The Daily Audio Bible
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16 And at the end of seven days, the word of the Lord came to me:
17 Son of man, I have made you a watchman to the house of Israel; therefore hear the word at My mouth and give them warning from Me.(A)
18 If I say to the wicked, You shall surely die, and you do not give him warning or speak to warn the wicked to turn from his wicked way, to save his life, the same wicked man shall die in his iniquity, but his blood will I require at your hand.
19 Yet if you warn the wicked and he turn not from his wickedness or from his wicked way, he shall die in his iniquity, but you have delivered yourself.
20 Again, if a righteous man turns from his righteousness (right doing and right standing with God) and some gift or providence which I lay before him he perverts into an occasion to sin and he commits iniquity, he shall die; because you have not given him warning, he shall die in his sin and his righteous deeds which he has done shall not be remembered, but his blood will I require at your hand.
21 Nevertheless if you warn the righteous man not to sin and he does not sin, he shall surely live because he is warned; also you have delivered yourself from guilt.
22 And the hand of the Lord was there upon me, and He said to me, Arise, go forth into the plain and I will talk with you there.
23 Then I arose and went forth into the plain, and behold, the glory of the Lord stood there, like the glory I had seen by the river Chebar, and I fell on my face.
24 Then the Spirit entered into me and set me on my feet; He spoke and said to me, Go, shut yourself up in your house.
25 But you, O son of man, behold, ropes will be put upon you and you will be bound with them, and you cannot go out among people.
26 And I will make your tongue cleave to the roof of your mouth so that you cannot talk and be a reprover of the people, for they are a rebellious house.
27 But when I speak with you, I will open your mouth and you shall say to the people, Thus says the Lord God; he who hears, let him hear, and he who refuses to hear, let him refuse; for they are a rebellious house.
4 And you, son of man, take a tile and lay it before you, and make upon it a drawing of a city, even Jerusalem.
2 And put siege works against it, build a siege wall against it, and cast up a mound against it; set camps also against it and set battering rams against it round about.
3 Moreover, take a plate of iron and place it for an iron wall between you and the city; and set your face toward it and it shall be besieged, and you shall press the siege against it. This is a sign to the house of Israel.
4 Then [bound as you are] lie upon your left [and north] side to bear symbolically the iniquity of the house of the ten tribes of Israel upon that side. According to the number of days that you shall lie upon it you shall bear their iniquity.
5 For I have laid upon you the years of their iniquity, according to the number of the days, 390 days [representing 390 years]; so you shall bear the iniquity of the house of Israel.
6 And when you have fulfilled the days for Israel, lie again, but on your right [and south] side, and you shall bear the iniquity of the house of Judah forty days. I have appointed you one day for each year.
7 Therefore you shall set your face toward the siege of Jerusalem and your arm shall be uncovered [ready for battle], and you shall prophesy against [the city].
8 And, behold, I will lay bands upon you and you shall not turn yourself from one side to another till you have ended the days of your siege.
9 Also take wheat, barley, beans, lentils, millet, and spelt, and put them into one vessel and make bread of them. According to the number of the days that you shall lie upon your side, 390 days you shall eat of it.
10 And the food you eat shall be by weight, twenty shekels or a full half pound a day, to be eaten at a fixed time each day.
11 You shall drink water by measure also, about one quart or the sixth part of a hin; you shall drink at a fixed time each day.
12 And you shall eat your food as barley cakes and you shall bake it with human dung as fuel in the sight of the people.
13 And the Lord said, Even thus shall the children of Israel eat their defiled bread among the nations to whom I will drive them.(B)
14 Then said I, Ah, Lord God! Behold, I have never defiled myself. From my youth up even till now have I not eaten of that which dies of itself or is torn in pieces; neither did there ever come abominable flesh into my mouth.(C)
15 Then He said to me, Behold, I will let you use cow’s dung instead of human dung, and you shall prepare your food with it.
16 Moreover, He said to me, Son of man, behold, I will break the staff of bread [by which life is supported] in Jerusalem; and they shall eat bread rationed by weight and with fearfulness, and they shall drink water rationed by measure and with dismay (silent, speechless grief caused by the impending starvation),(D)
17 In order that they may lack bread and water and look at one another in dismay and waste away [in their punishment] for their iniquity.
5 And you, son of man [Ezekiel], take a sharp sword and use it as a barber’s razor and shave your head and your beard. Then take balances for weighing and divide the hair into three parts.
2 You shall burn one part with fire in the midst of the city, when the days of the siege are fulfilled; and you shall take a second part and strike with the sword round about it; and a third part you shall scatter to the wind, and I will draw out a sword after them.
