Chronicles: Joash · Joel

2 Chronicles 24 WEB

¹Joash was seven years old when he began to reign, and he reigned forty years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Zibiah, of Beersheba. ²Joash did that which was right in the LORD’s eyes all the days of Jehoiada the priest. ³Jehoiada took for him two wives, and he became the father of sons and daughters. ⁴After this, Joash intended to restore the LORD’s house. ⁵He gathered together the priests and the Levites, and said to them, “Go out to the cities of Judah, and gather money to repair the house of your God from all Israel from year to year. See that you expedite this matter.” However the Levites didn’t do it right away. ⁶The king called for Jehoiada the chief, and said to him, “Why haven’t you required of the Levites to bring in the tax of Moses the servant of the LORD, and of the assembly of Israel, out of Judah and out of Jerusalem, for the Tent of the Testimony?” ⁷For the sons of Athaliah, that wicked woman, had broken up God’s house; and they also gave all the dedicated things of the LORD’s house to the Baals. ⁸So the king commanded, and they made a chest, and set it outside at the gate of the LORD’s house. ⁹They made a proclamation through Judah and Jerusalem, to bring in for the LORD the tax that Moses the servant of God laid on Israel in the wilderness. ¹⁰All the princes and all the people rejoiced, and brought in, and cast into the chest, until they had filled it. ¹¹Whenever the chest was brought to the king’s officers by the hand of the Levites, and when they saw that there was much money, the king’s scribe and the chief priest’s officer came and emptied the chest, and took it, and carried it to its place again. Thus they did day by day, and gathered money in abundance. ¹²The king and Jehoiada gave it to those who did the work of the service of the LORD’s house. They hired masons and carpenters to restore the LORD’s house, and also those who worked iron and bronze to repair the LORD’s house. ¹³So the workmen worked, and the work of repairing went forward in their hands. They set up God’s house as it was designed, and strengthened it. ¹⁴When they had finished, they brought the rest of the money before the king and Jehoiada, from which were made vessels for the LORD’s house, even vessels with which to minister and to offer, including spoons and vessels of gold and silver. They offered burnt offerings in the LORD’s house continually all the days of Jehoiada. ¹⁵But Jehoiada grew old and was full of days, and he died. He was one hundred thirty years old when he died. ¹⁶They buried him in David’s city among the kings, because he had done good in Israel, and toward God and his house. ¹⁷Now after the death of Jehoiada, the princes of Judah came and bowed down to the king. Then the king listened to them. ¹⁸They abandoned the house of the LORD, the God of their fathers, and served the Asherah poles and the idols, so wrath came on Judah and Jerusalem for this their guiltiness. ¹⁹Yet he sent prophets to them to bring them again to the LORD, and they testified against them; but they would not listen. ²⁰The Spirit of God came on Zechariah the son of Jehoiada the priest; and he stood above the people, and said to them, “God says, ‘Why do you disobey the LORD’s commandments, so that you can’t prosper? Because you have forsaken the LORD, he has also forsaken you.’” ²¹They conspired against him, and stoned him with stones at the commandment of the king in the court of the LORD’s house. ²²Thus Joash the king didn’t remember the kindness which Jehoiada his father had done to him, but killed his son. When he died, he said, “May the LORD look at it, and repay it.” ²³At the end of the year, the army of the Syrians came up against him. They came to Judah and Jerusalem, and destroyed all the princes of the people from among the people, and sent all their plunder to the king of Damascus. ²⁴For the army of the Syrians came with a small company of men; and the LORD delivered a very great army into their hand, because they had forsaken the LORD, the God of their fathers. So they executed judgment on Joash. ²⁵When they had departed from him (for they left him seriously wounded), his own servants conspired against him for the blood of the sons of Jehoiada the priest, and killed him on his bed, and he died. They buried him in David’s city, but they didn’t bury him in the tombs of the kings. ²⁶These are those who conspired against him: Zabad the son of Shimeath the Ammonitess and Jehozabad the son of Shimrith the Moabitess. ²⁷Now concerning his sons, the greatness of the burdens laid on him, and the rebuilding of God’s house, behold, they are written in the commentary of the book of the kings. Amaziah his son reigned in his place.

