The One Year Bible TLB (204 page)
Read The One Year Bible TLB Online
Authors: Tyndale
Don’t envy godless men; don’t even enjoy their company.
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For they spend their days plotting violence and cheating.
September 25Jehovah, the Holy One of Israel, Israel’s Creator, says: What right have you to question what I do? Who are you to command me concerning the work of my hands?
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I have made the earth and created man upon it. With my hands I have stretched out the heavens and commanded all the vast myriads of stars.
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I have raised up Cyrus
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to fulfill my righteous purpose, and I will direct all his paths. He shall restore my city and free my captive people—and not for a reward!
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Jehovah says: The Egyptians, Ethiopians, and Sabeans shall be subject to you. They shall come to you with all their merchandise, and it shall all be yours. They shall follow you as prisoners in chains and fall down on their knees before you and say, “The only God there is, is your God!”
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Truly, O God of Israel, Savior, you work in strange, mysterious ways.
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All who worship idols shall be disappointed and ashamed.
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But Israel shall be saved by Jehovah with eternal salvation; they shall never be disappointed in their God through all eternity.
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For Jehovah created the heavens and earth and put everything in place, and he made the world to be lived in, not to be an empty chaos. I am Jehovah, he says, and there is no other!
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I publicly proclaim bold promises; I do not whisper obscurities in some dark corner so that no one can know what I mean. And I didn’t tell Israel to ask me for what I didn’t plan to give! No, for I, Jehovah, speak only truth and righteousness.
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Gather together and come, you nations that escape from Cyrus’s hand. What fools they are who carry around the wooden idols and pray to gods that cannot save!
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Consult together, argue your case and state your proofs that idol worship pays! Who but God has said that these things concerning Cyrus would come true? What idol ever told you they would happen? For there is no other God but me—a just God and a Savior—no, not one!
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Let all the world look to me for salvation! For I am God; there is no other.
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I have sworn by myself, and I will never go back on my word, for it is true—that every knee in all the world shall bow to me, and every tongue shall swear allegiance to my name.
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“In Jehovah is all my righteousness and strength,” the people shall declare. And all who were angry with him shall come to him and be ashamed.
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In Jehovah all the generations of Israel shall be justified, triumphant.
46:
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The idols of Babylon, Bel and Nebo,
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are being hauled away on ox carts! But look! The beasts are stumbling! The cart is turning over! The gods are falling out onto the ground! Is that the best that they can do? If they cannot even save themselves from such a fall, how can they save their worshipers from Cyrus?
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“Listen to me, all Israel who are left; I have created you and cared for you since you were born.
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I will be your God through all your lifetime, yes, even when your hair is white with age. I made you and I will care for you. I will carry you along and be your Savior.
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“With what in all of heaven and earth do I compare? Whom can you find who equals me?
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Will you compare me with an idol made lavishly with silver and with gold? They hire a goldsmith to take your wealth and make a god from it! Then they fall down and worship it!
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They carry it around on their shoulders, and when they set it down, it stays there, for it cannot move! And when someone prays to it, there is no answer, for it cannot get him out of his trouble.
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“Don’t forget this, O guilty ones.
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And don’t forget the many times I clearly told you what was going to happen in the future. For I am God—I only—and there is no other like me
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who can tell you what is going to happen. All I say will come to pass, for I do whatever I wish.
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I will call that swift bird of prey from the east—that man Cyrus from far away. And he will come and do my bidding. I have said I would do it and I will.
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Listen to me, you stubborn, evil men!
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For I am offering you my deliverance; not in the distant future, but right now! I am ready to save you, and I will restore Jerusalem and Israel, who is my glory.
47:
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“O Babylon, the unconquered, come sit in the dust; for your days of glory, pomp, and honor are ended. O daughter of Chaldea, never again will you be the lovely princess, tender and delicate.
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Take heavy millstones and grind the corn; remove your veil;
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strip off your robe; expose yourself to public view.
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You shall be in nakedness and shame. I will take vengeance upon you and will not repent.”
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So speaks our Redeemer, who will save Israel from Babylon’s mighty power; the Lord Almighty is his name, the Holy One of Israel.
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Sit in darkness and silence, O Babylon; never again will you be called “The Queen of Kingdoms.”
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For I was angry with my people Israel and began to punish them a little by letting them fall into your hands, O Babylon. But you showed them no mercy. You have made even the old folks carry heavy burdens.
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You thought your reign would never end, Queen Kingdom of the world. You didn’t care a whit about my people or think about the fate of those who do them harm.
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O pleasure-mad kingdom, living at ease, bragging as the greatest in the world—listen to the sentence of my court upon your sins. You say, “I alone am God! I’ll never be a widow; I’ll never lose my children.”
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Well, those two things shall come upon you in one moment, in full measure in one day: widowhood and the loss of your children, despite all your witchcraft and magic.
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You felt secure in all your wickedness. “No one sees me,” you said. Your “wisdom” and “knowledge” have caused you to turn away from me and claim that you yourself are Jehovah.
