AMOS 4:1-6:14
REVELATION 2:18-3:6
PSALM 130:1-8
PROVERBS 29:21-22
AMOS 4:1-6:14
Listen to me [Amos], you " fat cows" of Samaria, you women who oppress the poor and crush the needy and who are always asking your husbands for another drink! 2 The Sovereign LORD has sworn this by his holiness: " The time will come when you will be led away with hooks in your noses. Every last one of you will be dragged away like a fish on a hook! 3 You will leave by going straight through the breaks in the wall; you will be thrown from your fortresses. I, the LORD, have spoken! 4 " Go ahead and offer your sacrifices to the idols at Bethel and Gilgal. Keep on disobeying--your sins are mounting up! Offer sacrifices each morning and bring your tithes every three days! 5 Present your bread made with yeast as an offering of thanksgiving. Then give your extra voluntary offerings so you can brag about it everywhere! This is the kind of thing you Israelites love to do," says the Sovereign LORD. 6 " I brought hunger to every city and famine to every town. But still you wouldn't return to me," says the LORD.7 " I kept the rain from falling when you needed it the most, ruining all your crops. I sent rain on one town but withheld it from another. Rain fell on one field, while another field withered away. 8 People staggered from one town to another for a drink of water, but there was never enough. But still you wouldn't return to me," says the LORD. 9 " I struck your farms and vineyards with blight and mildew. Locusts devoured all your fig and olive trees. But still you wouldn't return to me," says the LORD. 10 " I sent plagues against you like the plagues I sent against Egypt long ago. I killed your young men in war and slaughtered all your horses. The stench of death filled the air! But still you wouldn't return to me," says the LORD. 11 " I destroyed some of your cities, as I destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. Those of you who survived were like half-burned sticks snatched from a fire. But still you wouldn't return to me," says the LORD. 12 " Therefore, I will bring upon you all these further disasters I have announced. Prepare to meet your God as he comes in judgment, you people of Israel!" 13 For the LORD is the one who shaped the mountains, stirs up the winds, and reveals his every thought. He turns the light of dawn into darkness and treads the mountains under his feet. The LORD God Almighty is his name!5:1 LISTEN, you people of Israel! Listen to this funeral song I am singing: 2 " The virgin Israel has fallen,
never to rise again!
She lies forsaken on the ground,
with none to raise her up."
3 The Sovereign LORD says: " When one of your cities sends a thousand men to battle, only a hundred will return. When a town sends a hundred, only ten will come back alive." 4 Now this is what the LORD says to the family of Israel: " Come back to me and live! 5 Don't go to worship the idols of Bethel, Gilgal, or Beersheba. For the people of Gilgal will be dragged off into exile, and the people of Bethel will come to nothing." 6 Come back to the LORD and live! If you don't, he will roar through Israel like a fire, devouring you completely. Your gods in Bethel certainly won't be able to quench the flames! 7 You wicked people! You twist justice, making it a bitter pill for the poor and oppressed. Righteousness and fair play are meaningless fictions to you. 8 It is the LORD who created the stars, the Pleiades and Orion. It is he who turns darkness into morning and day into night. It is he who draws up water from the oceans and pours it down as rain on the land. The LORD is his name! 9 With blinding speed and power he destroys the strong, crushing all their defenses. 10 How you hate honest judges! How you despise people who tell the truth! 11 You trample the poor and steal what little they have through taxes and unfair rent. Therefore, you will never live in the beautiful stone houses you are building. You will never drink wine from the lush vineyards you are planting. 12 For I know the vast number of your sins and rebellions. You oppress good people by taking bribes and deprive the poor of justice in the courts. 13 So those who are wise will keep quiet, for it is an evil time. 14 Do what is good and run from evil--that you may live! Then the LORD God Almighty will truly be your helper, just as you have claimed he is. 15 Hate evil and love what is good; remodel your courts into true halls of justice. Perhaps even yet the LORD God Almighty will have mercy on his people who remain.16 Therefore, this is what the Lord, the LORD God Almighty, says: " There will be crying in all the public squares and in every street. Call for the farmers to weep with you, and summon professional mourners to wail and lament. 17 There will be wailing in every vineyard, for I will pass through and destroy them all. I, the LORD, have spoken!" 18 How terrible it will be for you who say, " If only the day of the LORD were here! For then the LORD would rescue us from all our enemies." But you have no idea what you are wishing for. That day will not bring light and prosperity, but darkness and disaster. 19 In that day you will be like a man who runs from a lion--only to meet a bear. After escaping the bear, he leans his hand against a wall in his house--and is bitten by a snake. 20 Yes, the day of the LORD will be a dark and hopeless day, without a ray of joy or hope. 21 " I hate all your show and pretense--the hypocrisy of your religious festivals and solemn assemblies. 22 I will not accept your burnt offerings and grain offerings. I won't even notice all your choice peace offerings. 23 Away with your hymns of praise! They are only noise to my ears. I will not listen to your music, no matter how lovely it is. 24 Instead, I want to see a mighty flood of justice, a river of righteous living that will never run dry. 25 " Was it to me you were bringing sacrifices and offerings during the forty years in the wilderness, Israel? 