3 You shall also take from these a small number of hairs and bind them in the skirts of your robe.
4 And of these again take some hairs and cast them into the midst of the fire and burn them in the fire; from there a fire shall come forth into all the house of Israel.
5 Thus says the Lord God: This is Jerusalem; in the center of the nations I have set her, and countries are round about her.
6 And she has changed and rebelled against My ordinances more wickedly than the [heathen] nations, and against My statutes more than the countries that are round about her; for [Israel] rejected My ordinances, and as for My statutes, they have not walked in them.(E)
7 Therefore thus says the Lord God: Because you were more turbulent and raged [against Me] more than the nations that are round about you and have not walked in My statutes, neither have kept My ordinances, nor have done according to the ordinances [concerning] the nations that are round about you;(F)
8 Therefore thus says the Lord God: Behold, I, even I, am against you, and I will execute judgments in the midst of you in the sight of the nations.
9 And because of all your abominations, I will do in you that which I have not done and the like of which I will never do again.(G)
10 Therefore fathers shall eat their sons in your midst, and sons shall eat their fathers; and I will execute judgments on you and all who are left of you I will scatter to all the winds.(H)
11 Therefore, as I live, says the Lord God, surely because you have defiled My sanctuary with all your detestable things and with all your abominations, therefore will I also diminish you and withdraw My eye that it shall not spare you. And I also will have no pity.
12 And a third of you shall die of pestilence and be consumed by famine in the midst of you; a third shall fall by the sword round about you; and I will scatter a third to all the winds and will draw out a sword after them.
13 Thus shall My anger be spent and I will cause My wrath toward them to rest and I will be eased and comforted. And they shall know, understand, and realize that I the Lord have spoken in My zeal, when I have accomplished My wrath upon them.(I)
14 Moreover, I will make you a desolation and a reproach among the nations that are round about you and in the sight of all who pass by.(J)
15 So it shall be a reproach and a taunt, a warning and a horror and an astonishment to the [heathen] nations around you when I shall execute judgments upon you in anger and in wrath and in furious chastisements and rebukes—I the Lord have spoken it.(K)
16 When I shall loose against them the evil arrows of hunger that are for destruction, which I will send to destroy you, then I will increase the famine upon you and will break your staff of bread.
17 And I will send upon you hunger and wild beasts, and they shall bereave you [of your loved ones]; and pestilence and blood shall pass through you, and I will bring the sword upon you. I the Lord have spoken it.
6 And the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2 Son of man, set your face toward the mountains of Israel and prophesy against them,
3 And say, You mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord God! Thus says the Lord God to the mountains and the hills, to the river ravines and the valleys: Behold, I, even I, will bring a sword upon you, and I will destroy your high places [of idolatrous worship],
4 And your altars shall be made desolate and your sun-pillars shall be broken in pieces, and I will cast down your slain before your idols.(L)
5 And I will lay the dead bodies of the children of Israel before their idols, and I will scatter your bones round about your altars.
6 In all your dwelling places the cities shall be laid waste and the high places shall be made desolate, that your altars may bear their guilt and be laid waste and made desolate, your idols may be broken and destroyed, your sun-images may be hewn down, and your handiworks may be wiped away and blotted out.
7 And the slain shall fall in the midst of you, and you shall [a]know, understand, and realize that I am the Lord.
8 Yet will I leave some of you alive. When you have some that shall escape the sword among the nations, when you shall be scattered through the countries,
9 Then those of you who escape shall [earnestly] remember Me among the nations to which they shall be carried captive, how that I have been broken by their lewdness and have Myself broken their wanton heart which has departed from Me and blinded their eyes which turn after their idols wantonly; and they shall be loathsome in their own sight for the evils which they have committed in all their abominations.
10 And they shall know, understand, and realize that I am the Lord. I have not said in vain that I would bring this evil calamity [in punishment] upon them.
11 Thus says the Lord God: Strike with your fist, stamp with your foot, and say, Alas! over all the vile abominations of the house of Israel for which [Israel] shall fall by sword, by famine, and by pestilence.
12 He who is far off shall die of the pestilence, and he that is near shall fall by the sword, and he who remains and is preserved shall die by the famine. Thus will I accomplish My wrath upon them.
13 Then shall you know, understand, and realize that I am the Lord, when their slain shall lie among their idols round about their altars upon every high hill, on all the tops of the mountains, under every green tree, and under every thickly leafed oak, the places where they were accustomed to offer sweet incense to all their idols.
