Read Ezekiel 7

Ezekiel7

The Hour of Doom

¹And the word of the LORD came to me, saying,²“O son of man, this is what the Lord GOD says to the land of Israel:
‘The end! The end has comeupon the four corners of the land.³The end is now upon you,and I will unleash My anger against you.I will judge you according to your waysand repay you for all your abominations.⁴I will not look on you with pity,nor will I spare you,but I will punish you for your waysand for the abominations among you.Then you will know that I am the LORD.’

⁵This is what the Lord GOD says:‘Disaster! An unprecedented disaster —behold, it is coming!⁶The end has come!The end has come!It has roused itself against you.Behold, it has come!⁷Doom has come to you,O inhabitants of the land.The time has come;the day is near;there is panic on the mountainsinstead of shouts of joy.

⁸Very soon I will pour out My wrath upon youand vent My anger against you;I will judge you according to your waysand repay you for all your abominations.⁹I will not look on you with pity,nor will I spare you,but I will punish you for your waysand for the abominations among you.Then you will know that it is I, the LORD,who strikes the blow.

¹⁰Behold, the day is here!It has come!Doom has gone out,the rod has budded,arrogance has bloomed.¹¹Their violence has grown into a rodto punish their wickedness.None of them will remain:none of their multitude,none of their wealth,and nothing of value.

¹²The time has come;the day has arrived.Let the buyer not rejoiceand the seller not mourn,for wrath is upon the whole multitude.¹³The seller will surely not recover what he soldwhile both remain alive.For the vision concerning the whole multitudewill not be revoked,and because of their iniquity,not one of them will preserve his life.

The Desolation of Israel

¹⁴They have blown the trumpetand made everything ready,but no one goes to war,for My wrath is upon the whole multitude.¹⁵The sword is outside;plague and famine are within.Those in the country will die by the sword,and those in the city will be devouredby famine and plague.

¹⁶The survivors will escapeand live in the mountains,moaning like doves of the valley,each for his own iniquity.¹⁷Every hand will go limp,and every knee will turn to water.¹⁸They will put on sackcloth,and terror will overwhelm them.Shame will cover all their faces,and all their heads will be shaved.

¹⁹They will throw their silver into the streets,and their gold will seem unclean.Their silver and gold cannot save themin the day of the wrath of the LORD.They cannot satisfy their appetitesor fill their stomachs with wealth,for it became the stumbling blockthat brought their iniquity.

²⁰His beautiful ornamentsthey transformed into prideand used them to fashiontheir vile images and detestable idols.Therefore I will make theseinto something unclean for them.²¹And I will hand these things overas plunder to foreignersand loot to the wicked of the earth,who will defile them.²²I will turn My face away from them,and they will defile My treasured place.Violent men will enter it,and they will defile it.

²³Forge the chain,for the land is full of crimes of bloodshed,and the city is full of violence.²⁴So I will bring the most wicked of nationsto take possession of their houses.I will end the pride of the mighty,and their holy places will be profaned.

²⁵Anguish is coming!They will seek peace, but find none.²⁶Disaster upon disaster will come,and rumor after rumor.Then they will seek a vision from a prophet,but instruction from the priests will perish,as will counsel from the elders.²⁷The king will mourn,the prince will be clothed with despair,and the hands of the people of the land will tremble.I will deal with them according to their conduct,and I will judge them by their own standards.Then they will know that I am the LORD.’”