Isaiah 27–28

27At that time the Lord will punish Leviathan, the gliding snake.

He will punish Leviathan, the coiled snake,

with his great and hard and powerful sword.

He will kill the monster in the sea.

²At that time

people will sing about the pleasant vineyard.

³“I, the Lord, will care for that vineyard;

I will water it at the right time.

No one will hurt it,

because I will guard it day and night.

⁴I am not angry.

If anyone builds a wall of thornbushes in war,

I will march to it and burn it.

⁵But if anyone comes to me for safety

and wants to make peace with me,

he should come and make peace with me.”

⁶In the days to come, the people of Jacob will be like a plant with good roots;

Israel will grow like a plant beginning to bloom.

Then the world will be filled with their children.

The Lord Will Send Israel Away

⁷The Lord has not hurt his people as he hurt their enemies;

his people have not been killed like those who tried to kill them.

⁸He will settle his argument with Israel by sending it far away.

Like a hot desert wind, he will drive it away.

⁹This is how Israel’s guilt will be forgiven;

this is how its sins will be taken away:

Israel will crush the rocks of the altar to dust,

and no statues or altars will be left standing for the Asherah idols.

¹⁰At that time the strong, walled city will be empty

like a desert.

Calves will eat grass there.

They will lie down there

and eat leaves from the branches.

¹¹The limbs will become dry and break off,

so women will use them for firewood.

The people refuse to understand,

so God will not comfort them;

their Maker will not be kind to them.

¹²At that time the Lord will begin gathering his people one by one from the Euphrates River to the brook of Egypt. He will separate them from others as grain is separated from chaff. ¹³Many of my people are now lost in Assyria. Some have run away to Egypt. But at that time a great trumpet will be blown, and all those people will come and worship the Lord on that holy mountain in Jerusalem.

Warnings to Israel

28How terrible it will be for Samaria, the pride of Israel’s drunken people!

That beautiful crown of flowers is just a dying plant

set on a hill above a rich valley where drunkards live.

²Look, the Lord has someone who is strong and powerful.

Like a storm of hail and strong wind,

like a sudden flood of water pouring over the country,

he will throw Samaria down to the ground.

³That city, the pride of Israel’s drunken people,

will be trampled underfoot.

⁴That beautiful crown of flowers is just a dying plant

set on a hill above a rich valley.

That city will be like the first fig of summer.

Anyone who sees it

quickly picks it and eats it.

⁵At that time the Lord All-Powerful

will be like a beautiful crown,

like a wonderful crown of flowers

for his people who are left alive.

⁶Then he will give wisdom to the judges who must decide cases

and strength to those who battle at the city gate.

⁷But now those leaders are drunk with wine;

they stumble from drinking too much beer.

The priests and prophets are drunk with beer

and are filled with wine.

They stumble from too much beer.

The prophets are drunk when they see their visions;

the judges stumble when they make their decisions.

⁸Every table is covered with vomit,

so there is not a clean place anywhere.

⁹The Lord is trying to teach the people a lesson;

he is trying to make them understand his teachings.

But the people are like babies too old for breast milk,

like those who no longer nurse at their mother’s breast.

¹⁰So they make fun of the Lord’s prophet and say:

“A command here, a command there.

A rule here, a rule there.

A little lesson here, a little lesson there.”

¹¹So the Lord will use strange words and foreign languages

to speak to these people.

¹²God said to them,

“Here is a place of rest;

let the tired people come and rest.

This is the place of peace.”

But the people would not listen.

¹³So the words of the Lord will be,

“A command here, a command there.

A rule here, a rule there.

A little lesson here, a little lesson there.”

They will fall back and be defeated;

they will be trapped and captured.

¹⁴So listen to the Lord’s message, you who brag,

you leaders in Jerusalem.

¹⁵You say, “We have made an agreement with death;

we have a contract with death.

When terrible punishment passes by,

it won’t hurt us.

Our lies will keep us safe,

and our tricks will hide us.”

¹⁶Because of these things, this is what the Lord God says:

“I will put a stone in the ground in Jerusalem,

a tested stone.

Everything will be built on this important and precious rock.

Anyone who trusts in it will never be disappointed.

¹⁷I will use justice as a measuring line

and goodness as the standard.

The lies you hide behind will be destroyed as if by hail.

They will be washed away as if in a flood.

¹⁸Your agreement with death will be erased;

your contract with death will not help you.

When terrible punishment comes,

you will be crushed by it.

¹⁹Whenever punishment comes, it will take you away.

It will come morning after morning;

it will defeat you by day and by night.

Those who understand this punishment will be terrified.”

²⁰You will be like the person who tried to sleep

on a bed that was too short

and with a blanket that was too narrow

to wrap around himself.

²¹The Lord will fight as he did at Mount Perazim.

He will be angry as he was in the Valley of Gibeon.

He will do his work, his strange work.

He will finish his job, his strange job.

²²Now, you must not make fun of these things,

or the ropes around you will become tighter.

The Lord God All-Powerful has told me

how the whole earth will be destroyed.

The Lord Punishes Fairly

²³Listen closely to what I tell you;

listen carefully to what I say.

²⁴A farmer does not plow his field all the time;

he does not go on working the soil.

²⁵He makes the ground flat and smooth.

Then he plants the dill and scatters the cumin.

He plants the wheat in rows,

the barley in its special place,

and other wheat as a border around the field.

²⁶His God teaches him

and shows him the right way.

²⁷A farmer doesn’t use heavy boards to crush dill;

he doesn’t use a wagon wheel to crush cumin.

He uses a small stick to break open the dill,

and with a stick he opens the cumin.

²⁸The grain is ground to make bread.

People do not ruin it by crushing it forever.

The farmer separates the wheat from the chaff with his cart,

but he does not let his horses grind it.

²⁹This lesson also comes from the Lord All-Powerful,

who gives wonderful advice, who is very wise.