Rehum the commander and Shimshai the scribe wrote the letter against Jerusalem to King Artaxerxes as follows: From Rehum the commander, Shimshai the scribe, and the rest of their associates—the judges and officials over Tripolis, Persia, Erech and Babylon, the Elamites of Susa, and the rest of the peoples whom the great and honorable Ashurbanipal deported and settled in the cities of Samaria and elsewhere west of the Euphrates. (This is the text of the letter they sent to him.) To King Artaxerxes, From your servants, the men west of the Euphrates: Let it be known to the king that the Jews who came from you to us have returned to Jerusalem. And they are rebuilding that rebellious and wicked city, restoring its walls, and repairing its foundations. . . .

Artaxerxes, king of kings. To Ezra the priest, the scribe of the Law of the God of heaven: Greetings. I hereby decree that any volunteers among the Israelites in my kingdom, including the priests and Levites, may go up with you to Jerusalem. You are sent by the king and his seven counselors to evaluate Judah and Jerusalem according to the Law of your God, which is in your hand. Moreover, you are to take with you the silver and gold that the king and his counselors have freely offered to the God of Israel, whose dwelling is in Jerusalem, together with all the silver and gold you may find in all the province of Babylon, as well as the freewill offerings of the people and priests to the house of their God in Jerusalem. . . .

Then the king of Assyria brought people from Babylon, Cuthah, Avva, Hamath, and Sepharvaim and settled them in the towns of Samaria to replace the Israelites. They took possession of Samaria and lived in its towns.

His forces will rise up and desecrate the temple fortress. They will abolish the daily sacrifice and set up the abomination of desolation.

Then the astrologers answered the king in Aramaic, “O king, may you live forever! Tell your servants the dream, and we will give the interpretation.”

And a scroll was found in the fortress of Ecbatana, in the province of Media, with the following written on it: Memorandum:

Who has believed our message? And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed? He grew up before Him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of dry ground. He had no stately form or majesty to attract us, no beauty that we should desire Him. He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief. Like one from whom men hide their faces, He was despised, and we esteemed Him not. Surely He took on our infirmities and carried our sorrows; yet we considered Him stricken by God, struck down and afflicted. But He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed. . . .

Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, the virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call Him Immanuel.

For this is what the LORD says: “When Babylon’s seventy years are complete, I will attend to you and confirm My promise to restore you to this place.

These are the words of Amos, who was among the sheepherders of Tekoa—what he saw concerning Israel two years before the earthquake, in the days when Uzziah was king of Judah and Jeroboam son of Jehoash was king of Israel.

Later, King Belshazzar held a great feast for a thousand of his nobles, and he drank wine with them.

And I heard the voice of a man calling from between the banks of the Ulai: “Gabriel, explain the vision to this man.”

As I was contemplating all this, suddenly a goat with a prominent horn between his eyes came out of the west, crossing the surface of the entire earth without touching the ground.

Know and understand this: From the issuance of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem, until the Messiah, the Prince, there will be seven weeks and sixty-two weeks. It will be rebuilt with streets and a trench, but in times of distress.

And he will confirm a covenant with many for one week, but in the middle of the week he will put an end to sacrifice and offering. And on the wing of the temple will come the abomination that causes desolation, until the decreed destruction is poured out upon him.”

How Sheshach has been captured! The praise of all the earth has been seized. What a horror Babylon has become among the nations!

But even the archangel Michael, when he disputed with the devil over the body of Moses, did not presume to bring a slanderous charge against him, but said, “The Lord rebuke you!”

Nevertheless, the king of Assyria sent the Tartan, the Rabsaris, and the Rabshakeh, along with a great army, from Lachish to King Hezekiah at Jerusalem. They advanced up to Jerusalem and stationed themselves by the aqueduct of the upper pool, on the road to the Launderer’s Field.

One day, while he was worshiping in the temple of his god Nisroch, his sons Adrammelech and Sharezer put him to the sword and escaped to the land of Ararat. And his son Esar-haddon reigned in his place.

