Isaiah 4-5

New King James Version

Jerusalem’s Glorious Future

4 And ^(A)in that day seven women shall take hold of one man, saying,
“We will ^(B)eat our own food and wear our own apparel;
Only let us be called by your name,
To take away ^(C)our reproach.”

The Renewal of Zion

²In that day ^(D)the Branch of the Lord shall be beautiful and glorious;
And the fruit of the earth shall be excellent and appealing
For those of Israel who have escaped.

³And it shall come to pass that he who is left in Zion and remains in Jerusalem ^(E)will be called holy—everyone who is ^(F)recorded among the living in Jerusalem. ⁴When ^(G)the Lord has washed away the filth of the daughters of Zion, and purged the ^[a]blood of Jerusalem from her midst, by the spirit of judgment and by the spirit of burning, ⁵then the Lord will create above every dwelling place of Mount Zion, and above her assemblies, ^(H)a cloud and smoke by day and ^(I)the shining of a flaming fire by night. For over all the glory there will be a ^[b]covering. ⁶And there will be a tabernacle for shade in the daytime from the heat, ^(J)for a place of refuge, and for a shelter from storm and rain.

God’s Disappointing Vineyard

5 Now let me sing to my Well-beloved
A song of my Beloved ^(K)regarding His vineyard:

My Well-beloved has a vineyard
^[c]On a very fruitful hill.
²He dug it up and cleared out its stones,
And planted it with the choicest vine.
He built a tower in its midst,
And also ^[d]made a winepress in it;
^(L)So He expected it to bring forth good grapes,
But it brought forth wild grapes.

³“And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah,
^(M)Judge, please, between Me and My vineyard.
⁴What more could have been done to My vineyard
That I have not done in ^(N)it?
Why then, when I expected it to bring forth good grapes,
Did it bring forth wild grapes?
⁵And now, please let Me tell you what I will do to My vineyard:
^(O)I will take away its hedge, and it shall be burned;
And break down its wall, and it shall be trampled down.
⁶I will lay it ^(P)waste;
It shall not be pruned or ^[e]dug,
But there shall come up briers and ^(Q)thorns.
I will also command the clouds
That they rain no rain on it.”

⁷For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel,
And the men of Judah are His pleasant plant.
He looked for justice, but behold, oppression;
For righteousness, but behold, ^[f]a cry for help.

Impending Judgment on Excesses

⁸Woe to those who ^[g]join ^(R)house to house;
They add field to field,
Till there is no place
Where they may dwell alone in the midst of the land!
⁹^(S)In my hearing the Lord of hosts said,
“Truly, many houses shall be desolate,
Great and beautiful ones, without inhabitant.
¹⁰For ten acres of vineyard shall yield one ^(T)bath,^[h]
And a homer of seed shall yield one ^[i]ephah.”

¹¹^(U)Woe to those who rise early in the morning,
That they may ^[j]follow intoxicating drink;
Who continue until night, till wine inflames them!
¹²^(V)The harp and the strings,
The tambourine and flute,
And wine are in their feasts;
But ^(W)they do not regard the work of the Lord,
Nor consider the operation of His hands.

¹³^(X)Therefore my people have gone into captivity,
Because they have no ^(Y)knowledge;
Their honorable men are famished,
And their multitude dried up with thirst.
¹⁴Therefore Sheol has enlarged itself
And opened its mouth beyond measure;
Their glory and their multitude and their pomp,
And he who is jubilant, shall descend into it.
¹⁵People shall be brought down,
^(Z)Each man shall be humbled,
And the eyes of the lofty shall be humbled.
¹⁶But the Lord of hosts shall be ^(AA)exalted in judgment,
And God who is holy shall be hallowed in righteousness.
¹⁷Then the lambs shall feed in their pasture,
And in the waste places of ^(AB)the ^[k]fat ones strangers shall eat.

¹⁸Woe to those who ^[l]draw iniquity with cords of ^[m]vanity,
And sin as if with a cart rope;
¹⁹^(AC)That say, “Let Him make speed and hasten His work,
That we may see it;
And let the counsel of the Holy One of Israel draw near and come,
That we may know it.”

²⁰Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil;
Who put darkness for light, and light for darkness;
Who put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!

²¹Woe to those who are ^(AD)wise in their own eyes,
And prudent in their own sight!

²²Woe to men mighty at drinking wine,
Woe to men valiant for mixing intoxicating drink,
²³Who ^(AE)justify the wicked for a bribe,
And take away justice from the righteous man!

