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Malachi 2:10-4:6

Judah Profaned the Covenant

¹⁰Have we not all one Father? Has not one God created us? Why then are we faithless to one another, profaning the covenant of our fathers? ¹¹Judah has been faithless, and abomination has been committed in Israel and in Jerusalem. For Judah has profaned the sanctuary of the LORD, which he loves, and has married the daughter of a foreign god. ¹²May the LORD cut off from the tents of Jacob any descendant of the man who does this, who brings an offering to the LORD of hosts!

¹³And this second thing you do. You cover the LORD’s altar with tears, with weeping and groaning because he no longer regards the offering or accepts it with favor from your hand. ¹⁴ But you say, "Why does he not?" Because the LORD was witness between you and the wife of your youth, to whom you have been faithless, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant. ¹⁵ Did he not make them one, with a portion of the Spirit in their union? And what was the one God seeking? Godly offspring. So guard yourselves in your spirit, and let none of you be faithless to the wife of your youth. ¹⁶"For the man who does not love his wife but divorces her, says the LORD, the God of Israel, covers his garment with violence, says the LORD of hosts. So guard yourselves in your spirit, and do not be faithless."

The Messenger of the LORD

¹⁷ You have wearied the LORD with your words. But you say, "How have we wearied him?" By saying, "Everyone who does evil is good in the sight of the LORD, and he delights in them." Or by asking, "Where is the God of justice?"

Malachi 3

¹ "Behold, I send my messenger, and he will prepare the way before me. And the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple; and the messenger of the covenant in whom you delight, behold, he is coming, says the LORD of hosts. ²But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner’s fire and like fullers’ soap. ³He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, and they will bring offerings in righteousness to the LORD. ⁴ Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasing to the LORD as in the days of old and as in former years.

⁵"Then I will draw near to you for judgment. I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, against the adulterers, against those who swear falsely, against those who oppress the hired worker in his wages, the widow and the fatherless, against those who thrust aside the sojourner, and do not fear me, says the LORD of hosts.

Robbing God

⁶"For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed. ⁷ From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts. But you say, 'How shall we return?' ⁸Will man rob God? Yet you are robbing me. But you say, 'How have we robbed you?' In your tithes and contributions. ⁹ You are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing me, the whole nation of you. ¹⁰ Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. And thereby put me to the test, says the LORD of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need. ¹¹I will rebuke the devourer for you, so that it will not destroy the fruits of your soil, and your vine in the field shall not fail to bear, says the LORD of hosts. ¹²Then all nations will call you blessed, for you will be a land of delight, says the LORD of hosts.

¹³ "Your words have been hard against me, says the LORD. But you say, 'How have we spoken against you?' ¹⁴You have said, 'It is vain to serve God. What is the profit of our keeping his charge or of walking as in mourning before the LORD of hosts? ¹⁵And now we call the arrogant blessed. Evildoers not only prosper but they put God to the test and they escape.'"

The Book of Remembrance

¹⁶Then those who feared the LORD spoke with one another. The LORD paid attention and heard them, and a book of remembrance was written before him of those who feared the LORD and esteemed his name. ¹⁷"They shall be mine, says the LORD of hosts, in the day when I make up my treasured possession, and I will spare them as a man spares his son who serves him. ¹⁸Then once more you shall see the distinction between the righteous and the wicked, between one who serves God and one who does not serve him.

Malachi 4

The Great Day of the LORD

¹ "For behold, the day is coming, burning like an oven, when all the arrogant and all evildoers will be stubble. The day that is coming shall set them ablaze, says the LORD of hosts, so that it will leave them neither root nor branch. ²But for you who fear my name, the sun of righteousness shall rise with healing in its wings. You shall go out leaping like calves from the stall. ³And you shall tread down the wicked, for they will be ashes under the soles of your feet, on the day when I act, says the LORD of hosts.

⁴ "Remember the law of my servant Moses, the statutes and rules that I commanded him at Horeb for all Israel.

⁵ "Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and awesome day of the LORD comes. ⁶And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction."

Joel 1-3:21

Joel 1

¹The word of the LORD that came to Joel, the son of Pethuel:

An Invasion of Locusts

² Hear this, you elders;
give ear, all inhabitants of the land!
Has such a thing happened in your days,
or in the days of your fathers?
³ Tell your children of it,
and let your children tell their children,
and their children to another generation.

⁴What the cutting locust left,
  the swarming locust has eaten.
What the swarming locust left,
  the hopping locust has eaten,
and what the hopping locust left,
  the destroying locust has eaten.