Josiah was eight years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem thirty-one years. His mother’s name was Jedidah daughter of Adaiah; she was from Bozkath. And he did what was right in the eyes of the LORD and walked in all the ways of his father David; he did not turn aside to the right or to the left. Now in the eighteenth year of his reign, King Josiah sent the scribe, Shaphan son of Azaliah, the son of Meshullam, to the house of the LORD, saying, “Go up to Hilkiah the high priest and have him count the money that has been brought into the house of the LORD, which the doorkeepers have collected from the people. And let them deliver it into the hands of the supervisors of those doing the work on the house of the LORD, who in turn are to give it to the workmen repairing the damages to the house of the LORD— . . .

Jehoiachin was eighteen years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem three months. His mother’s name was Nehushta daughter of Elnathan; she was from Jerusalem.

Ahaziah was twenty-two years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem one year. His mother’s name was Athaliah, the granddaughter of Omri king of Israel.

All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for instruction, for conviction, for correction, and for training in righteousness,

On the fourteenth night we were still being driven across the Adriatic Sea. About midnight the sailors sensed they were approaching land.

In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim king of Judah, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came to Jerusalem and besieged it.

In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim king of Judah, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came to Jerusalem and besieged it. And the Lord delivered into his hand Jehoiakim king of Judah, along with some of the articles from the house of God. He carried these off to the land of Shinar, to the house of his god, where he put them in the treasury of his god. Then the king ordered Ashpenaz, the chief of his court officials, to bring in some Israelites from the royal family and the nobility— young men without blemish, handsome, gifted in all wisdom, knowledgeable, quick to understand, and qualified to serve in the king’s palace—and to teach them the language and literature of the Chaldeans. The king assigned them daily provisions of the royal food and wine. They were to be trained for three years, after which they were to enter the king’s service. . . .

Among these young men were some from Judah: Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah.

In the days of those kings, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that will never be destroyed, nor will it be left to another people. It will shatter all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, but will itself stand forever.

As soon as you hear the sound of the horn, flute, zither, lyre, harp, pipes, and all kinds of music, you must fall down and worship the golden statue that King Nebuchadnezzar has set up.

In the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, to fulfill the word of the LORD spoken through Jeremiah, the LORD stirred the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia to send a proclamation throughout his kingdom and to put it in writing as follows:

At the beginning of the reign of Xerxes, an accusation was lodged against the people of Judah and Jerusalem.

From Rehum the commander, Shimshai the scribe, and the rest of their associates—the judges and officials over Tripolis, Persia, Erech and Babylon, the Elamites of Susa,

So this Sheshbazzar came and laid the foundation of the house of God in Jerusalem, and from that time until now it has been under construction, but it has not yet been completed.”

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness, to rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, and over all the earth itself and every creature that crawls upon it.”

From that land he went forth into Assyria, where he built Nineveh, Rehoboth-Ir, Calah,

And by the seventh day God had finished the work He had been doing; so on that day He rested from all His work.

And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed. He will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.”

So Rachel died and was buried on the way to Ephrath (that is, Bethlehem).

And Zillah gave birth to Tubal-cain, a forger of every implement of bronze and iron. And the sister of Tubal-cain was Naamah.

Now when men began to multiply on the face of the earth and daughters were born to them, the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful, and they took as wives whomever they chose. So the LORD said, “My Spirit will not contend with man forever, for he is mortal; his days shall be 120 years.” The Nephilim were on the earth in those days—and afterward as well—when the sons of God had relations with the daughters of men. And they bore them children who became the mighty men of old, men of renown. Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great upon the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was altogether evil all the time. . . .

This is the vision concerning Judah and Jerusalem that Isaiah son of Amoz saw during the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah. Listen, O heavens, and give ear, O earth, for the LORD has spoken: “I have raised children and brought them up, but they have rebelled against Me. The ox knows its owner, and the donkey its master’s manger, but Israel does not know; My people do not understand.” Alas, O sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a brood of evildoers, children of depravity! They have forsaken the LORD; they have despised the Holy One of Israel and turned their backs on Him. Why do you want more beatings? Why do you keep rebelling? Your head has a massive wound, and your whole heart is afflicted. . . .