²⁴Therefore, ^(AF)as the ^[n]fire devours the stubble,
And the flame consumes the chaff,
So ^(AG)their root will be as rottenness,
And their blossom will ascend like dust;
Because they have rejected the law of the Lord of hosts,
And despised the word of the Holy One of Israel.
²⁵^(AH)Therefore the anger of the Lord is aroused against His people;
He has stretched out His hand against them
And stricken them,
And ^(AI)the hills trembled.
Their carcasses were as refuse in the midst of the streets.

^(AJ)For all this His anger is not turned away,
But His hand is stretched out still.

²⁶^(AK)He will lift up a banner to the nations from afar,
And will ^(AL)whistle to them from ^(AM)the end of the earth;
Surely ^(AN)they shall come with speed, swiftly.
²⁷No one will be weary or stumble among them,
No one will slumber or sleep;
Nor ^(AO)will the belt on their loins be loosed,
Nor the strap of their sandals be broken;
²⁸^(AP)Whose arrows are sharp,
And all their bows bent;
Their horses’ hooves will ^[o]seem like flint,
And their wheels like a whirlwind.
²⁹Their roaring will be like a lion,
They will roar like young lions;
Yes, they will roar
And lay hold of the prey;
They will carry it away safely,
And no one will deliver.
³⁰In that day they will roar against them
Like the roaring of the sea.
And if one ^(AQ)looks to the land,
Behold, darkness and ^[p]sorrow;
And the light is darkened by the clouds.

Footnotes

Isaiah 4:4 bloodshed
Isaiah 4:5 canopy
Isaiah 5:1 Lit. In a horn, the son of fatness
Isaiah 5:2 Lit. hewed out
Isaiah 5:6 hoed
Isaiah 5:7 wailing
Isaiah 5:8 Accumulate houses
Isaiah 5:10 1 bath=1⁄10 homer
Isaiah 5:10 1 ephah=1⁄10 homer
Isaiah 5:11 pursue
Isaiah 5:17 Lit. fatlings, rich ones
Isaiah 5:18 drag
Isaiah 5:18 emptiness or falsehood
Isaiah 5:24 Lit. tongue of fire
Isaiah 5:28 Lit. be regarded as
Isaiah 5:30 distress

Psalm 115-116

New King James Version

The Futility of Idols and the Trustworthiness of God

115 Not ^(A)unto us, O Lord, not unto us,
But to Your name give glory,
Because of Your mercy,
Because of Your truth.
²Why should the ^[a]Gentiles say,
^(B)“So where is their God?”

³^(C)But our God is in heaven;
He does whatever He pleases.
⁴^(D)Their idols are silver and gold,
The work of men’s hands.
⁵They have mouths, but they do not speak;
Eyes they have, but they do not see;
⁶They have ears, but they do not hear;
Noses they have, but they do not smell;
⁷They have hands, but they do not handle;
Feet they have, but they do not walk;
Nor do they mutter through their throat.
⁸^(E)Those who make them are like them;
So is everyone who trusts in them.

⁹^(F)O Israel, trust in the Lord;
^(G)He is their help and their shield.
¹⁰O house of Aaron, trust in the Lord;
He is their help and their shield.
¹¹You who fear the Lord, trust in the Lord;
He is their help and their shield.

¹²The Lord ^[b]has been mindful of us;
He will bless us;
He will bless the house of Israel;
He will bless the house of Aaron.
¹³^(H)He will bless those who fear the Lord,
Both small and great.

¹⁴May the Lord give you increase more and more,
You and your children.
¹⁵May you be ^(I)blessed by the Lord,
^(J)Who made heaven and earth.

¹⁶The heaven, even the heavens, are the Lord’s;
But the earth He has given to the children of men.
¹⁷^(K)The dead do not praise the Lord,
Nor any who go down into silence.
¹⁸^(L)But we will bless the Lord
From this time forth and forevermore.

Praise the Lord!

Thanksgiving for Deliverance from Death

116 I ^(M)love the Lord, because He has heard
My voice and my supplications.
²Because He has inclined His ear to me,
Therefore I will call upon Him as long as I live.

³^(N)The ^[c]pains of death surrounded me,
And the ^[d]pangs of Sheol ^[e]laid hold of me;
I found trouble and sorrow.
⁴Then I called upon the name of the Lord:
“O Lord, I implore You, deliver my soul!”

⁵^(O)Gracious is the Lord, and ^(P)righteous;
Yes, our God is merciful.
⁶The Lord preserves the simple;
I was brought low, and He saved me.
⁷Return to your ^(Q)rest, O my soul,
For ^(R)the Lord has dealt bountifully with you.