Joel 1–2 WEB

^1:1The LORD’s word that came to Joel, the son of Pethuel. ²Hear this, you elders, and listen, all you inhabitants of the land! Has this ever happened in your days, or in the days of your fathers? ³Tell your children about it, and have your children tell their children, and their children, another generation. ⁴What the swarming locust has left, the great locust has eaten. What the great locust has left, the grasshopper has eaten. What the grasshopper has left, the caterpillar has eaten. ⁵Wake up, you drunkards, and weep! Wail, all you drinkers of wine, because of the sweet wine, for it is cut off from your mouth. ⁶For a nation has come up on my land, strong, and without number. His teeth are the teeth of a lion, and he has the fangs of a lioness. ⁷He has laid my vine waste, and stripped my fig tree. He has stripped its bark, and thrown it away. Its branches are made white. ⁸Mourn like a virgin dressed in sackcloth for the husband of her youth! ⁹The meal offering and the drink offering are cut off from the LORD’s house. The priests, the LORD’s ministers, mourn. ¹⁰The field is laid waste. The land mourns, for the grain is destroyed, The new wine has dried up, and the oil languishes. ¹¹Be confounded, you farmers! Wail, you vineyard keepers, for the wheat and for the barley; for the harvest of the field has perished. ¹²The vine has dried up, and the fig tree withered— the pomegranate tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree, even all of the trees of the field are withered; for joy has withered away from the sons of men. ¹³Put on sackcloth and mourn, you priests! Wail, you ministers of the altar. Come, lie all night in sackcloth, you ministers of my God, for the meal offering and the drink offering are withheld from your God’s house. ¹⁴Sanctify a fast. Call a solemn assembly. Gather the elders and all the inhabitants of the land to the house of the LORD, your God, and cry to the LORD. ¹⁵Alas for the day! For the day of the LORD is at hand, and it will come as destruction from the Almighty. ¹⁶Isn’t the food cut off before our eyes, joy and gladness from the house of our God? ¹⁷The seeds rot under their clods. The granaries are laid desolate. The barns are broken down, for the grain has withered. ¹⁸How the animals groan! The herds of livestock are perplexed, because they have no pasture. Yes, the flocks of sheep are made desolate. ¹⁹LORD, I cry to you, for the fire has devoured the pastures of the wilderness, and the flame has burned all the trees of the field. ²⁰Yes, the animals of the field pant to you, for the water brooks have dried up, and the fire has devoured the pastures of the wilderness.

^2:1Blow the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain! Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble, for the day of the LORD comes, for it is close at hand: ²A day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness. As the dawn spreading on the mountains, a great and strong people; there has never been the like, neither will there be any more after them, even to the years of many generations. ³A fire devours before them, and behind them, a flame burns. The land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them, a desolate wilderness. Yes, and no one has escaped them. ⁴Their appearance is as the appearance of horses, and they run as horsemen. ⁵Like the noise of chariots on the tops of the mountains, they leap, like the noise of a flame of fire that devours the stubble, like a strong people set in battle array. ⁶At their presence the peoples are in anguish. All faces have grown pale. ⁷They run like mighty men. They climb the wall like warriors. They each march in his line, and they don’t swerve off course. ⁸One doesn’t jostle another. They each march in their own path. They burst through the defenses and don’t break ranks. ⁹They rush on the city. They run on the wall. They climb up into the houses. They enter in at the windows like thieves. ¹⁰The earth quakes before them. The heavens tremble. The sun and the moon are darkened, and the stars withdraw their shining. ¹¹The LORD thunders his voice before his army, for his forces are very great; for he is strong who obeys his command; for the day of the LORD is great and very awesome, and who can endure it? ¹²“Yet even now,” says the LORD, “turn to me with all your heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning.” ¹³Tear your heart and not your garments, and turn to the LORD, your God; for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness, and relents from sending calamity. ¹⁴Who knows? He may turn and relent, and leave a blessing behind him, even a meal offering and a drink offering to the LORD, your God. ¹⁵Blow the trumpet in Zion! Sanctify a fast. Call a solemn assembly. ¹⁶Gather the people. Sanctify the assembly. Assemble the elders. Gather the children, and those who nurse from breasts. Let the bridegroom go out of his room, and the bride out of her chamber. ¹⁷Let the priests, the ministers of the LORD, weep between the porch and the altar, and let them say, “Spare your people, LORD, and don’t give your heritage to reproach, that the nations should rule over them. Why should they say among the peoples, ‘Where is their God?’” ¹⁸Then the LORD was jealous for his land, and had pity on his people. ¹⁹The LORD answered his people, “Behold, I will send you grain, new wine, and oil, and you will be satisfied with them; and I will no more make you a reproach among the nations. ²⁰But I will remove the northern army far away from you, and will drive it into a barren and desolate land, its front into the eastern sea, and its back into the western sea; and its stench will come up, and its bad smell will rise.” Surely he has done great things. ²¹Land, don’t be afraid. Be glad and rejoice, for the LORD has done great things. ²²Don’t be afraid, you animals of the field; for the pastures of the wilderness spring up, for the tree bears its fruit. The fig tree and the vine yield their strength. ²³“Be glad then, you children of Zion, and rejoice in the LORD, your God; for he gives you the early rain in just measure, and he causes the rain to come down for you, the early rain and the latter rain, as before. ²⁴The threshing floors will be full of wheat, and the vats will overflow with new wine and oil. ²⁵I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the great locust, the grasshopper, and the caterpillar, my great army, which I sent among you. ²⁶You will have plenty to eat and be satisfied, and will praise the name of the LORD, your God, who has dealt wondrously with you; and my people will never again be disappointed. ²⁷You will know that I am among Israel, and that I am the LORD, your God, and there is no one else; and my people will never again be disappointed. ²⁸“It will happen afterward, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh; and your sons and your daughters will prophesy. Your old men will dream dreams. Your young men will see visions. ²⁹And also on the servants and on the handmaids in those days, I will pour out my Spirit. ³⁰I will show wonders in the heavens and on the earth: blood, fire, and pillars of smoke. ³¹The sun will be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of the LORD comes. ³²It will happen that whoever will call on the LORD’s name shall be saved; for in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there will be those who escape, as the LORD has said, and among the remnant, those whom the LORD calls.