Isaiah 64

• 1. Oh, that you would burst from the heavens and come down! How the mountains would quake in your presence!
• 2. As fire causes wood to burn and water to boil, your coming would make the nations tremble. Then your enemies would learn the reason for your fame!
• 3. When you came down long ago, you did awesome things beyond our highest expectations. And oh, how the mountains quaked!
• 4. For since the world began, no ear has heard, and no eye has seen a God like you, who works for those who wait for him!
• 5. You welcome those who cheerfully do good, who follow godly ways. But we are not godly. We are constant sinners, so your anger is heavy on us. How can people like us be saved?
• 6. We are all infected and impure with sin. When we proudly display our righteous deeds, we find they are but filthy rags. Like autumn leaves, we wither and fall. And our sins, like the wind, sweep us away.
• 7. Yet no one calls on your name or pleads with you for mercy. Therefore, you have turned away from us and turned us over to our sins.
• 8. And yet, LORD, you are our Father. We are the clay, and you are the potter. We are all formed by your hand.
• 9. Oh, don't be so angry with us, LORD. Please don't remember our sins forever. Look at us, we pray, and see that we are all your people.
• 10. Your holy cities are destroyed; even Jerusalem is a desolate wilderness.
• 11. The holy, beautiful Temple where our ancestors praised you has been burned down, and all the things of beauty are destroyed.
• 12. After all this, LORD, must you still refuse to help us? Will you continue to be silent and punish us?

Isaiah 65

• 1. The LORD says, "People who never before inquired about me are now asking about me. I am being found by people who were not looking for me. To them I have said, `I am here!'
• 2. "I opened my arms to my own people all day long, but they have rebelled. They follow their own evil paths and thoughts.
• 3. All day long they insult me to my face by worshiping idols in their sacred gardens. They burn incense on the rooftops of their homes.
• 4. At night they go out among the graves and secret places to worship evil spirits. They also eat pork and other forbidden foods.
• 5. Yet they say to each other, `Don't come too close or you will defile me! I am holier than you!' They are a stench in my nostrils, an acrid smell that never goes away.
• 6. "Look, my decree is written out in front of me: I will not stand silent; I will repay them in full! Yes, I will repay them--
• 7. both for their own sins and for those of their ancestors," says the LORD. "For they also burned incense on the mountains and insulted me on the hills. I will pay them back in full!
• 8. "But I will not destroy them all," says the LORD. "For just as good grapes are found among a cluster of bad ones (and someone will say, `Don't throw them all away--there are some good grapes there!'), so I will not destroy all Israel. For I still have true servants there.
• 9. I will preserve a remnant of the people of Israel and of Judah to possess my land. Those I choose will inherit it and serve me there.
• 10. For my people who have searched for me, the plain of Sharon will again be filled with flocks, and the valley of Achor will be a place to pasture herds.
• 11. "But because the rest of you have forsaken the LORD and his Temple and worship the gods of Fate and Destiny,
• 12. I will `destine' you to the sword. All of you will bow before the executioner, for when I called, you did not answer. When I spoke, you did not listen. You deliberately sinned--before my very eyes--and chose to do what you know I despise."
• 13. Therefore, this is what the Sovereign LORD says: "You will starve, but my servants will eat. You will be thirsty, but they will drink. You will be sad and ashamed, but they will rejoice.
• 14. You will cry in sorrow and despair, while my servants sing for joy.
• 15. Your name will be a curse word among my people, for the Sovereign LORD will destroy you and call his true servants by another name.
• 16. All who invoke a blessing or take an oath will do so by the God of truth. For I will put aside my anger and forget the evil of earlier days.
• 17. "Look! I am creating new heavens and a new earth--so wonderful that no one will even think about the old ones anymore.
• 18. Be glad; rejoice forever in my creation! And look! I will create Jerusalem as a place of happiness. Her people will be a source of joy.
• 19. I will rejoice in Jerusalem and delight in my people. And the sound of weeping and crying will be heard no more.
• 20. "No longer will babies die when only a few days old. No longer will adults die before they have lived a full life. No longer will people be considered old at one hundred! Only sinners will die that young!
• 21. In those days, people will live in the houses they build and eat the fruit of their own vineyards.
• 22. It will not be like the past, when invaders took the houses and confiscated the vineyards. For my people will live as long as trees and will have time to enjoy their hard-won gains.
• 23. They will not work in vain, and their children will not be doomed to misfortune. For they are people blessed by the LORD, and their children, too, will be blessed.
• 24. I will answer them before they even call to me. While they are still talking to me about their needs, I will go ahead and answer their prayers!
• 25. The wolf and lamb will feed together. The lion will eat straw like the ox. Poisonous snakes will strike no more. In those days, no one will be hurt or destroyed on my holy mountain. I, the LORD, have spoken!"

