Isaiah 28
28
Chapter 28
A sad song about Ephraim #28:1 Ephraim was the Israelite kingdom in the north. Its capital city was Samaria.
1It will be very bad for Ephraim's beautiful city, Samaria! The people who live there drink too much wine and they become drunk. They are proud of their great city. It is on a hill above a valley where many good things grow. It is like a beautiful flower, but it will be beautiful no more and it will die.
2Look! The Lord God is sending a strong and powerful army to attack it. #28:2 This was probably the Assyrian army. It comes like a strong storm of ice. Its wind destroys everything. It is like rain that pours down and causes a flood. He will knock down Ephraim's great city to the ground with his great power!
3The drunk people of Samaria think that their city is great. But their enemies will knock it down and walk all over it. 4The city is like a beautiful flower that will soon die. It is on a hill above a valley where many good things grow. But it will be like a fig on a tree. It is ready to eat before the harvest time. When someone sees it, he will quickly pick it. And he will eat it!
5At that time. the Lord Almighty will be a great leader of his people. He will be like a beautiful crown for his people who still remain alive. 6He will help judges to decide what is right. He will give strength to the people who keep the city safe from those who attack it.
7But now wine causes the leaders in Ephraim to become drunk. They cannot walk in a straight line because they drink too much beer. Beer causes the priests and the prophets to fall over. Wine confuses their minds. When they see visions, they cannot understand them. When they judge people, they cannot decide what is right.
8They are sick over all their tables. Everywhere is covered with dirt.
9They say, ‘Why does the Lord try to teach us like that? Who does he think that we are? He speaks to us as if we are babies! He thinks that we have just left our mother's breast! 10He teaches us one rule at a time, one line at a time. He says it several times, a little bit here, a little bit there.’
11So now the Lord will use foreign enemies to speak to these people. He will speak to them in a strange language.
12In the past, he said to them, ‘This is a place where you can rest when you are tired. It is a place where you can be safe.’ But his people refused to listen. 13So the Lord's message will seem to them like, ‘One rule at a time, one line at a time, a little bit here, a little bit there.’ So as they try to move forward, they will fall over. An enemy will hurt them, and he will catch them in a trap.
A message about Jerusalem
14So listen to the Lord's message, you leaders in Jerusalem who rule these people. Do not laugh at what the Lord is doing.
15You boast, ‘We have made a covenant with death. Yes, we have made an agreement with Sheol. When trouble comes to our city like a deep flood of water, we will be safe. We trust in our lies to keep us safe.’
16So the Almighty Lord says this:
‘Look! I am putting a special stone in Zion. It is a valuable stone, because it makes a strong foundation at the corner of my building. Anyone who trusts in that foundation will never be disappointed.
17 Justice and righteousness will make that foundation strong and true. But if you trust in lies, a storm of ice will destroy your safe place. A flood of water will destroy the place where you are hiding. 18I will stop your covenant with death. Your agreement with Sheol will not continue. When trouble comes like a deep flood of water, it will drown you. 19A flood of punishment will come again and again, and it will carry you away. It will come every morning, and all through the day and the night.’
When you understand this message from the Lord, you will be very afraid. 20You will not be able to rest, like a tall person who tries to sleep on a short bed. Your blanket will not cover your whole body.
21But the Lord will do a great thing, like he did at Mount Perazim. He will be very angry, as he was in the Gibeon Valley. He will do something that is very wonderful and strange.
22So do not laugh at me when I warn you. If you do not listen, your punishment will become even worse. The Lord Almighty has told me what he has decided. He has decided to destroy the whole land.
23So listen carefully to my message. Hear what I am saying!
24A farmer ploughs the ground because he wants to plant seeds in it. He does not continue to plough for ever. 25When he has prepared the ground, he plants many different seeds. He plants dill and cummin. He plants wheat, barley and different grains in their proper places.
26God teaches the farmer and he tells him the right thing to do. 27After the harvest, the farmer knows how to remove seeds from dill or from cummin. He will not pull a heavy iron weight over dill. He will not run the wheels of a cart over cummin. Instead, he will hit them with a light stick.
28When he crushes grain to make flour for bread, he does not do it for a long time. He drives the wheels of his cart over the grain, but he does not let his horses crush it.