I will sing for my beloved a song of his vineyard: My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill. He dug it up and cleared the stones and planted the finest vines. He built a watchtower in the middle and dug out a winepress as well. He waited for the vineyard to yield good grapes, but the fruit it produced was sour! “And now, O dwellers of Jerusalem and men of Judah, I exhort you to judge between Me and My vineyard. What more could I have done for My vineyard than I already did for it? Why, when I expected sweet grapes, did it bring forth sour fruit? Now I will tell you what I am about to do to My vineyard: I will take away its hedge, and it will be consumed; I will tear down its wall, and it will be trampled. . . .

Of the increase of His government and peace there will be no end. He will reign on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish and sustain it with justice and righteousness from that time and forevermore. The zeal of the LORD of Hosts will accomplish this.

These are the words of Jeremiah son of Hilkiah, one of the priests in Anathoth in the territory of Benjamin.

Thus you are to tell them: “These gods, who have made neither the heavens nor the earth, will perish from this earth and from under these heavens.”

Hammered silver is brought from Tarshish, and gold from Uphaz—the work of a craftsman from the hands of a goldsmith. Their clothes are blue and purple, all fashioned by skilled workers.

The men of Memphis and Tahpanhes have shaved the crown of your head.

But when seventy years are complete, I will punish the king of Babylon and that nation, the land of the Chaldeans, for their guilt, declares the LORD, and I will make it an everlasting desolation.

all the kings of the north, both near and far, one after another—all the kingdoms on the face of the earth. And after all of them, the king of Sheshach will drink it too.

In the fifth month of that same year, the fourth year, near the beginning of the reign of King Zedekiah of Judah, the prophet Hananiah son of Azzur, who was from Gibeon, said to me in the house of the LORD in the presence of the priests and all the people:

Then all the officials of the king of Babylon entered and sat in the Middle Gate: Nergal-sharezer of Samgar, Nebo-sarsekim the Rabsaris, Nergal-sharezer the Rabmag, and all the rest of the officials of the king of Babylon.

A lion has gone up from his thicket, and a destroyer of nations has set out. He has left his lair to lay waste your land. Your cities will be reduced to ruins and lie uninhabited.

This is what the LORD says: Behold, I will deliver Pharaoh Hophra king of Egypt into the hands of his enemies who seek his life, just as I delivered Zedekiah king of Judah into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, the enemy who was seeking his life.”

Prepare the nations for battle against her—the kings of the Medes, their governors and all their officials, and all the lands they rule.

The snorting of enemy horses is heard from Dan. At the sound of the neighing of mighty steeds, the whole land quakes. They come to devour the land and everything in it, the city and all who dwell in it.

Can you bring forth the constellations in their seasons or lead out the Bear and her cubs?

After Aaron casts lots for the two goats, one for the LORD and the other for the scapegoat,

Heshbon was the city of Sihon king of the Amorites, who had fought against the former king of Moab and taken all his land as far as the Arnon.

In the days when the judges ruled, there was a famine in the land. And a certain man from Bethlehem in Judah, with his wife and two sons, went to reside in the land of Moab. The man’s name was Elimelech, his wife’s name was Naomi, and the names of his two sons were Mahlon and Chilion. They were Ephrathites from Bethlehem in Judah, and they entered the land of Moab and settled there. Then Naomi’s husband Elimelech died, and she was left with her two sons, who took Moabite women as their wives, one named Orpah and the other named Ruth. And after they had lived in Moab about ten years, both Mahlon and Chilion also died, and Naomi was left without her two sons and without her husband. . . .

with nard and saffron, with calamus and cinnamon, with every kind of frankincense tree, with myrrh and aloes, with all the finest spices.

