Isaiah 24 - 25 - Legacy Standard Bible

Isaiah 24 - 25

Yahweh Will Empty the Earth

Behold, Yahweh empties the earth to destruction, eviscerates it, distorts its surface, and scatters its inhabitants. 2 And the people will be like the priest, the male slave like his master, the female slave like her mistress, the buyer like the seller, the lender like the borrower, the creditor like the debtor. 3 The earth will be completely emptied to destruction and completely plundered, for Yahweh has spoken this word. 4 The earth mourns and withers; the world languishes and withers; the exalted of the people of the earth languish. 5 The earth is also polluted by its inhabitants, for they trespassed laws, violated statutes, broke the everlasting covenant. 6 Therefore, a curse devours the earth, and those who inhabit it are held guilty. Therefore, the inhabitants of the earth are burned, and few men remain. 7

The new wine mourns;

The vine languishes;

All the glad of heart sigh.

The joy of tambourines ceases;

The rumbling of those exulting stops;

The joy of the harp ceases.

They do not drink wine with song;

Strong drink is bitter to those who drink it.

The city of chaos is broken down;

Every house is shut up so that none may enter.

There is an outcry in the streets concerning the wine;

All gladness turns to gloom.

The joy of the earth is taken away into exile.

Desolation remains in the city,

And the gate is struck down to ruins.

For thus it will be in the midst of the earth among the peoples,

As the shaking of an olive tree,

As the gleanings when the grape harvest is over.

They lift up their voices, they shout for joy;

They cry out from the west concerning the majesty of Yahweh.

Therefore glorify Yahweh in the east,

The name of Yahweh, the God of Israel,

In the coastlands of the sea.

From the ends of the earth we hear songs, “Glory to the Righteous One,”

But I say, “I waste away! I waste away! Woe is me!

The treacherous deal treacherously,

And the treacherous deal very treacherously.”

Panic and pit and pitfall

Are upon you, O inhabitant of the earth.

Then it will be that he who flees the sound of panic will fall into the pit,

And he who climbs out of the pit will be caught in the pitfall;

For the windows above are opened, and the foundations of the earth quake.

The earth is broken asunder;

The earth is split through;

The earth is shaken violently.

The earth reels to and fro like a drunkard

And it totters like a shack,

For its transgression is heavy upon it,

And it will fall, never to rise again.

So it will be in that day,

That Yahweh will punish the host of heights on high,

And the kings of the earth on earth.

They will be gathered together

Like prisoners in the pit,

And will be confined in prison;

And after many days they will be punished.

Then the moon will be humiliated and the sun ashamed,

For Yahweh of hosts will reign on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem,

And His glory will be before His elders.

Yahweh Will Swallow Up Death

O Yahweh, You are my God;

I will exalt You, I will give thanks to Your name;

For You have worked wonders,

Counsels formed long ago, with perfect faithfulness.

For You have made a city into a heap,

A fortified town into a ruin;

A palace of strangers is a city no more,

It will never be rebuilt.

Therefore a strong people will glorify You;

Towns of ruthless nations will fear You.

For You have been a strong defense for the poor,

A strong defense for the needy in his distress,

A refuge from the storm, a shade from the heat;

For the breath of the ruthless

Is like a rain storm against a wall.

Like heat in a dry land, You subdue the rumbling of strangers;

Like heat by the shadow of a cloud, the song of the ruthless is silenced.

And Yahweh of hosts will prepare a lavish banquet for all peoples on this mountain;

A banquet of aged wine, choice pieces with marrow,

And refined, aged wine.

And on this mountain He will swallow up the covering which is over all peoples,

Even the veil which is stretched over all nations.

He will swallow up death for all time,

And Lord Yahweh will wipe tears away from all faces,

And He will remove the reproach of His people from all the earth;

For Yahweh has spoken.

And it will be said in that day,

“Behold, this is our God in whom we have hoped that He would save us.

This is Yahweh in whom we have hoped;

Let us rejoice and be glad in His salvation.”

For the hand of Yahweh will rest on this mountain,

And Moab will be trodden down in his place

As straw is trodden down in the water of a manure pile.

And he will spread out his hands in the middle of it

As a swimmer spreads out his hands to swim,

But Yahweh will lay low his lofty pride together with the trickery of his hands.

The unassailable fortifications of your walls He will bring down,

Lay low, and cast to the ground, even to the dust.

