Isaiah 5–6
1 Now I will sing to my well-beloved a song of my beloved
concerning His vineyard:
My well-beloved has a vineyard
in a very fruitful hill.
2 And He fenced it, and removed its stones,
and planted it with the choicest vine.
And He built a tower in the midst of it,
and also made a winepress in it;
and He expected it to bring forth good grapes,
but it brought forth wild grapes.
3 Now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah,
judge between My vineyard and Me.
4 What more could have been done to My vineyard
that I have not done in it?
Why, when I expected it to bring forth good grapes,
did it bring forth wild grapes?
5 So now I will tell you
what I will do to My vineyard:
I will take away its hedge,
and it shall be consumed;
I will break down its wall,
and it shall be trodden down.
6 And I will lay it waste:
It shall not be pruned or dug,
but briers and thorns shall come up.
I will also command the clouds
that they rain no rain on it.
7 For the vineyard of the Lord of Hosts
is the house of Israel,
and the men of Judah
His pleasant plant.
Thus He looked for justice, but saw oppression;
for righteousness, but heard a cry.
8 Woe to those who join house to house,
who add field to field,
until there is no more space
where they may live alone in the midst of the land!
9 In my ears the Lord of Hosts said:
Truly, many houses shall be desolate,
even great and beautiful, without inhabitants.
10 For ten acres of vineyard shall yield one bath,
and the homer of seed shall yield an ephah.
11 Woe to those who rise up early in the morning
that they may pursue strong drink;
who continue late in the evening
until wine inflames them!
12 The lyre and the harp, the tambourine and pipe,
and wine are in their feasts;
but they do not regard the deeds of the Lord,
or consider the work of His hands.
13 Therefore My people go into captivity
because they have no knowledge;
and their honorable men are famished,
and their multitude dried up with thirst.
14 Therefore Sheol has enlarged itself
and opened its mouth without measure;
so their glory, and their multitude, and their pomp,
and he who rejoices shall descend into it.
15 The common man shall be brought down,
and the great man shall be humbled,
and the eyes of the lofty shall be humbled.
16 But the Lord of Hosts shall be exalted in judgment,
and God who is holy shall be hallowed in righteousness.
17 Then the lambs shall feed in their pasture,
and strangers shall eat in the waste places of the wealthy.
18 Woe to those who draw iniquity with cords of falsehood
and sin as if with a cart rope,
19 who 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!”
20 Woe to those who call evil good,
and good evil;
who exchange darkness for light,
and light for darkness;
who exchange bitter for sweet,
and sweet for bitter!
21 Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes
and prudent in their own sight!
22 Woe to those who are mighty to drink wine,
and men of strength to mingle strong drink,
23 who justify the wicked for a reward,
and take away the justice of the righteous from him!
24 Therefore, as the fire devours the stubble
and the flame consumes the chaff,
so their root shall be as rottenness,
and their blossom shall go up as dust;
because they have cast away the law of the Lord of Hosts
and despised the word of the Holy One of Israel.
25 Therefore the anger of the Lord burns against His people,
and He has stretched out His hand against them, and has stricken them,
and the hills trembled.
Their corpses were torn in the midst of the streets.
For all this His anger is not turned away,
and His hand is still stretched out.
26 He will lift up a banner to the nations from afar
and will hiss at them from the ends of the earth;
certainly they shall come
with speed, swiftly.
27 No one shall be weary or stumble among them;
no one shall slumber or sleep;
neither shall the girdle of their loins be loosed,
nor the strap of their shoes be broken;
28 their arrows are sharp
and all their bows bent;
their horses’ hooves will seem like flint,
and their wheels like a whirlwind.
29 Their roaring shall be like a lion,
they shall roar like young lions;
they shall roar and lay hold of the prey;
and shall carry it away, and no one shall deliver it.
30 In that day they shall roar against them
like the roaring of the sea.
And if one looks to the land—
Only darkness and sorrow,
and the light is darkened by the clouds.
Chapter 6
1 In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up, and His train filled the temple. 2 Above it stood the seraphim. Each one had six wings. With two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. 3 One cried to another and said:
“Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of Hosts;
the whole earth is full of His glory.”
4 The posts of the door moved at the voice of him who cried, and the house was filled with smoke.
5 And I said: “Woe is me! For I am undone because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips. For my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of Hosts.”
6 Then one of the seraphim flew to me with a live coal which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar in his hand. 7 And he laid it on my mouth, and said, “This has touched your lips, and your iniquity is taken away, and your sin purged.”
8 Also I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?”
Then I said, “Here am I. Send me.”
9 He said, “Go, and tell this people:
‘Keep on hearing, but do not understand;
keep on seeing, but do not perceive.’
10 Make the heart of this people dull,
and their ears heavy,
and shut their eyes;
lest they see with their eyes,
and hear with their ears,
and understand with their heart,
and turn and be healed.”
11 Then I said, “Lord, how long?”
And He answered:
“Until the cities are laid waste
without inhabitants,
and the houses without man,
and the land is utterly desolate,
12 and the Lord has removed men far away,
and there is a great forsaking in the midst of the land.
13 But yet in it shall be a tenth,
and it shall return, and shall be burned,
as a terebinth tree or as an oak,
whose stump remains when it is cut down,
so the holy seed is its stump.”
Ephesians 1
1 Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God,
To the saints who are at Ephesus and to the faithful in Christ Jesus:
2 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, 4 just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, to be holy and blameless before Him in love; 5 He predestined us to adoption as sons to Himself through Jesus Christ according to the good pleasure of His will, 6 to the praise of the glory of His grace which He graciously bestowed on us in the Beloved. 7 In Him we have redemption through His blood and the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of His grace, 8 which He lavished on us in all wisdom and insight, 9 making known to us the mystery of His will, according to His good pleasure, which He purposed in Himself, 10 as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in Christ, which are in heaven and on earth.
11 In Him also we have received an inheritance, being predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His own will, 12 that we, who were the first to hope in Christ, should live for the praise of His glory. 13 In Him you also, after hearing the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and after believing in Him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, 14 who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory.
15 Therefore I also, after hearing of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, 16 do not cease giving thanks for you, mentioning you in my prayers, 17 so that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, 18 that the eyes of your understanding may be enlightened, that you may know what is the hope of His calling and what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance among the saints, 19 and what is the surpassing greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power, 20 which He performed in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His own right hand in the heavenly places, 21 far above all principalities, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in that which is to come. 22 And He put all things in subjection under His feet and made Him the head over all things for the church, 23 which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all things in all ways.