As soon as I send Artemas or Tychicus to you, make every effort to come to me at Nicopolis, because I have decided to winter there.

I am glad that Stephanas, Fortunatus, and Achaicus have arrived, because they have supplied what was lacking from you.

If anyone does not love the Lord, let him be under a curse. Come, O Lord!

To the rest I say this (I, not the Lord): If a brother has an unbelieving wife and she is willing to live with him, he must not divorce her.

because everyone born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world: our faith.

But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, to proclaim the virtues of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

I am afraid, however, that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent’s cunning, your minds may be led astray from your simple and pure devotion to Christ.

In Damascus, the governor under King Aretas secured the city of the Damascenes in order to arrest me.

All this is from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation:

For if God did not spare the angels when they sinned, but cast them deep into hell, placing them in chains of darkness to be held for judgment;

if He did not spare the ancient world when He brought the flood on its ungodly people, but preserved Noah, a preacher of righteousness, among the eight;

So the soldiers followed their orders and brought Paul by night to Antipatris.

Five days later the high priest Ananias came down with some elders and a lawyer named Tertullus, who presented to the governor their case against Paul.

We boarded an Adramyttian ship about to sail for ports along the coast of Asia, and we put out to sea. Aristarchus, a Macedonian from Thessalonica, was with us.

The brothers there had heard about us and traveled as far as the Forum of Appius and the Three Taverns to meet us. When Paul saw them, he was encouraged and gave thanks to God.

Put on the full armor of God, so that you can make your stand against the devil’s schemes.

In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one.

O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? Before your very eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law, or by hearing with faith? Are you so foolish? After starting in the Spirit, are you now finishing in the flesh? Have you suffered so much for nothing, if it really was for nothing? Does God lavish His Spirit on you and work miracles among you because you practice the law, or because you hear and believe? . . .

What I mean is this: The law that came 430 years later does not revoke the covenant previously established by God, so as to nullify the promise.

The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity, and debauchery;

Let us hold resolutely to the hope we profess, for He who promised is faithful.

Now faith is the assurance of what we hope for and the certainty of what we do not see. This is why the ancients were commended. By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible. By faith Abel offered God a better sacrifice than Cain did. By faith he was commended as righteous when God gave approval to his gifts. And by faith he still speaks, even though he is dead. By faith Enoch was taken up so that he did not see death: “He could not be found, because God had taken him away.” For before he was taken, he was commended as one who pleased God. . . .

They were stoned, they were sawed in two, they were put to death by the sword. They went around in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, oppressed, and mistreated.

What causes conflicts and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from the passions at war within you? You crave what you do not have; you kill and covet, but are unable to obtain it. You quarrel and fight. You do not have, because you do not ask.

to Apphia our sister, to Archippus our fellow soldier, and to the church that meets at your house:

saying, “Write on a scroll what you see and send it to the seven churches: to Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea.”

“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, who is and was and is to come—the Almighty.

And I will empower my two witnesses, and they will prophesy for 1,260 days, clothed in sackcloth.”

And the dragon was enraged at the woman, and went to make war with the rest of her children, who keep the commandments of God and hold to the testimony of Jesus. And the dragon stood on the shore of the sea.

Then a war broke out in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back.

And they assembled the kings in the place that in Hebrew is called Armageddon.

I know where you live, where the throne of Satan sits. Yet you have held fast to My name and have not denied your faith in Me, even in the day when My faithful witness Antipas was killed among you, where Satan dwells.

They were ruled by a king, the angel of the Abyss. His name in Hebrew is Abaddon, and in Greek it is Apollyon.

that if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.

Greet Apelles, who is approved in Christ. Greet those who belong to the household of Aristobulus.

Greet Andronicus and Junia, my fellow countrymen and fellow prisoners. They are outstanding among the apostles, and they were in Christ before I was.

But because of your hard and unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of wrath, when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed.

There is no one who understands, no one who seeks God.

Isaiah cries out concerning Israel: “Though the number of the Israelites is like the sand of the sea, only the remnant will be saved.