Luke 14

Jesus Heals on the Sabbath

And it happened that when He went into the house of one of the leaders of the Pharisees on the Sabbath to eat bread, they were watching Him closely. 2 And behold, in front of Him was a man suffering from dropsy. 3 And Jesus answered and spoke to the scholars of the Law and Pharisees, saying, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath, or not?” 4 But they were silent. And He took hold of him, healed him, and sent him away. 5 And He said to them, “Which one of you will have a son or an ox fall into a well, and will not immediately pull him out on a Sabbath day?” 6 And they could make no reply to this.

Parable of the Wedding Feast

7 And He was telling a parable to the invited guests when He noticed how they were picking out the places of honor at the table, saying to them, 8 “When you are invited by someone to a wedding feast, do not recline at the place of honor, lest someone more highly regarded than you be invited by him, 9 and he who invited you both will come and say to you, ‘Give your place to this man,’ and then in shame you proceed to occupy the last place. 10 But when you are invited, go and recline at the last place, so that when the one who has invited you comes, he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher’; then you will have honor in the sight of all who recline at the table with you. 11 For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.” 12 And He also went on to say to the one who had invited Him, “When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return and that will be your repayment. 13 But when you give a reception, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, 14 and you will be blessed, since they do not have the means to repay you; for it will be repaid to you at the resurrection of the righteous.” 15 But when one of those who were reclining at the table with Him heard this, he said to Him, “Blessed is everyone who will eat bread in the kingdom of God!”

Parable of the Dinner

16 And He said to him, “A man was giving a big dinner, and he invited many. 17 And at the dinner hour he sent his slave to say to those who had been invited, ‘Come, for everything is ready now.’ 18 But they all alike began to make excuses. The first one said to him, ‘I have bought a piece of land and I need to go out and look at it. I ask you, consider me excused.’ 19 And another one said, ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I am going to try them out. I ask you, consider me excused.’ 20 And another one said, ‘I have married a wife, and for that reason I cannot come.’ 21 And when the slave came back, he reported these things to his master. Then the head of the household became angry and said to his slave, ‘Go out at once into the streets and lanes of the city and bring in here the poor and crippled and blind and lame.’ 22 And the slave said, ‘Master, what you commanded has been done, and still there is room.’ 23 And the master said to the slave, ‘Go out into the highways and along the fences, and compel them to come in, so that my house may be filled. 24 For I tell you, none of those men who were invited shall taste of my dinner.’”

The Cost of Discipleship

25 Now many crowds were going along with Him, and He turned and said to them, 26 “If anyone comes to Me, and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple. 27 Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple. 28 For which one of you, when he wants to build a tower, does not first sit down and calculate the cost to see if he has enough to complete it? 29 Lest, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who observe it begin to ridicule him, 30 saying, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish.’ 31 Or what king, when he sets out to meet another king in battle, will not first sit down and consider whether he is strong enough with ten thousand men to encounter the one coming against him with twenty thousand? 32 Or else, while the other is still far away, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace. 33 So then, none of you can be My disciple who does not give up all his own possessions. 34 “Therefore, salt is good, but if even salt has become tasteless, with what will it be seasoned? 35 It is useless either for the soil or for the manure pile; it is thrown out. He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”

Psalm 49

Why Should I Fear in Days of Evil?

For the choir director. Of the sons of Korah. A Psalm.

Hear this, all peoples;

Give ear, all inhabitants of the world,

Both low and high,

Rich and poor together.

My mouth will speak wisdom,

And the meditation of my heart will be discernment.

I will incline my ear to a proverb;

I will express my riddle on the harp.

Why should I fear in days of evil,

When the iniquity of my supplanters surrounds me,

Even those who trust in their wealth

And boast in the abundance of their riches?

Truly, no man can redeem his brother;

He cannot give to God a ransom for him—

For the redemption price for their soul is costly,

And it ceases forever—

That he should live on eternally,

That he should not see corruption.

For he sees that even wise men die;

The fool and the senseless alike perish

And leave their wealth to others.

Their inner thought is that their houses are forever

And their dwelling places from generation to generation;

They have called their lands after their own names.

But man in his honor will not endure;

He is like the animals that perish.

This is the way of those who are foolish,

And of those after them who are pleased with their words. Selah.

As sheep they are appointed for Sheol;

Death will shepherd them;

And the upright shall have dominion over them in the morning,

And their form shall be for Sheol to consume,

Far away from his habitation.

But God will redeem my soul from the power of Sheol,

For He will receive me. Selah.

Do not be afraid when a man becomes rich,

When the glory of his house increases;

For when he dies he will not take any of it;

His glory will not descend after him.

For while he lives he blesses his soul—

And men will praise you when you do well for yourself—

But his soul shall go to the generation of his fathers;

They will eternally not see light.

Man in his honor, but who does not understand,

Is like the animals that perish.