Day 232 of 365

¹Behold, a day of the Lord comes, when your spoil will be divided in your midst.

²For I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle; and the city will be taken, the houses rifled, and the women ravished. Half of the city will go out into captivity, and the rest of the people will not be cut off from the city.

³Then the Lord will go out and fight against those nations, as when he fought in the day of battle.

⁴His feet will stand in that day on the Mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem on the east; and the Mount of Olives will be split in two, from east to west, making a very great valley. Half of the mountain will move toward the north, and half of it toward the south.

⁵You shall flee by the valley of my mountains; for the valley of the mountains shall reach to Azel; yes, you shall flee, just like you fled from before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah. The Lord my God will come, and all the holy ones with you.

⁶It will happen in that day, that there will not be light, cold, or frost.

⁷It will be a unique day which is known to the Lord; not day, and not night; but it will come to pass, that at evening time there will be light.

⁸It will happen in that day, that living waters will go out from Jerusalem; half of them toward the eastern sea, and half of them toward the western sea; in summer and in winter will it be.

⁹The Lord will be King over all the earth. In that day the Lord will be one, and his name one.

¹⁰All the land will be made like the Arabah, from Geba to Rimmon south of Jerusalem; and she will be lifted up, and will dwell in her place, from Benjamin's gate to the place of the first gate, to the corner gate, and from the tower of Hananel to the king's winepresses.

¹¹Men will dwell therein, and there will be no more curse; but Jerusalem will dwell safely.

¹²This will be the plague with which the Lord will strike all the peoples who have warred against Jerusalem: their flesh will consume away while they stand on their feet, and their eyes will consume away in their sockets, and their tongue will consume away in their mouth.

¹³It will happen in that day, that a great panic from the Lord will be among them; and they will lay hold everyone on the hand of his neighbor, and his hand will rise up against the hand of his neighbor.

¹⁴Judah also will fight at Jerusalem; and the wealth of all the surrounding nations will be gathered together: gold, and silver, and clothing, in great abundance.

¹⁵So will be the plague of the horse, of the mule, of the camel, and of the donkey, and of all the animals that will be in those camps, as that plague.

¹⁶It will happen that everyone who is left of all the nations that came against Jerusalem will go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and to keep the feast of booths.

¹⁷It will be, that whoever of all the families of the earth doesn't go up to Jerusalem to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, on them there will be no rain.

¹⁸If the family of Egypt doesn't go up, and doesn't come, neither will it rain on them. This will be the plague with which the Lord will strike the nations that do not go up to keep the feast of booths.

¹⁹This will be the punishment of Egypt, and the punishment of all the nations that do not go up to keep the feast of booths.

²⁰In that day there will be on the bells of the horses, "HOLY TO THE Lord;" and the pots in the Lord's house will be like the bowls before the altar.

²¹Yes, every pot in Jerusalem and in Judah will be holy to the Lord of hosts; and all those who sacrifice will come and take of them, and cook in them. In that day there will no longer be a Canaanite in the house of the Lord of hosts.

¹An oracle: the word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi.

²"I have loved you," says the Lord. Yet you say, "How have you loved us?" "Wasn't Esau Jacob's brother?" says the Lord, "Yet I loved Jacob;

³but Esau I hated, and made his mountains a desolation, and gave his heritage to the jackals of the wilderness."

⁴Whereas Edom says, "We are beaten down, but we will return and build the waste places;" thus says the Lord of hosts, "They shall build, but I will throw down; and men will call them 'The Wicked Land,' even the people against whom the Lord shows wrath forever."

⁵Your eyes will see, and you will say, "The Lord is great-even beyond the border of Israel!"

⁶"A son honors his father, and a servant his master. If I am a father, then where is my honor? And if I am a master, where is the respect due me? Says the Lord of hosts to you, priests, who despise my name. You say, 'How have we despised your name?'

⁷You offer polluted bread on my altar. You say, 'How have we polluted you?' In that you say, 'The Lord's table contemptible.'

⁸When you offer the blind for sacrifice, isn't that evil? And when you offer the lame and sick, isn't that evil? Present it now to your governor! Will he be pleased with you? Or will he accept your person?" says the Lord of hosts.

⁹"Now, please entreat the favor of God, that he may be gracious to us. With this, will he accept any of you?" says the Lord of hosts.

¹⁰"Oh that there were one among you who would shut the doors, that you might not kindle fire on my altar in vain! I have no pleasure in you," says the Lord of hosts, "neither will I accept an offering at your hand.

¹¹For from the rising of the sun even to the going down of the same, my name is great among the nations, and in every place incense will be offered to my name, and a pure offering: for my name is great among the nations," says the Lord of hosts.

¹²"But you profane it, in that you say, 'The Lord's table is polluted, and its fruit, even its food, is contemptible.'

