- Joel
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3
1 For, in those days and in that time, when I bring back again the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem, 2 I will also gather all the nations and bring them down into the Valley of Jehoshaphat, and there I will enter into judgment with them for my people and my heritage Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations, and divided my land.
3 They have cast lots for my people.
They have traded boys
for prostitutes,
and sold girls for wine,
and drunk it.
4 What are you to me, Tyre and Sidon and all the districts of Philistia? Were you repaying any deed of mine, or were you doing something for me? Quickly will I return your deed upon your heads. 5 You who have taken my silver and my gold, and you have brought my goodly jewels into your palaces, 6 you have sold the people of Judah and of Jerusalem to the Greeks, so that you might remove them far from their own borders. 7 I am about to stir them up from the place to which you have sold them, and I will turn your deeds upon your own head. 8 I will sell your sons and your daughters into the hands of the people of Judah, and they will sell them to the Sabeans, to a nation far off, for the Lord has spoken.
9 Proclaim this among the nations, sanctify war.
Arouse the warriors,
let all the fighting men muster and go up.
10 Beat your ploughshares into swords,
and your pruning-hooks into lances;
let the weak say, I, indeed, am strong.
11 Bestir yourselves and come,
all you nations round about.
Quickly gather yourselves together,
ask the Lord to bring his warriors.
12 Let the nations rouse themselves
and come up to the Valley of Jehoshaphat,
for there will I sit to judge
all the surrounding nations.
13 Put in the sickle,
for the harvest is ripe;
go in, tread,
for the wine press is full.
The vats overflow,
for great is their wickedness.
14 Noisy multitudes, noisy multitudes
in the valley of decision.
For near is the Lord’s day in the valley of decision!
15 Sun and moon have turned dark,
and the stars have withdrawn their shining.
16 Whenever the Lord roars from Zion
and utters his voice from Jerusalem,
earth and sky quake;
but the Lord is a refuge to his people,
and a fortress to the people of Israel.
17 And you will know that I am the Lord your God,
I who dwells in Zion, my holy mountain,
and Jerusalem will be holy,
and strangers will not pass through her any more.
18 In that day,
the mountains will drop sweet wine,
the hills will flow with milk,
all the channels of Judah will flow with water,
a fountain will spring from the house of Judah,
and will water the Valley of Shittim.
19 Egypt will become a desolation,
and Edom a wilderness,
because of the violence done to the people of Judah,
because they shed innocent blood in their land,
20 Judah will remain inhabited forever,
and Jerusalem from generation to generation.
21 I will avenge their blood which I have not yet avenged.
The Lord lives in Zion!

- Joel
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