Zephaniah 2

The Lord Asks People to Change

2Gather together, gather,

you unwanted people.

²Do it before it’s too late,

before you are blown away like chaff,

before the Lord’s terrible anger reaches you,

before the day of the Lord’s anger comes to you.

³Come to the Lord, all you who are not proud,

who obey his laws.

Do what is right. Learn to be humble.

Maybe you will escape

on the day the Lord shows his anger.

Philistia Will Be Punished

⁴No one will be left in the city of Gaza,

and the city of Ashkelon will be destroyed.

Ashdod will be empty by noon,

and the people of Ekron will be chased away.

⁵How terrible it will be for you who live by the Mediterranean Sea,

you Philistines!

The word of the Lord is against you,

Canaan, land of the Philistines.

“I will destroy you

so that no one will be left.”

⁶The land by the Mediterranean Sea, in which you live,

will become pastures, fields for shepherds, and pens for sheep.

⁷It will belong to the descendants of Judah who are left alive.

There they will let their sheep eat grass.

At night they will sleep

in the houses of Ashkelon.

The Lord their God will pay attention to them

and will make their life good again.

Moab and Ammon Will Be Punished

⁸“I have heard the insults of the country of Moab

and the threats of the people of Ammon.

They have insulted my people

and have taken their land.”

⁹So the Lord All-Powerful, the God of Israel, says,

“As surely as I live,

Moab will be destroyed like Sodom,

and Ammon will be destroyed like Gomorrah ⁿ—

a heap of weeds, a pit of salt,

and a ruin forever.

Those of my people who are left alive will take whatever they want from them;

those who are left from my nation will take their land.”

¹⁰This is what Moab and Ammon get for being proud,

because they insulted and made fun of the people of the Lord All-Powerful.

¹¹The Lord will frighten them,

because he will destroy all the gods of the earth.

Then everyone in faraway places

will worship him wherever they are.

Cush and Assyria Will Be Destroyed

¹²“You Cushites also

will be killed by my sword.”

¹³Then the Lord will turn against the north

and destroy Assyria.

He will make Nineveh

a ruin as dry as a desert.

¹⁴Flocks and herds will lie down there,

and all wild animals.

The owls and crows will sit

on the stone pillars.

The owl will hoot through the windows,

trash will be in the doorways,

and the wooden boards of the buildings will be gone.

¹⁵This is the happy and safe city

that thinks there is no one else as strong as it is.

But what a ruin it will be,

a place where wild animals live.

All those who pass by will make fun

and shake their fists.