Isaiah 30 - 31 - Legacy Standard Bible

Isaiah 30 - 31

Alliance with Egypt Condemned

“Woe to the rebellious children,” declares Yahweh,

“Who execute counsel, but not Mine,

And make an alliance, but not of My Spirit,

In order to add sin to sin,

Who go down to Egypt—

But did not ask Me—

To find strength in the strong defense of Pharaoh

And to take refuge in the shadow of Egypt!

Therefore the strong defense of Pharaoh will be your shame

And the refuge in the shadow of Egypt, your dishonor.

For their princes are at Zoan

And their messengers reach Hanes.

Everyone will be ashamed because of a people who cannot profit them,

Who are not for help or profit, but for shame and also for reproach.”

6 The oracle concerning the beasts of the Negev.

Through a land of distress and anguish,

From where come lioness and lion, viper and flying fiery serpent,

They carry their wealth on the backs of young donkeys

And their treasures on camels’ humps,

To a people who cannot profit them;

Even Egypt, whose help is vain and empty.

Therefore, I have called her

“Rahab who has ceased.”

Now go, write it on a tablet before them

And inscribe it on a scroll,

That it may be in the time to come

As a witness forever.

For this is a rebellious people, false sons,

Sons who are not willing to listen

To the law of Yahweh,

Who say to the seers, “You must not see,”

And to those who have visions, “You must not behold visions for us of what is right,

Speak to us pleasant words,

Behold visions of illusions.

Get out of the way, turn aside from the path,

Cease speaking before us about the Holy One of Israel.”

12 Therefore thus says the Holy One of Israel,

“Since you have rejected this word

And have put your trust in oppression and deviousness and have relied on them,

Therefore this iniquity will be to you

Like a breach about to fall,

A bulge in a high wall,

Whose breaking comes suddenly in an instant,

Whose breaking is like the breaking of a potter’s jar,

So ruthlessly shattered

That a potsherd will not be found among its pieces

To take fire from a hearth

Or to scoop water from a cistern.”

15 For thus Lord Yahweh, the Holy One of Israel, has said,

“In repentance and rest you will be saved,

In quietness and trust is your might.”

But you were not willing,

And you said, “No, for we will flee on horses,”

Therefore you shall flee!

“And we will ride on swift horses,”

Therefore those who pursue you shall be swift.

One thousand will flee at the threat of one man;

You will flee at the threat of five,

Until you are left as a flag on a mountain top

And as a standard on a hill.

Yahweh Is Gracious and Just

Therefore Yahweh waits with longing to be gracious to you,

And therefore He is on high to have compassion on you.

For Yahweh is a God of justice;

How blessed are all those who wait for Him.

19 O people in Zion, inhabitant in Jerusalem, you will weep no longer. He will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry; when He hears it, He will answer you. 20 The Lord has given you bread of distress and water of oppression; He, your Teacher will no longer hide Himself, but your eyes will see your Teacher. 21 And your ears will hear a word behind you, “This is the way, walk in it,” whenever you turn to the right or to the left. 22 And you will defile your graven images overlaid with your silver, and your molten images plated with your gold. You will scatter them as an impure thing and say to them, “Be gone!” 23 Then He will give you rain for the seed which you will sow in the ground, and bread from the produce of the ground, and it will be rich and fat; on that day your livestock will graze in a roomy pasture. 24 Also the oxen and the donkeys which work the ground will eat salted fodder, which has been winnowed with shovel and fork. 25 And it will be that on every lofty mountain and on every lifted up hill there will be streams running with water on the day of the great slaughter, when the towers fall. 26 And the light of the moon will be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun will be seven times brighter, like the light of seven days, on the day Yahweh binds up the fracture of His people and heals the bruise He has inflicted. 27

Behold, the name of Yahweh comes from afar;

Burning is His anger and heavy is His smoke;

His lips are filled with indignation

And His tongue is like a consuming fire;

His breath is like an overflowing torrent,

Which reaches to the neck,

To shake the nations back and forth in a sieve of worthlessness,

And to put in the jaws of the peoples the bridle which staggers one to ruin.

You will have songs as in the night when you set yourself apart as holy for the festival,

And gladness of heart as when one marches to the sound of the flute,

To go to the mountain of Yahweh, to the Rock of Israel.

And Yahweh will cause His splendid voice to be heard,

And the descending of His arm to be seen in raging anger,

And in the flame of a consuming fire

In cloudburst, downpour, and hailstones.

For at the voice of Yahweh Assyria will be dismayed,

When He strikes with the rod.

And every blow of the appointed staff,

Which Yahweh will cause to rest upon him,

Will be with the music of tambourines and lyres;

And in battles, waving weapons He will fight them.

For Topheth has long been ready,

Indeed, it has been prepared for the king.

He has made it deep and large,

A pyre of fire with plenty of wood;

The breath of Yahweh, like a torrent of brimstone, sets it afire.

Woe to Those Who Go down to Egypt

Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help

And rely on horses,

And trust in chariots because they are many

And in horsemen because they are very mighty,

But they do not have regard for the Holy One of Israel, nor seek Yahweh!

Yet He also is wise and will bring about an evil demise

And does not turn His words aside,

But will arise against the house of evildoers

And against the help of the workers of iniquity.

Now the Egyptians are men and not God,

And their horses are flesh and not spirit;

So Yahweh will stretch out His hand,

And he who helps will stumble,

And he who is helped will fall,

And all of them will come to an end together.