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That is why disaster shall overtake you suddenly—so suddenly that you won’t know where it comes from. And there will be no atonement then to cleanse away your sins.
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Call out the demon hordes you’ve worshiped all these years. Call on them to help you strike deep terror into many hearts again.
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You have advisors by the ton—your astrologers and stargazers, who try to tell you what the future holds.
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But they are as useless as dried grass burning in the fire. They cannot even deliver themselves! You’ll get no help from them at all. Theirs is no fire to sit beside to make you warm!
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And all your friends of childhood days shall slip away and disappear, unable to help.
48:
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Hear me, my people: you swear allegiance to the Lord without meaning a word of it when you boast of living in the Holy City and brag about depending on the God of Israel.
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Time and again I told you what was going to happen in the future. My words were scarcely spoken when suddenly I did just what I said.
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I knew how hard and obstinate you are. Your necks are as unbending as iron; you are as hardheaded as brass.
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That is why I told you ahead of time what I was going to do, so that you could never say, “My idol did it; my carved image commanded it to happen!”
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You have heard my predictions and seen them fulfilled, but you refuse to agree it is so. Now I will tell you new things I haven’t mentioned before, secrets you haven’t heard.
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Then you can’t say, “We knew that all the time!”
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Yes, I’ll tell you things entirely new, for I know so well what traitors you are, rebels from earliest childhood, rotten through and through.
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Yet for my own sake and for the honor of my name I will hold back my anger and not wipe you out.
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I refined you in the furnace of affliction, but found no silver there. You are worthless, with nothing good in you at all.
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Yet for my own sake—yes,
for my own sake—
I will save you from my anger and not destroy you lest the heathen say their gods have conquered me. I will not let them have my glory.
I beg you—I, a prisoner here in jail for serving the Lord—to live and act in a way worthy of those who have been chosen for such wonderful blessings as these.
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Be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other’s faults because of your love.
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Try always to be led along together by the Holy Spirit and so be at peace with one another.
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We are all parts of one body, we have the same Spirit, and we have all been called to the same glorious future.
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For us there is only one Lord, one faith, one baptism,
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and we all have the same God and Father who is over us all and in us all, and living through every part of us.
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However, Christ has given each of us special abilities—whatever he wants us to have out of his rich storehouse of gifts.
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The psalmist tells about this, for he says that when Christ returned triumphantly to heaven after his resurrection and victory over Satan, he gave generous gifts to men.
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Notice that it says he returned to heaven. This means that he had first come down from the heights of heaven, far down to the lowest parts of the earth.
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The same one who came down is the one who went back up, that he might fill all things everywhere with himself, from the very lowest to the very highest.
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Some of us have been given special ability as apostles; to others he has given the gift of being able to preach well; some have special ability in winning people to Christ, helping them to trust him as their Savior; still others have a gift for caring for God’s people as a shepherd does his sheep, leading and teaching them in the ways of God.
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Why is it that he gives us these special abilities to do certain things best? It is that God’s people will be equipped to do better work for him, building up the Church, the body of Christ, to a position of strength and maturity;
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until finally we all believe alike about our salvation and about our Savior, God’s Son, and all become full-grown in the Lord—yes, to the point of being filled full with Christ.
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Then we will no longer be like children, forever changing our minds about what we believe because someone has told us something different or has cleverly lied to us and made the lie sound like the truth.
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Instead, we will lovingly follow the truth at all times—speaking truly, dealing truly, living truly
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—and so become more and more in every way like Christ who is the Head of his body, the Church. Under his direction, the whole body is fitted together perfectly, and each part in its own special way helps the other parts, so that the whole body is healthy and growing and full of love.
What a glorious Lord! He who daily bears our burdens also gives us our salvation.
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He frees us! He rescues us from death.
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But he will crush his enemies, for they refuse to leave their guilty, stubborn ways.
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The Lord says, “Come,” to all his people’s enemies;
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they are hiding on Mount Hermon’s highest slopes and deep within the sea!
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His people must destroy them. Cover your feet with their blood; dogs will eat them.
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The procession of God my King moves onward to the sanctuary—
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singers in front, musicians behind, girls playing the timbrels in between.
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Let all the people of Israel praise the Lord, who is Israel’s fountain.
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The little tribe of Benjamin leads the way. The princes and elders of Judah, and the princes of Zebulun and Naphtali are right behind.
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Summon your might; display your strength, O God, for you have done such mighty things for us.
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The kings of the earth are bringing their gifts to your Temple in Jerusalem.
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Rebuke our enemies, O Lord. Bring them—submissive, tax in hand.
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Scatter all who delight in war.
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Egypt will send gifts of precious metals. Ethiopia will stretch out her hands to God in adoration.
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Sing to the Lord, O kingdoms of the earth—sing praises to the Lord,
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to him who rides upon the ancient heavens, whose mighty voice thunders from the sky.
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Power belongs to God! His majesty shines down on Israel; his strength is mighty in the heavens.
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What awe we feel, kneeling here before him in the sanctuary. The God of Israel gives strength and mighty power to his people. Blessed be God!