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3:1 (4:1) “For look! In those days and at that time I will return the exiles to Judah and Jerusalem. 3:2 Then I will gather all the nations and bring them down to the Valley of Jehoshaphat. I will enter into judgment against them there concerning my people Israel who are my inheritance, whom they scattered among the nations. They partitioned my land, 3:3 and they cast lots for my people. They traded a boy for a prostitute; they sold a little girl for wine so they could drink. 3:4 Why are you doing these things to me, Tyre and Sidon? Are you trying to get even with me, land of Philistia? If you are, I will very quickly repay you for what you have done! 3:5 For you took my silver and my gold and brought my precious valuables to your own palaces. 3:6 You sold Judeans and Jerusalemites to the Greeks, removing them far from their own country. 3:7 Look! I am rousing them from that place to which you sold them. I will repay you for what you have done! 3:8 I will sell your sons and daughters to the people of Judah. They will sell them to the Sabeans, a nation far away.” Indeed, the Lord has spoken.
3:9 Proclaim this among the nations: “Prepare for a holy war! Call out the warriors! Let all these fighting men approach and attack! 3:10 Beat your plowshares into swords and your pruning hooks into spears. Let the weak say, ‘I too am a warrior!’ 3:11 Lend your aid and come, all you surrounding nations, and gather yourselves to that place.” Bring down, O Lord, your warriors! 3:12 “Let the nations be roused and let them go up to the Valley of Jehoshaphat, for there I will sit in judgment on all the surrounding nations. 3:13 Rush forth with the sickle, for the harvest is ripe! Come, stomp the grapes, for the winepress is full! The vats overflow. Indeed, their evil is great!” 3:14 Crowds, great crowds are in the Valley of Decision, for the day of the Lord is near in the Valley of Decision! 3:15 The sun and moon are darkened; the stars withhold their brightness. 3:16 The Lord roars from Zion; from Jerusalem his voice bellows out. The heavens and the earth shake. But the Lord is a refuge for his people; he is a stronghold for the citizens of Israel.
3:17 “You will be convinced that I, the Lord, am your God, dwelling on Zion, my holy mountain. Jerusalem will be holy— conquering armies will no longer pass through it. 3:18 On that day the mountains will drip with sweet wine, and the hills will flow with milk. All the dry stream beds of Judah will flow with water. A spring will flow out from the temple of the Lord, watering the Valley of Acacia Trees. 3:19 Egypt will be desolate, and Edom will be a desolate wilderness because of the violence they did to the people of Judah, in whose land they shed innocent blood. 3:20 But Judah will reside securely forever, and Jerusalem will be secure from one generation to the next. 3:21 I will avenge their blood that I had not previously acquitted.” It is the Lord who dwells in Zion!
NET Bible Second Edition. Copyright 2017 Biblical Studies Press
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