29The Lord Almighty causes farmers to know all that. His ideas are very wise, and he shows us how to live in a wise way.
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Isaiah 28
28
A Warning to the Northern Kingdom
1The kingdom of Israel is doomed! Its glory is fading like the crowns of flowers on the heads of its drunken leaders. Their proud heads are well perfumed, but there they lie, dead drunk. 2The Lord has someone strong and powerful ready to attack them, someone who will come like a hailstorm, like a torrent of rain, like a rushing, overpowering flood, and will overwhelm the land. 3The pride of those drunken leaders will be trampled underfoot. 4The fading glory of those proud leaders will disappear like the first figs of the season, picked and eaten as soon as they are ripe.
5A day is coming when the LORD Almighty will be like a glorious crown of flowers for his people who survive. 6He will give a sense of justice to those who serve as judges, and courage to those who defend the city gates from attack.
Isaiah and the Drunken Prophets of Judah
7Even the prophets and the priests are so drunk that they stagger. They have drunk so much wine and liquor that they stumble in confusion. The prophets are too drunk to understand the visions that God sends, and the priests are too drunk to decide the cases that are brought to them. 8The tables where they sit are all covered with vomit, and not a clean spot is left.
9They complain about me. They say, “Who does that man think he's teaching? Who needs his message? It's only good for babies that have just been weaned! 10He is trying to teach us letter by letter, line by line, lesson by lesson.”
11 #
1 Cor 14.21
If you won't listen to me, then God will use foreigners speaking some strange-sounding language to teach you a lesson. 12He offered rest and comfort to all of you, but you refused to listen to him. 13That is why the LORD is going to teach you letter by letter, line by line, lesson by lesson. Then you will stumble with every step you take. You will be wounded, trapped, and taken prisoner.
A Cornerstone for Zion
14Now you arrogant ones who rule here in Jerusalem over this people, listen to what the LORD is saying. 15You boast that you have made a treaty with death and reached an agreement with the world of the dead. You are certain that disaster will spare you when it comes, because you depend on lies and deceit to keep you safe. 16#Ps 118.22–23; Rom 9.33; 10.11; 1 Pet 2.6This, now, is what the Sovereign LORD says: “I am placing in Zion a foundation that is firm and strong. In it I am putting a solid cornerstone on which are written the words, ‘Faith that is firm is also patient.’ 17Justice will be the measuring line for the foundation, and honesty will be its plumb line.”
Hailstorms will sweep away all the lies you depend on, and floods will destroy your security. 18The treaty you have made with death will be abolished, and your agreement with the world of the dead will be cancelled. When disaster sweeps down, you will be overcome. 19It will strike you again and again, morning after morning. You will have to bear it day and night. Each new message from God will bring new terror! 20You will be like the person in the proverb, who tries to sleep in a bed too short to stretch out on, with a blanket too narrow to wrap himself in. 21#Josh 10.10–12; 2 Sam 5.20; 1 Chr 14.11The LORD will fight as he did at Mount Perazim and in the valley of Gibeon, in order to do what he intends to do — strange as his actions may seem. He will complete his work, his mysterious work.
22Don't laugh at the warning I am giving you! If you do, it will be even harder for you to escape. I have heard the LORD Almighty's decision to destroy the whole country.
God's Wisdom
23Listen to what I am saying; pay attention to what I am telling you. 24No farmer goes on constantly ploughing his fields and getting them ready for sowing. 25Once he has prepared the soil, he sows the seeds of herbs such as dill and cumin. He sows rows of wheat and barley,#28.25 Hebrew has an additional word, the meaning of which is unclear. and at the edges of his fields he sows other grain. 26He knows how to do his work, because God has taught him. 27He never uses a heavy club to beat out dill seeds or cumin seeds; instead he uses light sticks of the proper size. 28He does not ruin the wheat by threshing it endlessly, and he knows how to thresh it by driving a cart over it without bruising the grains. 29All this wisdom comes from the LORD Almighty. The plans God makes are wise, and they always succeed!
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Good News Bible. Scripture taken from the Good News Bible (r) (Today's English Version Second Edition, UK/British Edition). Copyright © 1992 British & Foreign Bible Society. Used by permission.