The Daily Audio Bible
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7 Moreover, the word of the Lord came to me, saying,
2 Also, son of man, thus says the Lord God to the land of Israel: An end! The end has come upon the four corners of the land.(A)
3 Now is the end upon you, and I will send My anger upon you and will judge you according to your ways and will bring upon you retribution for all your abominations.
4 And My eye will not spare you, neither will I have pity; but I will bring recompense for your evil ways upon you, while your abominations are in the midst of you [calling down punishment from a righteous God]; and you shall know (recognize, understand, and realize) that I am the Lord.
5 Thus says the Lord God: Behold, an evil is coming, [an evil so destructive and injurious, so sudden and violent, that it stands alone, not as a succession but as] only one evil.
6 An end has come! The end has come! [The end—after sleeping so long] awakes against you. See, it has come!
7 Your turn (your doom) has come upon you, O inhabitant of the land; the time has come, the day is near, a day not of joyful shouting, but a day of tumult upon the mountains.
8 Now will I shortly pour out My wrath upon you and finish spending My anger against you, and I will judge you according to your ways and will recompense you with punishment for all your abominations.
9 And My eye will not spare, nor will I have pity. I will punish you according to your ways while your abominations are right in the midst of you. And you shall know, understand, and realize that it is I the Lord Who smites you.
10 Behold, the day! Behold, it has come! Your doom has gone forth, the rod has blossomed, pride has budded.
11 Violence has grown up into a rod of wickedness; none of [Israel] shall remain, none of their abundance, none of their wealth; neither shall there be preeminence among them or wailing for them.
12 The time has come, the day draws near. Let not the buyer rejoice nor the seller mourn, for wrath is upon all their multitude.
13 For the seller shall not return to that which is sold, even were they yet alive. For the vision [of punishment] is touching [Israel’s] whole multitude; he shall not come back, neither shall any strengthen himself whose life is in his iniquity.
14 They have blown the trumpet and have made all ready, but none goes to the battle, for My wrath is upon all their multitude.
15 The sword is without and pestilence and famine are within. He who is in the field shall die by the sword, and him who is in the city shall famine and pestilence devour.
16 But those of them that escape shall escape, but shall be on the mountains like doves of the valleys, all of them moaning, every one in his iniquity’s [punishment].
17 All hands shall be feeble and all knees shall be weak as water.(B)
18 They shall also gird themselves with sackcloth; horror and dismay shall cover them, and shame shall be upon all faces and baldness upon all their heads [as evidence of grief].
19 They shall cast their silver into the streets, and their gold shall be [discarded] like an unclean thing or rubbish; their silver and their gold shall not be able to deliver them in the day of the wrath of the Lord; they shall not satisfy their animal cravings nor fill their stomachs with them, for [wealth] has been the stumbling block of their iniquity.(C)
20 As for the beauty of gold for ornament, they turned it to pride and made of it the images of their abominations (idols) and of their detestable things. Therefore I will make it to them as an unclean thing.
21 And I will give it for plunder into the hands of strangers and to the wicked of the earth for a spoil, and they shall profane it.
22 Also I will turn My face from them and they shall profane My secret treasure [the temple]; and robbers shall enter into it and profane it.
23 Prepare the chain [of imprisonment], for the land is full of bloodguiltiness [murders committed with pretended formalities of justice] and the city is full of violence.
24 Therefore I will bring in the worst of the [heathen] nations, who will take possession of the houses [of the people of Judah]; I will also silence their strongholds and put an end to their proud might, and their holy places and those who sanctify them shall be profaned.
25 Distress, panic, and destruction shall come, and they [of Judah] shall seek peace, and there shall be none.
26 Calamity shall come upon calamity and rumor shall be upon rumor, and they shall seek a vision of the prophet; and the law and instruction shall cease from the [distracted] priest and counsel from the [dismayed] elders.(D)
27 The king [of Judah] shall wear mourning and the prince shall clothe himself with garments of despair and desolation, while the hands of the people of the land shall tremble [palsied by terror]; for I will do to them in accordance with their ways, and according to their deserts will I judge them; and they shall know, recognize, and realize that I am the Lord.
8 And in the sixth year [of the capitivity of King Jehoiachin], in the sixth month, on the fifth day of the month, as I sat in my house [a captive of the Babylonians] with the elders of Judah sitting before me, the hand of the Lord God fell there upon me.