⁸^(S)For You have delivered my soul from death,
My eyes from tears,
And my feet from falling.
⁹I will walk before the Lord
^(T)In the land of the living.
¹⁰^(U)I believed, therefore I spoke,
“I am greatly afflicted.”
¹¹^(V)I said in my haste,
^(W)“All men are liars.”

¹²What shall I render to the Lord
For all His benefits toward me?
¹³I will take up the cup of salvation,
And call upon the name of the Lord.
¹⁴^(X)I will pay my vows to the Lord
Now in the presence of all His people.

¹⁵^(Y)Precious in the sight of the Lord
Is the death of His saints.

¹⁶O Lord, truly ^(Z)I am Your servant;
I am Your servant, ^(AA)the son of Your maidservant;
You have loosed my bonds.
¹⁷I will offer to You ^(AB)the sacrifice of thanksgiving,
And will call upon the name of the Lord.

¹⁸I will pay my vows to the Lord
Now in the presence of all His people,
¹⁹In the ^(AC)courts of the Lord’s house,
In the midst of you, O Jerusalem.

^[f]Praise the Lord!

Footnotes

Psalm 115:2 nations
Psalm 115:12 has remembered us
Psalm 116:3 Lit. cords
Psalm 116:3 distresses
Psalm 116:3 Lit. found me
Psalm 116:19 Heb. Hallelujah

Jude

New King James Version

Greeting to the Called

¹Jude, a bondservant of Jesus Christ, and ^(A)brother of James,

To those who are ^(B)called, ^[a]sanctified by God the Father, and ^(C)preserved in Jesus Christ:

²Mercy, ^(D)peace, and love be multiplied to you.

Contend for the Faith

³Beloved, while I was very diligent to write to you ^(E)concerning our common salvation, I found it necessary to write to you exhorting ^(F)you to contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints. ⁴For certain men have crept in unnoticed, who long ago were marked out for this condemnation, ungodly men, who turn the grace of our God into lewdness and deny the only Lord ^[b]God and our Lord Jesus Christ.

Old and New Apostates

⁵But I want to remind you, though you once knew this, that ^(G)the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe. ⁶And the angels who did not keep their ^[c]proper domain, but left their own abode, He has reserved in everlasting chains under darkness for the judgment of the great day; ⁷as ^(H)Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities around them in a similar manner to these, having given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh, are set forth as an example, suffering the ^[d]vengeance of eternal fire.

⁸^(I)Likewise also these dreamers defile the flesh, reject authority, and ^(J)speak evil of ^[e]dignitaries. ⁹Yet Michael the archangel, in ^[f]contending with the devil, when he disputed about the body of Moses, dared not bring against him a reviling accusation, but said, ^(K)“The Lord rebuke you!” ¹⁰^(L)But these speak evil of whatever they do not know; and whatever they know naturally, like brute beasts, in these things they corrupt themselves. ¹¹Woe to them! For they have gone in the way ^(M)of Cain, ^(N)have run greedily in the error of Balaam for profit, and perished ^(O)in the rebellion of Korah.

Apostates Depraved and Doomed

¹²These are ^[g]spots in your love feasts, while they feast with you without fear, serving only themselves. They are clouds without water, carried ^[h]about by the winds; late autumn trees without fruit, twice dead, pulled up by the roots; ¹³^(P)raging waves of the sea, ^(Q)foaming up their own shame; wandering stars ^(R)for whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever.

¹⁴Now Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about these men also, saying, “Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of His saints, ¹⁵to execute judgment on all, to convict all who are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have committed in an ungodly way, and of all the ^(S)harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him.”

Apostates Predicted

¹⁶These are grumblers, complainers, walking according to their own lusts; and they ^(T)mouth great swelling words, ^(U)flattering people to gain advantage. ¹⁷^(V)But you, beloved, remember the words which were spoken before by the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ: ¹⁸how they told you that ^(W)there would be mockers in the last time who would walk according to their own ungodly lusts. ¹⁹These are ^[i]sensual persons, who cause divisions, not having the Spirit.

Maintain Your Life with God

²⁰But you, beloved, ^(X)building yourselves up on your most holy faith, ^(Y)praying in the Holy Spirit, ²¹keep yourselves in the love of God, ^(Z)looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.

²²And on some have compassion, ^[j]making a distinction; ²³but ^(AA)others save ^[k]with fear, ^(AB)pulling them out of the ^[l]fire, hating even ^(AC)the garment defiled by the flesh.

Glory to God

²⁴^(AD)Now to Him who is able to keep ^[m]you from stumbling,
And ^(AE)to present you faultless
Before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy,
²⁵To ^[n]God our Savior,
^[o]Who alone is wise,
Be glory and majesty,
Dominion and ^[p]power,
Both now and forever.
Amen.