Isaiah 66

• 1. This is what the LORD says: "Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. Could you ever build me a temple as good as that? Could you build a dwelling place for me?
• 2. My hands have made both heaven and earth, and they are mine. I, the LORD, have spoken! "I will bless those who have humble and contrite hearts, who tremble at my word.
• 3. But those who choose their own ways, delighting in their sins, are cursed. Their offerings will not be accepted. When such people sacrifice an ox, it is no more acceptable than a human sacrifice. When they sacrifice a lamb or bring an offering of grain, it is as bad as putting a dog or the blood of a pig on the altar! When they burn incense, it is as if they had blessed an idol.
• 4. I will send great troubles against them--all the things they feared. For when I called, they did not answer. When I spoke, they did not listen. They deliberately sinned--before my very eyes--and chose to do what they know I despise."
• 5. Hear this message from the LORD, and tremble at his words: "Your close relatives hate you and throw you out for being loyal to my name. `Let the LORD be honored!' they scoff. `Be joyful in him!' But they will be put to shame.
• 6. What is all the commotion in the city? What is that terrible noise from the Temple? It is the voice of the LORD taking vengeance against his enemies.
• 7. "Before the birth pains even begin, Jerusalem gives birth to a son.
• 8. Who has ever seen or heard of anything as strange as this? Has a nation ever been born in a single day? Has a country ever come forth in a mere moment? But by the time Jerusalem's birth pains begin, the baby will be born; the nation will come forth.
• 9. Would I ever bring this nation to the point of birth and then not deliver it?" asks the LORD. "No! I would never keep this nation from being born," says your God.
• 10. "Rejoice with Jerusalem! Be glad with her, all you who love her and mourn for her.
• 11. Delight in Jerusalem! Drink deeply of her glory even as an infant drinks at its mother's generous breasts.
• 12. Peace and prosperity will overflow Jerusalem like a river," says the LORD. "The wealth of the nations will flow to her. Her children will be nursed at her breasts, carried in her arms, and treated with love.
• 13. I will comfort you there as a child is comforted by its mother."
• 14. When you see these things, your heart will rejoice. Vigorous health will be yours! Everyone will see the good hand of the LORD on his people--and his anger against his enemies.
• 15. See, the LORD is coming with fire, and his swift chariots of destruction roar like a whirlwind. He will bring punishment with the fury of his anger and the flaming fire of his hot rebuke.
• 16. The LORD will punish the world by fire and by his sword, and many will be killed by the LORD.
• 17. "Those who `purify' themselves in a sacred garden, feasting on pork and rats and other forbidden meats, will come to a terrible end," says the LORD.
• 18. "I can see what they are doing, and I know what they are thinking. So I will gather all nations and peoples together, and they will see my glory.
• 19. I will perform a sign among them. And I will send those who survive to be messengers to the nations--to Tarshish, to the Libyans and Lydians (who are famous as archers), to Tubal and Greece, and to all the lands beyond the sea that have not heard of my fame or seen my glory. There they will declare my glory to the nations.
• 20. They will bring the remnant of your people back from every nation. They will bring them to my holy mountain in Jerusalem as an offering to the LORD. They will ride on horses, in chariots and wagons, and on mules and camels," says the LORD.
• 21. "And I will appoint some of those who return to be my priests and Levites. I, the LORD, have spoken!
• 22. "As surely as my new heavens and earth will remain, so will you always be my people, with a name that will never disappear," says the LORD.
• 23. "All humanity will come to worship me from week to week and from month to month.
• 24. And as they go out, they will see the dead bodies of those who have rebelled against me. For the worms that devour them will never die, and the fire that burns them will never go out. All who pass by will view them with utter horror."

New Living Translation: 258 of 324 days.