2 Then I beheld, and lo, a likeness of a Man with the appearance of fire; from His waist downward He was like fire, and from His waist upward He had the appearance of brightness like gleaming bronze.
3 And He put forth the form of a hand and took me by a lock of my head; and the Spirit lifted me up between the earth and the heavens and brought me in the visions of God to Jerusalem, to the entrance of the door of the inner [court] which faces toward the north, where was the seat of the idol (image) of jealousy, which provokes to jealousy.(E)
4 And behold, there was the glory of the God of Israel [Who had loved and chosen them], like the vision I saw in the plain.(F)
5 Then He [the Spirit] said to me, Son of man, now lift up your eyes toward the north. So I lifted up my eyes toward the north, and behold, on the north of the altar gate was that idol (image) of jealousy in the entrance.
6 Furthermore, [the Spirit] said to me, Son of man, do you see what they are doing? The great abominations that the house of Israel is committing here to drive Me far from My sanctuary? But you shall again see greater abominations.
7 And He brought me to the door of the court; and when I looked, behold, there was a hole in the wall.
8 Then He said to me, Son of man, dig now in the wall. And when I had dug in the wall, behold, there was a door.
9 And He said to me, Go in and see the wicked abominations that they do here.
10 So I went in and saw there pictures of every form of creeping things and loathsome beasts and all the idols of the house of Israel, painted round about on the wall.
11 And there stood before these [pictures] seventy men of the elders of the house of Israel, and in the midst of them stood Jaazaniah the son of Shaphan [the scribe], with every man his censer in his hand, and a thick cloud of incense was going up [in prayer to these their gods].
12 Then said He to me, Son of man, have you seen what the elders of the house of Israel do in the dark, every man in his [secret] chambers of [idol] pictures? For they say, The Lord does not see us; the Lord has forsaken the land.
13 He also said to me, Yet again you shall see greater abominations which they are committing.
14 Then He brought me to the entrance of the north gate of the Lord’s house; and behold, there sat women weeping for Tammuz [a Babylonian god, who was supposed to die annually and subsequently be resurrected].
15 Then said [the Spirit] to me, Have you seen this, O son of man? Yet again you shall see greater abominations that they are committing.
16 And He brought me to the inner court of the Lord’s house; and behold, at the door of the temple of the Lord, between the porch and the bronze altar, were about twenty-five men with their backs to the temple of the Lord and their faces toward the east, and they were bowing themselves toward the east and worshiping the sun.
17 Then [the Spirit] said to me, Have you seen this, O son of man? Is it too slight a thing to the house of Judah to commit the abominations which they commit here, that they must fill the land with violence and turn back afresh to provoke Me to anger? And behold, they put the branch to their nose [actually, before their mouths, in superstitious worship]!
18 Therefore I will deal in wrath; My eye will not spare, nor will I have pity; and though they cry in My ears with a loud voice, yet will I not hear them.(G)
9 [The Spirit] cried in my ears [in the vision] with a loud voice, saying, Cause those to draw near who have charge over the city [as executioners], every man with his destroying weapon in his hand.
2 And behold, six men came from the direction of the Upper Gate, which faces north, every man with his battle-ax in his hand; and one man among them was clothed in linen, with a writer’s ink bottle at his side. And they went in and stood beside the bronze altar.
3 And the glory of the God of Israel [the Shekinah, cloud] had gone up from the cherubim upon which it had rested to [stand above] the threshold of the [Lord’s] house. And [the Lord] called to the man clothed with linen, who had the writer’s ink bottle at his side.
4 And the Lord said to him, Go through the midst of the city, through the midst of Jerusalem, and set a mark upon the foreheads of the men who sigh and groan over all the abominations that are committed in the midst of it.
5 And to the others He said in my hearing, Follow [the man with the ink bottle] through the city and smite; let not your eye spare, neither have any pity.
6 Slay outright the elderly, the young man and the virgin, the infant and the women; but do not touch or go near anyone on whom is the mark. Begin at My sanctuary. So they began with the old men who were in front of the temple [who did not have the Lord’s mark on their foreheads].(H)
7 And He said to [the executioners], Defile the temple and fill its courts with the slain. Go forth! And they went forth and slew in the city.
