Study Desk

The sword of the LORD is bathed in blood. It drips with fat-with the blood of lambs and goats, with the fat of the kidneys of rams. For the LORD has a sacrifice in Bozrah, a great slaughter in the land of Edom.

For the LORD has a day of vengeance, a time of retribution for Edom's hostility against Zion.

Her towers will be overgrown with thorns, her fortresses with thistles and briers. She will become a haunt for jackals, an abode for ostriches.

Then the lame will leap like a deer and the mute tongue will shout for joy. For waters will gush forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert.

You claim to have a strategy and strength for war, but these are empty words. On whom are you now relying, that you have rebelled against me?

For how can you repel a single officer among the weakest of my master's servants when you depend on Egypt for chariots and horsemen?

This is what the king says: Do not let Hezekiah deceive you, for he cannot deliver you.

Do not listen to Hezekiah, for this is what the king of Assyria says: Make peace with me and come out to me. Then every one of you will eat from his own vine and his own fig tree, and drink water from his own cistern,

But the people remained silent and did not answer a word, for Hezekiah had commanded, "Do not answer him."

to tell him, "This is what Hezekiah says: Today is a day of distress, rebuke, and disgrace; for children have come to the point of birth, but there is no strength to deliver them.

Perhaps the LORD your God will hear the words of the Rab-shakeh, whom his master the king of Assyria has sent to defy the living God, and He will rebuke him for the words that the LORD your God has heard. Therefore lift up a prayer for the remnant that still survives."

They have cast their gods into the fire and destroyed them, for they were not gods, but only wood and stone-the work of human hands.

For a remnant will go forth from Jerusalem, and survivors from Mount Zion. The zeal of the LORD of Hosts will accomplish this.

I will defend this city and rescue it for My own sake and for the sake of My servant David.'"

In those days Hezekiah became mortally ill. The prophet Isaiah son of Amoz came to him and said, "This is what the LORD says: Put your house in order, for you are about to die; you will not recover."

Surely, for my welfare I had such great anguish; but Your love has delivered me from the pit of oblivion, for You have cast all my sins behind Your back.

For Sheol cannot thank You; death cannot praise You. Those who go down to the Pit cannot hope for Your faithfulness.

At that time Merodach-baladan son of Baladan king of Babylon sent letters and a gift to Hezekiah, for he had heard about Hezekiah's illness and recovery.

But Hezekiah said to Isaiah, "The word of the LORD that you have spoken is good." For he thought, "At least there will be peace and security in my lifetime."

"Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her that her forced labor has been completed, her iniquity has been pardoned; for she has received from the hand of the LORD double for all her sins."