Through My Bible Yr 01 – January 10

    Listen, you rulers of Jacob,
    you leaders of the house of Israel.
    Shouldn’t you recognize justice?
² But you hate good and love evil.
    You tear off the skin and the flesh from the bones.
³ You eat the flesh of my people
    and peel off their skin.
    You smash their bones.
    You chop them up like pieces for the cooking pot,
    like meat for the cauldron.

⁴ Then they will cry out to the Lord for help,
    but he will not answer them.
    He will hide his face from them at that time,
    because their deeds were evil.

    Give them something to chew with their teeth, and they declare peace,
    but they declare a holy war against anyone who doesn’t put something into their mouths.
⁶ Therefore, a night without prophetic vision will come upon you.
    Darkness will come upon you, without any omens from God.
    The sun will set for the prophets,
    and daytime will become dark for them.
⁷ The seers will be ashamed,
    and the fortune tellers will hide in disgrace.
    They will all cover their mouths, ^[1]
    because there will be no answer from God.

⁸         I, on the other hand, I am full of power from the Spirit of the Lord,
        full of judgment and strength,
        to declare Jacob’s sinful rebellion to him
            and Israel’s sin to him.

⁹ Hear this, you heads of the house of Jacob.
    Listen attentively, leaders of the house of Israel,
    you who have contempt for justice and pervert everything that is right,
¹⁰ you who build Zion with blood and Jerusalem with injustice.
¹¹ Her leaders render verdicts for a bribe,
    and her priests issue rulings for a payoff.
    Her prophets foretell the future for silver,
    yet they lean on the Lord and say,
    “The Lord is in our midst, isn’t he? Disaster will not come upon us.”
¹² Therefore, because of you, Zion will be plowed like a field.
    Jerusalem will become a heap of ruins,
    and the Temple Mount will become a wooded hill.

    It will be raised above the hills,
    and peoples will stream to it like a river.
² Many nations will come and say,
    “Come, let us go up to the Mountain of the Lord,
    to the house of the God of Jacob.
    He will teach us his ways so that we may walk in his paths.”
    The law ^[3] will go out from Zion
    and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.
³ He will render judgment between many peoples.
    He will settle disputes between mighty nations from far away.
    They will pound their swords into plowshares
    and their spears into blades for trimming vines.
    Nation will not raise the sword against nation,
    and they will not learn how to wage war any longer.
⁴ Each man will sit under his own vine
    and under his own fig tree.
    There will be no one to make them afraid,
    for the mouth of the Lord of Armies has spoken.
⁵ For all the other peoples walk in the names of their gods,
    but we will walk in the name of the Lord our God forever and ever.