14 And I will stretch out My hand upon them and make the land desolate and waste, yes, more desolate than the wilderness toward Diblah [a Moabite city], throughout all their dwelling places; and they shall know, understand, and realize that I am the Lord.
4 Therefore, while the promise of entering His rest still holds and is offered [today], let us be afraid [[a]to distrust it], lest any of you should [b]think he has come too late and has come short of [reaching] it.
2 For indeed we have had the glad tidings [Gospel of God] proclaimed to us just as truly as they [the Israelites of old did when the good news of deliverance from bondage came to them]; but the message they heard did not benefit them, because it was not mixed with faith (with [c]the leaning of the entire personality on God in absolute trust and confidence in His power, wisdom, and goodness) by those who heard it; [d]neither were they united in faith with the ones [Joshua and Caleb] who heard (did believe).
3 For we who have believed (adhered to and trusted in and relied on God) do enter that rest, [e]in accordance with His declaration that those [who did not believe] should not enter when He said, As I swore in My wrath, They shall not enter My rest; and this He said although [His] works had been completed and prepared [and waiting for all who would believe] from the foundation of the world.(A)
4 For in a certain place He has said this about the seventh day: And God rested on the seventh day from all His works.(B)
5 And [they forfeited their part in it, for] in this [passage] He said, They shall not enter My rest.(C)
6 Seeing then that the promise remains over [from past times] for some to enter that rest, and that those who formerly were given the good news about it and the opportunity, failed to appropriate it and did not enter because of disobedience,
7 Again He sets a definite day, [a new] Today, [and gives another opportunity of securing that rest] saying through David after so long a time in the words already quoted, Today, if you would hear His voice and when you hear it, do not harden your hearts.(D)
8 [This mention of a rest was not a reference to their entering into Canaan.] For if Joshua had given them rest, He [God] would not speak afterward about another day.
9 So then, there is still awaiting a full and complete Sabbath-rest reserved for the [true] people of God;
10 For he who has once entered [God’s] rest also has ceased from [the weariness and pain] of human labors, just as God rested from those labors [f]peculiarly His own.(E)
11 Let us therefore be zealous and exert ourselves and strive diligently to enter that rest [of God, to know and experience it for ourselves], that no one may fall or perish by the same kind of unbelief and disobedience [into which those in the wilderness fell].
12 For the Word that God speaks is alive and full of power [making it active, operative, energizing, and effective]; it is sharper than any two-edged sword, penetrating to the dividing line of the [g]breath of life (soul) and [the immortal] spirit, and of joints and marrow [of the deepest parts of our nature], exposing and sifting and analyzing and judging the very thoughts and purposes of the heart.
13 And not a creature exists that is concealed from His sight, but all things are open and exposed, naked and defenseless to the eyes of Him with Whom we have to do.
14 Inasmuch then as we have a great High Priest Who has [already] ascended and passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession [of faith in Him].
15 For we do not have a High Priest Who is unable to understand and sympathize and have a shared feeling with our weaknesses and infirmities and liability to the assaults of temptation, but One Who has been tempted in every respect as we are, yet without sinning.
16 Let us then fearlessly and confidently and boldly draw near to the throne of grace (the throne of God’s unmerited favor to us sinners), that we may receive mercy [for our failures] and find grace to help in good time for every need [appropriate help and well-timed help, coming just when we need it].
24 O Lord, how many and varied are Your works! In wisdom have You made them all; the earth is full of Your riches and Your creatures.
25 Yonder is the sea, great and wide, in which are swarms of innumerable creeping things, creatures both small and great.
26 There go the ships of the sea, and Leviathan (the sea monster), which You have formed to sport in it.
27 These all wait and are dependent upon You, that You may give them their food in due season.
28 When You give it to them, they gather it up; You open Your hand, and they are filled with good things.
29 When You hide Your face, they are troubled and dismayed; when You take away their breath, they die and return to their dust.
30 When You send forth Your Spirit and give them breath, they are created, and You replenish the face of the ground.
31 May the glory of the Lord endure forever; may the Lord rejoice in His works—
32 Who looks on the earth, and it quakes and trembles, Who touches the mountains, and they smoke!
33 I will sing to the Lord as long as I live; I will sing praise to my God while I have any being.
34 May my meditation be sweet to Him; as for me, I will rejoice in the Lord.
35 Let sinners be consumed from the earth, and let the wicked be no more. Bless (affectionately, gratefully praise) the Lord, O my soul! Praise the Lord! (Hallelujah!)
27 Whoever digs a pit [for another man’s feet] shall fall into it himself, and he who rolls a stone [up a height to do mischief], it will return upon him.(A)
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