26 No, your real interest was in your pagan gods--Sakkuth your king god and Kaiwan your star god--the images you yourselves made. 27 So I will send you into exile, to a land east of Damascus," says the LORD, whose name is God Almighty.6:1 HOW terrible it will be for you who lounge in luxury and think you are secure in Jerusalem and Samaria! You are famous and popular in Israel, you to whom the people go for help. 2 Go over to Calneh and see what happened there. Then go to the great city of Hamath and on down to the Philistine city of Gath. You are no better than they were, and look at how they were destroyed. 3 You push away every thought of coming disaster, but your actions only bring the day of judgment closer. 4 How terrible it will be for you who sprawl on ivory beds surrounded with luxury, eating the meat of tender lambs and choice calves. 5 You sing idle songs to the sound of the harp, and you fancy yourselves to be great musicians, as King David was. 6 You drink wine by the bowlful, and you perfume yourselves with exotic fragrances, caring nothing at all that your nation is going to ruin. 7 Therefore, you will be the first to be led away as captives. Suddenly, all your revelry will end. 8 The Sovereign LORD has sworn by his own name, and this is what he, the LORD God Almighty, says: " I despise the pride and false glory of Israel, and I hate their beautiful homes. I will give this city and everything in it to their enemies." 9 If there are ten men left in one house, they will all die. 10 And when a close relative--one who is responsible for burning the dead--goes into the house to carry away a dead body, he will ask the last survivor, " Is there anyone else with you?" And the person will answer, " No!" Then he will say, " Hush! Don't even whisper the name of the LORD. He might hear you!" 11 When the LORD gives the command, homes both great and small will be smashed to pieces. 12 Can horses gallop over rocks? Can oxen be used to plow rocks? Stupid even to ask--but that's how stupid you are when you turn justice into poison and make bitter the sweet fruit of righteousness. 13 And just as stupid is this bragging about your conquest of Lo-debar. You boast, " Didn't we take Karnaim by our own strength and power?" 14 " O people of Israel, I am about to bring an enemy nation against you," says the LORD God Almighty. " It will oppress you bitterly throughout your land--from Lebo-hamath in the north to the Arabah Valley in the south."
REVELATION 2:18-3:6
" Write this letter to the angel of the church in Thyatira. This is the message from the Son of God, whose eyes are bright like flames of fire, whose feet are like polished bronze: 19 " I know all the things you do--your love, your faith, your service, and your patient endurance. And I can see your constant improvement in all these things. 20 But I have this complaint against you. You are permitting that woman--that Jezebel who calls herself a prophet--to lead my servants astray. She is encouraging them to worship idols, eat food offered to idols, and commit sexual sin. 21 I gave her time to repent, but she would not turn away from her immorality. 22 Therefore, I will throw her upon a sickbed, and she will suffer greatly with all who commit adultery with her, unless they turn away from all their evil deeds. 23 I will strike her children dead. And all the churches will know that I am the one who searches out the thoughts and intentions of every person. And I will give to each of you whatever you deserve. 24 But I also have a message for the rest of you in Thyatira who have not followed this false teaching (` deeper truths,' as they call them--depths of Satan, really). I will ask nothing more of you 25 except that you hold tightly to what you have until I come. 26 " To all who are victorious, who obey me to the very end, I will give authority over all the nations. 27 They will rule the nations with an iron rod and smash them like clay pots. 28 They will have the same authority I received from my Father, and I will also give them the morning star! 29 Anyone who is willing to hear should listen to the Spirit and understand what the Spirit is saying to the churches.3:1 " WRITE this letter to the angel of the church in Sardis. This is the message from the one who has the sevenfold Spirit of God and the seven stars: " I know all the things you do, and that you have a reputation for being alive--but you are dead. 2 Now wake up! Strengthen what little remains, for even what is left is at the point of death. Your deeds are far from right in the sight of God. 3 Go back to what you heard and believed at first; hold to it firmly and turn to me again. Unless you do, I will come upon you suddenly, as unexpected as a thief. 4 " Yet even in Sardis there are some who have not soiled their garments with evil deeds. They will walk with me in white, for they are worthy. 5 All who are victorious will be clothed in white. I will never erase their names from the Book of Life, but I will announce before my Father and his angels that they are mine. 6 Anyone who is willing to hear should listen to the Spirit and understand what the Spirit is saying to the churches."
PSALM 130:1-8
A song for the ascent to Jerusalem.
1 From the depths of despair, O LORD,
I call for your help.
2 Hear my cry, O Lord.
Pay attention to my prayer.
3 LORD, if you kept a record of our sins,
who, O Lord, could ever survive?
4 But you offer forgiveness,
that we might learn to fear you.
5 I am counting on the LORD;
yes, I am counting on him.
I have put my hope in his word.
6 I long for the Lord
more than sentries long for the dawn,
yes, more than sentries long for the dawn.
7 O Israel, hope in the LORD;
for with the LORD there is unfailing love
and an overflowing supply of salvation.
8 He himself will free Israel
from every kind of sin.
PROVERBS 29:21-22
A servant who is pampered from childhood will later become a rebel. A hot-tempered person starts fights and gets into all kinds of sin.
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