⁵Awake, you drunkards, and weep,
and wail, all you drinkers of wine,
because of the sweet wine,
for it is cut off from your mouth.
⁶For a nation has come up against my land,
  powerful and beyond number;
its teeth are lions’ teeth,
and it has the fangs of a lioness.
⁷It has laid waste my vine
and splintered my fig tree;
it has stripped off their bark and thrown it down;
their branches are made white.

⁸Lament like a virgin wearing sackcloth
for the bridegroom of her youth.
⁹ The grain offering and the drink offering are cut off
from the house of the LORD.
 The priests mourn,
the ministers of the LORD.
¹⁰The fields are destroyed,
  the ground mourns,
because the grain is destroyed,
the wine dries up,
the oil languishes.

¹¹ Be ashamed, O tillers of the soil;
wail, O vinedressers,
for the wheat and the barley,
  because the harvest of the field has perished.
¹²The vine dries up;
  the fig tree languishes.
Pomegranate, palm, and apple,
all the trees of the field are dried up,
and gladness dries up
from the children of man.

A Call to Repentance

¹³ Put on sackcloth and lament, O priests;
  wail, O ministers of the altar.
Go in, pass the night in sackcloth,
O ministers of my God!
Because grain offering and drink offering
are withheld from the house of your God.

¹⁴ Consecrate a fast;
  call a solemn assembly.
Gather the elders
and all the inhabitants of the land
to the house of the LORD your God,
and cry out to the LORD.

¹⁵Alas for the day! For the day of the LORD is near,
and as destruction from the Almighty it comes.
¹⁶Is not the food cut off
before our eyes,
 joy and gladness
from the house of our God?

¹⁷ The seed shrivels under the clods;
the storehouses are desolate;
the granaries are torn down
because the grain has dried up.
¹⁸How the beasts groan!
The herds of cattle are perplexed
because there is no pasture for them;
even the flocks of sheep suffer.

¹⁹To you, O LORD, I call. For fire has devoured
the pastures of the wilderness,
and flame has burned
all the trees of the field.
²⁰Even the beasts of the field pant for you
because the water brooks are dried up,
 and fire has devoured
the pastures of the wilderness.

Joel 2

The Day of the LORD

¹ Blow a trumpet in Zion;
sound an alarm on my holy mountain!
Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble,
for the day of the LORD is coming; it is near,
² a day of darkness and gloom,
  a day of clouds and thick darkness!
Like blackness there is spread upon the mountains
  a great and powerful people;
their like has never been before,
nor will be again after them
through the years of all generations.

³ Fire devours before them,
and behind them a flame burns.
The land is like the garden of Eden before them,
but behind them a desolate wilderness,
and nothing escapes them.

⁴ Their appearance is like the appearance of horses,
and like war horses they run.
⁵ As with the rumbling of chariots,
they leap on the tops of the mountains,
like the crackling of a flame of fire
devouring the stubble,
 like a powerful army
drawn up for battle.

⁶Before them peoples are in anguish;
  all faces grow pale.
⁷Like warriors they charge;
like soldiers they scale the wall.
They march each on his way;
they do not swerve from their paths.
⁸They do not jostle one another;
  each marches in his path;
they burst through the weapons
and are not halted.
⁹ They leap upon the city,
they run upon the walls,
 they climb up into the houses,
  they enter through the windows like a thief.

¹⁰ The earth quakes before them;
the heavens tremble.
 The sun and the moon are darkened,
and the stars withdraw their shining.
¹¹ The LORD utters his voice
before his army,
for his camp is exceedingly great;
  he who executes his word is powerful.
 For the day of the LORD is great and very awesome;
  who can endure it?

Return to the LORD

¹²"Yet even now," declares the LORD,
  "return to me with all your heart,
 with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning;
¹³and rend your hearts and not your garments."
Return to the LORD your God,
  for he is gracious and merciful,
slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love;
  and he relents over disaster.
¹⁴ Who knows whether he will not turn and relent,
and leave a blessing behind him,
 a grain offering and a drink offering
for the LORD your God?

¹⁵ Blow the trumpet in Zion;
  consecrate a fast;
call a solemn assembly;
¹⁶gather the people.
 Consecrate the congregation;
assemble the elders;
 gather the children,
even nursing infants.
 Let the bridegroom leave his room,
and the bride her chamber.

¹⁷ Between the vestibule and the altar
  let the priests, the ministers of the LORD, weep
and say, "Spare your people, O LORD,
and make not your heritage a reproach,
a byword among the nations.
 Why should they say among the peoples,
'Where is their God?'"

The LORD Had Pity

¹⁸ Then the LORD became jealous for his land
  and had pity on his people.
¹⁹The LORD answered and said to his people,"Behold, I am sending to you
grain, wine, and oil,
and you will be satisfied;
and I will no more make you
a reproach among the nations.

