the soil and never planting?

²⁵Does he not finally plant his seeds — black cumin, cumin, wheat, barley, and emmer wheat — each in its proper way, and each in its proper place?

²⁶The farmer knows just what to do, for God has given him understanding.

²⁷A heavy sledge is never used to thresh black cumin; rather, it is beaten with a light stick. A threshing wheel is never rolled on cumin; instead, it is beaten lightly with a flail.

²⁸Grain for bread is easily crushed, so he doesn’t keep on pounding it. He threshes it under the wheels of a cart, but he doesn’t pulverize it.

²⁹The LORD of Heaven’s Armies is a wonderful teacher, and he gives the farmer great wisdom.