8 And while they were slaying them and I was left, I fell upon my face and cried, Ah, Lord God! Will You destroy all that is left of Israel in Your pouring out of Your wrath and indignation upon Jerusalem?
9 Then said He to me, The iniquity and guilt of the house of Israel and Judah are exceedingly great; the land is full of blood and the city full of injustice and perverseness; for they say, The Lord has forsaken the land; the Lord does not see [what we are doing].
10 And as for Me, My eye will not spare, neither will I have pity, but I will recompense their wicked doings upon their own heads.
11 And behold, the man clothed in linen, who had the ink bottle at his side, reported the matter, saying, I have done as You have commanded me.
5 For every high priest chosen from among men is appointed to act on behalf of men in things relating to God, to offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins.
2 He is able to exercise gentleness and forbearance toward the ignorant and erring, since he himself also is liable to moral weakness and physical infirmity.
3 And because of this he is obliged to offer sacrifice for his own sins, as well as for those of the people.
4 Besides, one does not appropriate for himself the honor [of being high priest], but he is called by God and receives it of Him, just as Aaron did.
5 So too Christ (the Messiah) did not exalt Himself to be made a high priest, but was appointed and exalted by Him Who said to Him, You are My Son; today I have begotten You;(A)
6 As He says also in another place, You are a Priest [appointed] forever after the order (with [a]the rank) of Melchizedek.(B)
7 In the days of His flesh [Jesus] offered up definite, special petitions [for that which He not only wanted [b]but needed] and supplications with strong crying and tears to Him Who was [always] able to save Him [out] from death, and He was heard because of His reverence toward God [His godly fear, His piety, [c] in that He shrank from the horrors of separation from the bright presence of the Father].
8 Although He was a Son, He learned [active, special] obedience through what He suffered
9 And, [His completed experience] making Him perfectly [equipped], He became the Author and Source of eternal salvation to all those who give heed and obey Him,(C)
10 Being [d]designated and recognized and saluted by God as High Priest after the order (with [e]the rank) of Melchizedek.(D)
11 Concerning this we have much to say which is hard to explain, since you have become dull in your [spiritual] hearing and sluggish [even [f]slothful in achieving spiritual insight].
12 For even though by this time you ought to be teaching others, you actually need someone to teach you over again the very first principles of God’s Word. You have come to need milk, not solid food.
13 For everyone who continues to feed on milk is obviously inexperienced and unskilled in the doctrine of righteousness (of conformity to the divine will in purpose, thought, and action), for he is a mere infant [not able to talk yet]!
14 But solid food is for full-grown men, for those whose senses and mental faculties are trained by practice to discriminate and distinguish between what is morally good and noble and what is evil and contrary either to divine or human law.
Psalm 105
1 O give thanks unto the Lord, call upon His name, make known His doings among the peoples!
2 Sing to Him, sing praises to Him; meditate on and talk of all His marvelous deeds and devoutly praise them.
3 Glory in His holy name; let the hearts of those rejoice who seek and require the Lord [as their indispensable necessity].
4 Seek, inquire of and for the Lord, and crave Him and His strength (His might and inflexibility to temptation); seek and require His face and His presence [continually] evermore.
5 [Earnestly] remember the marvelous deeds that He has done, His miracles and wonders, the judgments and sentences which He pronounced [upon His enemies, as in Egypt].(A)
6 O you offspring of Abraham His servant, you children of Jacob, His chosen ones,
7 He is the Lord our God; His judgments are in all the earth.
8 He is [earnestly] mindful of His covenant and forever it is imprinted on His heart, the word which He commanded and established to a thousand generations,
9 The covenant which He made with Abraham, and His sworn promise to Isaac,(B)
10 Which He confirmed to Jacob as a statute, to Israel as an everlasting covenant,
11 Saying, Unto you will I give the land of Canaan as your measured portion, possession, and inheritance.
12 When they were but a few men in number, in fact, very few, and were temporary residents and strangers in it,
13 When they went from one nation to another, from one kingdom to another people,
14 He allowed no man to do them wrong; in fact, He reproved kings for their sakes,(C)
15 Saying, Touch not My anointed, and do My prophets no harm.(D)
28 A lying tongue hates those it wounds and crushes, and a flattering mouth works ruin.
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