4 For thus says Yahweh to me,

“As the lion or the young lion growls over its prey,

Against which a multitude of shepherds is called out,

And it will not be dismayed at their voice nor afflicted at their noise,

So will Yahweh of hosts come down to wage war on Mount Zion and on its hill.”

Like flying birds so Yahweh of hosts will defend Jerusalem.

He will defend and deliver it;

He will pass over and provide a way of escape.

6 Return to Him against whom you have deeply rebelled, O sons of Israel. 7 For in that day every man will reject his silver idols and his gold idols, which your hands have made for you as a sin. 8

And the Assyrian will fall by a sword not of man,

And a sword not of man will devour him.

So he will flee from the sword,

And his choice men will become forced laborers.

“His rock will pass away because of terror,

And his princes will be dismayed at the standard,”

Declares Yahweh, whose fire is in Zion and whose furnace is in Jerusalem.

Luke 17

Do All Which Jesus Commands

Now He said to His disciples, “It is inevitable that stumbling blocks come, but woe to him through whom they come! 2 It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck and he were thrown into the sea, than that he would cause one of these little ones to stumble. 3 Be on your guard! If your brother sins, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him. 4 And if he sins against you seven times a day, and returns to you seven times, saying, ‘I repent,’ forgive him.” 5 And the apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith!” 6 And the Lord said, “If you have faith like a mustard seed, you would say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and be planted in the sea’; and it would obey you. 7 “But which of you, having a slave plowing or tending sheep, will say to him when he has come in from the field, ‘Come immediately and sit down to eat’? 8 But will he not say to him, ‘Prepare something for me to eat, and, clothing yourself properly, serve me while I eat and drink; and afterward you may eat and drink’? 9 Is he grateful to the slave because he did the things which were commanded? 10 In this way, you also, when you do all the things which are commanded of you, say, ‘We are unworthy slaves; we have done only that which we ought to have done.’”

Jesus Cleanses Ten Lepers

11 And it happened that while He was on the way to Jerusalem, He was passing through Samaria and Galilee. 12 And as He entered a village, ten leprous men who stood at a distance met Him. 13 And they raised their voices, saying, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!” 14 When He saw them, He said to them, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.” And it happened that as they were going, they were cleansed. 15 Now one of them, when he saw that he had been healed, turned back, glorifying God with a loud voice, 16 and he fell on his face at His feet, giving thanks to Him. And he was a Samaritan. 17 Then Jesus answered and said, “Were there not ten cleansed? But the nine—where are they? 18 Was there no one found who turned back to give glory to God, except this foreigner?” 19 And He said to him, “Stand up and go; your faith has saved you.” 20 Now having been questioned by the Pharisees as to when the kingdom of God was coming, He answered them and said, “The kingdom of God is not coming with signs to be observed, 21 nor will they say, ‘Look, here!’ or, ‘There!’ For behold, the kingdom of God is in your midst.”

The Coming of the Son of Man

22 And He said to the disciples, “The days will come when you will long to see one of the days of the Son of Man, and you will not see it. 23 And they will say to you, ‘Look there! Look here!’ Do not go away, and do not run after them. 24 For just like the lightning, when it flashes out of one part of the sky, shines to the other part of the sky, so will the Son of Man be in His day. 25 But first He must suffer many things and be rejected by this generation. 26 And just as it was in the days of Noah, so it will be also in the days of the Son of Man: 27 they were eating, they were drinking, they were marrying, they were being given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all. 28 It was the same as in the days of Lot—they were eating, they were drinking, they were buying, they were selling, they were planting, they were building; 29 but on the day that Lot went out from Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all. 30 It will be just the same on the day that the Son of Man is revealed. 31 On that day, the one who is on the housetop and whose goods are in the house must not go down to take them out, and likewise the one who is in the field must not turn back. 32 Remember Lot’s wife. 33 Whoever seeks to keep his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life will preserve it. 34 I tell you, on that night there will be two in one bed; one will be taken and the other will be left. 35 There will be two women grinding grain at the same place; one will be taken and the other will be left. 36 [Two men will be in the field; one will be taken and the other will be left.”] 37 And answering they *said to Him, “Where, Lord?” And He said to them, “Where the body is, there also the vultures will be gathered.”

Psalm 53 - 54

There Is No One Who Does Good

For the choir director. According to Mahalath. A Maskil of David.

The wicked fool says in his heart, “There is no God,”

They act corruptly, and commit abominable injustice;

There is no one who does good.

God looks down from heaven upon the sons of men

To see if there is anyone who has insight,

Anyone who seeks after God.

Every one of them has turned back; together they have become worthless;

There is no one who does good, not even one.

Do the workers of iniquity not know,

Who eat up my people as they eat bread

And do not call upon God?

There they were in great dread where no dread had been;

For God scattered the bones of him who encamped against you;

You put them to shame, because God had rejected them.

Oh, that the salvation of Israel would come out of Zion!

When God restores His captive people,

May Jacob rejoice, may Israel be glad.

God Is My Helper

For the choir director. With stringed instruments. A Maskil of David. When the Ziphites came and said to Saul, “Is not David hiding himself among us?”

O God, save me by Your name,

And render justice to me by Your might.

O God, hear my prayer;

Give ear to the words of my mouth.

For strangers have risen against me

And ruthless men have sought my life;

They have not set God before them. Selah.

Behold, God is my helper;

The Lord is among those who sustain my soul.

He will return the evil to my foes;

Destroy them in Your truth.

With a freewill offering I will sacrifice to You;

I will give thanks to Your name, O Yahweh, for it is good.

For He has delivered me from all distress,

And my eye has looked in triumph upon my enemies.