²⁰"I will remove the northerner far from you,
and drive him into a parched and desolate land,
his vanguard into the eastern sea,
and his rear guard into the western sea;
 the stench and foul smell of him will rise,
for he has done great things.

²¹"Fear not, O land;
be glad and rejoice,
for the LORD has done great things!
²²Fear not, you beasts of the field,
for the pastures of the wilderness are green;
 the tree bears its fruit;
the fig tree and vine give their full yield.

²³ "Be glad, O children of Zion,
and rejoice in the LORD your God,
for he has given the early rain for your vindication;
he has poured down for you abundant rain,
the early and the latter rain, as before.

²⁴"The threshing floors shall be full of grain;
the vats shall overflow with wine and oil.
²⁵I will restore to you the years
that the swarming locust has eaten,
 the hopper, the destroyer, and the cutter,
my great army, which I sent among you.

²⁶ "You shall eat in plenty and be satisfied,
and praise the name of the LORD your God,
who has dealt wondrously with you.
And my people shall never again be put to shame. ²⁷ You shall know that I am in the midst of Israel,
and that I am the LORD your God and there is none else.
And my people shall never again be put to shame.

The LORD Will Pour Out His Spirit

²⁸ "And it shall come to pass afterward,
that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh;
 your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
your old men shall dream dreams,
and your young men shall see visions.
²⁹ Even on the male and female servants
in those days I will pour out my Spirit.

³⁰"And I will show wonders in the heavens and on the earth, blood and fire and columns of smoke. ³¹ The sun shall be turned to darkness, and the moon to blood, before the great and awesome day of the LORD comes. ³²And it shall come to pass that everyone who calls on the name of the LORD shall be saved. For in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there shall be those who escape, as the LORD has said, and among the survivors shall be those whom the LORD calls.

Joel 3

The LORD Judges the Nations

¹ "For behold, in those days and at that time, when I restore the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem, ² I will gather all the nations and bring them down to the Valley of Jehoshaphat. And I will enter into judgment with them there, on behalf of my people and my heritage Israel, because they have scattered them among the nations and have divided up my land, ³and have cast lots for my people, and have traded a boy for a prostitute, and have sold a girl for wine and have drunk it.

⁴"What are you to me, O Tyre and Sidon, and all the regions of Philistia? Are you paying me back for something? If you are paying me back, I will return your payment on your own head swiftly and speedily. ⁵For you have taken my silver and my gold, and have carried my rich treasures into your temples. ⁶You have sold the people of Judah and Jerusalem to the Greeks in order to remove them far from their own border. ⁷Behold, I will stir them up from the place to which you have sold them, and I will return your payment on your own head. ⁸I will sell your sons and your daughters into the hand of the people of Judah, and they will sell them to the Sabeans, to a nation far away, for the LORD has spoken."
⁹Proclaim this among the nations: Consecrate for war;
stir up the mighty men.
Let all the men of war draw near;
let them come up.
¹⁰ Beat your plowshares into swords,
and your pruning hooks into spears;
let the weak say, "I am a warrior."

¹¹ Hasten and come,
all you surrounding nations,
and gather yourselves there.
 Bring down your warriors, O LORD. ¹²Let the nations stir themselves up
and come up to the Valley of Jehoshaphat;
 for there I will sit to judge
all the surrounding nations.

¹³ Put in the sickle,
  for the harvest is ripe.
 Go in, tread,
for the winepress is full.
The vats overflow,
for their evil is great.

¹⁴Multitudes, multitudes,
in the valley of decision!
For the day of the LORD is near
in the valley of decision.
¹⁵ The sun and the moon are darkened,
and the stars withdraw their shining.

¹⁶ The LORD roars from Zion,
and utters his voice from Jerusalem,
  and the heavens and the earth quake.
But the LORD is a refuge to his people,
a stronghold to the people of Israel.

The Glorious Future of Judah

¹⁷ "So you shall know that I am the LORD your God,
  who dwells in Zion, my holy mountain.
And Jerusalem shall be holy,
and strangers shall never again pass through it.

¹⁸"And in that day the mountains shall drip sweet wine,
and the hills shall flow with milk,
and all the streambeds of Judah
shall flow with water;
 and a fountain shall come forth from the house of the LORD
and water the Valley of Shittim.

¹⁹ "Egypt shall become a desolation
and Edom a desolate wilderness,
 for the violence done to the people of Judah,
because they have shed innocent blood in their land.
²⁰ But Judah shall be inhabited forever,
and Jerusalem to all generations.
²¹ I will avenge their blood,
blood I have not avenged,
  for the LORD dwells in Zion."