Zephaniah 3:1–7

Sewer City

^1–53Doom to the rebellious city,

the home of oppressors—Sewer City!

The city that wouldn’t take advice,

wouldn’t accept correction,

Wouldn’t trust God,

wouldn’t even get close to her own god!

Her very own leaders

are rapacious lions,

Her judges are rapacious timber wolves

out every morning prowling for a fresh kill.

Her prophets are out for what they can get.

They’re opportunists—you can’t trust them.

Her priests desecrate the Sanctuary.

They use God’s law as a weapon to maim and kill souls.

Yet God remains righteous in her midst,

untouched by the evil.

He stays at it, day after day, meting out justice.

At evening he’s still at it, strong as ever.

But evil men and women, without conscience

and without shame, persist in evil.

⁶“So I cut off the godless nations.

I knocked down their defense posts,

Filled her roads with rubble

so no one could get through.

Her cities were bombed-out ruins,

unlivable and unlived in.

⁷“I thought, ‘Surely she’ll honor me now,

accept my discipline and correction,

Find a way of escape from the trouble she’s in,

find relief from the punishment I’m bringing.’

But it didn’t faze her. Bright and early

she was up at it again, doing the same old things.