¹³You say also, 'Behold, what a weariness it is!' and you have sniffed at it," says the Lord of hosts; "and you have brought that which was taken by violence, the lame, and the sick; thus you bring the offering. Should I accept this at your hand?" says the Lord.

¹⁴"But the deceiver is cursed, who has in his flock a male, and vows, and sacrifices to the Lord a blemished thing; for I am a great King," says the Lord of hosts, "and my name is awesome among the nations."

¹"Now, you priests, this commandment is for you.

²If you will not listen, and if you will not lay it to heart, to give glory to my name," says the Lord of hosts, "then will I send the curse on you, and I will curse your blessings. Indeed, I have cursed them already, because you do not lay it to heart.

³Behold, I will rebuke your seed, and will spread dung on your faces, even the dung of your feasts; and you will be taken away with it.

⁴You will know that I have sent this commandment to you, that my covenant may be with Levi," says the Lord of hosts.

⁵"My covenant was with him of life and peace; and I gave them to him that he might be reverent toward me; and he was reverent toward me, and stood in awe of my name.

⁶The law of truth was in his mouth, and unrighteousness was not found in his lips. He walked with me in peace and uprightness, and turned many away from iniquity.

⁷For the priest's lips should keep knowledge, and they should seek the law at his mouth; for he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts.

⁸But you have turned aside out of the way. You have caused many to stumble in the law. You have corrupted the covenant of Levi," says the Lord of hosts.

⁹"Therefore I have also made you contemptible and base before all the people, according to the way you have not kept my ways, but have had respect for persons in the law.

¹⁰Do we not all have one father? Hasn't one God created us? Why do we deal treacherously every man against his brother, profaning the covenant of our fathers?

¹¹Judah has dealt treacherously, and an abomination is committed in Israel and in Jerusalem; for Judah has profaned the holiness of the Lord which he loves, and has married the daughter of a foreign god.

¹²The Lord will cut off, to the man who does this, him who wakes and him who answers, out of the tents of Jacob, and him who offers an offering to the Lord of hosts.

¹³This again you do: you cover the altar of the Lord with tears, with weeping, and with sighing, because he doesn't regard the offering any more, neither receives it with good will at your hand.

¹⁴Yet you say, 'Why?' Because the Lord has been witness between you and the wife of your youth, against whom you have dealt treacherously, though she is your companion, and the wife of your covenant.

¹⁵Did he not make one, although he had the residue of the Spirit? Why one? He sought a godly seed. Therefore take heed to your spirit, and let none deal treacherously against the wife of his youth.

¹⁶For I hate divorce," says the Lord, the God of Israel, "and him who covers his garment with violence!" says the Lord of hosts. "Therefore take heed to your spirit, that you do not deal treacherously.

¹⁷You have wearied the Lord with your words. Yet you say, 'How have we wearied him?' In that you say, 'Everyone who does evil is good in the sight of the Lord, and he delights in them;' or 'Where is the God of justice?'

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, whom you desire, behold, he comes!" says the Lord of hosts.

²"But who can endure the day of his coming? And who will stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner's fire, and like launderer's soap;

³and he will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi, and refine them as gold and silver; and they shall offer to the Lord offerings in righteousness.

⁴Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasant to the Lord, as in the days of old, and as in ancient years.

⁵I will come near to you to judgment; and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, and against the adulterers, and against the perjurers, and against those who oppress the hireling in his wages, the widow, and the fatherless, and who deprive the foreigner of justice, and do not fear me," says the Lord of hosts.

⁶"For I, the Lord, do not change; therefore you, sons of Jacob, are not consumed.

⁷From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my ordinances, 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 a man rob God? Yet you rob me! But you say, 'How have we robbed you?' In tithes and offerings.

⁹You are cursed with the curse; for you rob me, even this whole nation.

¹⁰Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house, and test me now in this," says the Lord of hosts, "if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough for.

¹¹I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes, and he shall not destroy the fruits of your ground; neither shall your vine cast its fruit before its time in the field," says the Lord of hosts.

¹²"All nations shall call you blessed, for you will be a delightful land," says the Lord of hosts.

¹³"Your words have been stout against me," says the Lord. "Yet you say, 'What have we spoken against you?'

¹⁴You have said, 'It is vain to serve God;' and 'What profit is it that we have followed his instructions, and that we have walked mournfully before the Lord of hosts?

¹⁵Now we call the proud happy; yes, those who work wickedness are built up; yes, they tempt God, and escape.'

¹⁶Then those who feared the Lord spoke one with another; and the Lord listened, and heard, and a book of memory was written before him, for those who feared the Lord, and who honored his name.

¹⁷They shall be mine," says the Lord of hosts, "my own possession in the day that I make, and I will spare them, as a man spares his own son who serves him.

¹⁸Then you shall return and discern between the righteous and the wicked, between him who serves God and him who doesn't serve him.