ESV - Isaiah Chapter 24 to 26

24 Judgment on the Whole Earth

24:1 Behold, the Lord will empty the earth[1] and make it desolate, and he will twist its surface and scatter its inhabitants. ²And it shall be, as with the people, so with the priest; as with the slave, so with his master; as with the maid, so with her mistress; as with the buyer, so with the seller; as with the lender, so with the borrower; as with the creditor, so with the debtor. ³The earth shall be utterly empty and utterly plundered; for the Lord has spoken this word.

⁴The earth mourns and withers; the world languishes and withers; the highest people of the earth languish. ⁵The earth lies defiled under its inhabitants; for they have transgressed the laws, violated the statutes, broken the everlasting covenant. ⁶Therefore a curse devours the earth, and its inhabitants suffer for their guilt; therefore the inhabitants of the earth are scorched, and few men are left. ⁷The wine mourns, the vine languishes, all the merry-hearted sigh. ⁸The mirth of the tambourines is stilled, the noise of the jubilant has ceased, the mirth of the lyre is stilled. ⁹No more do they drink wine with singing; strong drink is bitter to those who drink it. ¹⁰The wasted city is broken down; every house is shut up so that none can enter. ¹¹There is an outcry in the streets for lack of wine; all joy has grown dark; the gladness of the earth is banished. ¹²Desolation is left in the city; the gates are battered into ruins. ¹³For thus it shall be in the midst of the earth among the nations, as when an olive tree is beaten, as at the gleaning when the grape harvest is done.

¹⁴They lift up their voices, they sing for joy; over the majesty of the Lord they shout from the west.^[2]¹⁵Therefore in the east[3] give glory to the Lord; in the coastlands of the sea, give glory to the name of the Lord, the God of Israel. ¹⁶From the ends of the earth we hear songs of praise, of glory to the Righteous One. But I say, “I waste away, I waste away. Woe is me! For the traitors have betrayed, with betrayal the traitors have betrayed.”

¹⁷Terror and the pit and the snare[4] are upon you, O inhabitant of the earth! ¹⁸He who flees at the sound of the terror shall fall into the pit, and he who climbs out of the pit shall be caught in the snare. For the windows of heaven are opened, and the foundations of the earth tremble. ¹⁹The earth is utterly broken, the earth is split apart, the earth is violently shaken. ²⁰The earth staggers like a drunken man; it sways like a hut; its transgression lies heavy upon it, and it falls, and will not rise again.

²¹On that day the Lord will punish the host of heaven, in heaven, and the kings of the earth, on the earth. ²²They will be gathered together as prisoners in a pit; they will be shut up in a prison, and after many days they will be punished. ²³Then the moon will be confounded and the sun ashamed, for the Lord of hosts reigns on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem, and his glory will be before his elders.

[1] Or land; also throughout this chapter [2] Hebrew from the sea [3] Hebrew in the realm of light [4] The Hebrew words for terror, pit, and snare sound alike

25 God Will Swallow Up Death Forever

25:1 O Lord, you are my God; I will exalt you; I will praise your name, for you have done wonderful things, plans formed of old, faithful and sure. ²For you have made the city a heap, the fortified city a ruin; the foreigners’ palace is a city no more; it will never be rebuilt. ³Therefore strong peoples will glorify you; cities of ruthless nations will fear you. ⁴For you have been a stronghold to the poor, a stronghold to the needy in his distress, a shelter from the storm and a shade from the heat; for the breath of the ruthless is like a storm against a wall, ⁵ like heat in a dry place. You subdue the noise of the foreigners; as heat by the shade of a cloud, so the song of the ruthless is put down.

⁶On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wine, of rich food full of marrow, of aged wine well refined. ⁷And he will swallow up on this mountain the covering that is cast over all peoples, the veil that is spread over all nations. ⁸ He will swallow up death forever; and the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces, and the reproach of his people he will take away from all the earth, for the Lord has spoken. ⁹It will be said on that day, “Behold, this is our God; we have waited for him, that he might save us. This is the Lord; we have waited for him; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation.” ¹⁰For the hand of the Lord will rest on this mountain, and Moab shall be trampled down in his place, as straw is trampled down in a dunghill.^[5]¹¹And he will spread out his hands in the midst of it as a swimmer spreads his hands out to swim, but the Lord will lay low his pompous pride together with the skill [6] of his hands. ¹²And the high fortifications of his walls he will bring down, lay low, and cast to the ground, to the dust.

[5] The Hebrew words for dunghill and for the Moabite town Madmen (Jeremiah 48:2) sound alike [6] Or in spite of the skill

26 You Keep Him in Perfect Peace

26:1 In that day this song will be sung in the land of Judah:

“We have a strong city; he sets up salvation as walls and bulwarks. ²Open the gates, that the righteous nation that keeps faith may enter in. ³You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you. ⁴Trust in the Lord forever, for the Lord God is an everlasting rock. ⁵For he has humbled the inhabitants of the height, the lofty city. He lays it low, lays it low to the ground, casts it to the dust. ⁶The foot tramples it, the feet of the poor, the steps of the needy.”

⁷The path of the righteous is level; you make level the way of the righteous. ⁸In the path of your judgments, O Lord, we wait for you; your name and remembrance are the desire of our soul. ⁹My soul yearns for you in the night; my spirit within me earnestly seeks you. For when your judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world learn righteousness. ¹⁰If favor is shown to the wicked, he does not learn righteousness; in the land of uprightness he deals corruptly and does not see the majesty of the Lord. ¹¹O Lord, your hand is lifted up, but they do not see it. Let them see your zeal for your people, and be ashamed. Let the fire for your adversaries consume them. ¹²O Lord, you will ordain peace for us; you have done for us all our works. ¹³O Lord our God, other lords besides you have ruled over us, but your name alone we bring to remembrance. ¹⁴They are dead, they will not live; they are shades, they will not arise; to that end you have visited them with destruction and wiped out all remembrance of them. ¹⁵But you have increased the nation, O Lord, you have increased the nation; you are glorified; you have enlarged all the borders of the land.

¹⁶O Lord, in distress they sought you; they poured out a whispered prayer when your discipline was upon them. ¹⁷Like a pregnant woman who writhes and cries out in her pangs when she is near to giving birth, so were we because of you, O Lord; ¹⁸ we were pregnant, we writhed, but we have given birth to wind. We have accomplished no deliverance in the earth, and the inhabitants of the world have not fallen. ¹⁹Your dead shall live; their bodies shall rise. You who dwell in the dust, awake and sing for joy! For your dew is a dew of light, and the earth will give birth to the dead.

²⁰Come, my people, enter your chambers, and shut your doors behind you; hide yourselves for a little while until the fury has passed by. ²¹For behold, the Lord is coming out from his place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity, and the earth will disclose the blood shed on it, and will no more cover its slain.