HOSEA 8

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Israel Reaps the Whirlwind8:1 Put the trumpet to your lips!

Like an eagle the enemy comes against the house of the LORD,

Because they have transgressed My covenant

And rebelled against My law.

2 They cry out to Me,

“My God, we of Israel know You!”

3 Israel has rejected the good;

The enemy will pursue him.

4 They have set up kings, but not by Me;

They have appointed princes, but I did not know it.

With their silver and gold they have made idols for themselves,

That they might be cut off.

5 He has rejected your calf, O Samaria, saying,

“My anger burns against them!”

How long will they be incapable of innocence?

6 For from Israel is even this!

A craftsman made it, so it is not God;

Surely the calf of Samaria will be broken to pieces.

7 For they sow the wind

And they reap the whirlwind.

The standing grain has no heads;

It yields no grain.

Should it yield, strangers would swallow it up.

8 Israel is swallowed up;

They are now among the nations

Like a vessel in which no one delights.

9 For they have gone up to Assyria,

Like a wild donkey all alone;

Ephraim has hired lovers.

10 Even though they hire allies among the nations,

Now I will gather them up;

And they will begin to diminish

Because of the burden of the king of princes.

11 Since Ephraim has multiplied altars for sin,

They have become altars of sinning for him.

12 Though I wrote for him ten thousand precepts of My law,

They are regarded as a strange thing.

13 As for My sacrificial gifts,

They sacrifice the flesh and eat it,

But the LORD has taken no delight in them.

Now He will remember their iniquity,

And punish them for their sins;

They will return to Egypt.

14 For Israel has forgotten his Maker and built palaces;

And Judah has multiplied fortified cities,

But I will send a fire on its cities that it may consume its palatial dwellings.

HOSEA 9

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Ephraim Punished9:1 Do not rejoice, O Israel, with exultation like the nations!

For you have played the harlot, forsaking your God.

You have loved harlots’ earnings on every threshing floor.

2 Threshing floor and wine press will not feed them,

And the new wine will fail them.

3 They will not remain in the LORD’S land,

But Ephraim will return to Egypt,

And in Assyria they will eat unclean food.

4 They will not pour out drink offerings of wine to the LORD,

Their sacrifices will not please Him.

Their bread will be like mourners’ bread;

All who eat of it will be defiled,

For their bread will be for themselves alone;

It will not enter the house of the LORD.

5 What will you do on the day of the appointed festival

And on the day of the feast of the LORD?

6 For behold, they will go because of destruction;

Egypt will gather them up, Memphis will bury them.

Weeds will take over their treasures of silver;

Thorns will be in their tents.

7 The days of punishment have come,

The days of retribution have come;

Let Israel know this!

The prophet is a fool,

The inspired man is demented,

Because of the grossness of your iniquity,

And because your hostility is so great.

8 Ephraim was a watchman with my God, a prophet;

Yet the snare of a bird catcher is in all his ways,

And there is only hostility in the house of his God.

9 They have gone deep in depravity

As in the days of Gibeah;

He will remember their iniquity,

He will punish their sins.

10 I found Israel like grapes in the wilderness;

I saw your forefathers as the earliest fruit on the fig tree in its first season.

But they came to Baal-peor and devoted themselves to shame,

And they became as detestable as that which they loved.

11 As for Ephraim, their glory will fly away like a bird--

No birth, no pregnancy and no conception!

12 Though they bring up their children,

Yet I will bereave them until not a man is left.

Yes, woe to them indeed when I depart from them!

13 Ephraim, as I have seen,

Is planted in a pleasant meadow like Tyre;

But Ephraim will bring out his children for slaughter.

14 Give them, O LORD--what will You give?

Give them a miscarrying womb and dry breasts.

15 All their evil is at Gilgal;

Indeed, I came to hate them there!

Because of the wickedness of their deeds

I will drive them out of My house!

I will love them no more;

All their princes are rebels.

16 Ephraim is stricken, their root is dried up,

They will bear no fruit.

Even though they bear children,

I will slay the precious ones of their womb.

17 My God will cast them away

Because they have not listened to Him;

And they will be wanderers among the nations.

PROVERBS 1

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The Usefulness of Proverbs  1:1 The proverbs of Solomon the son of David, king of Israel:

2 To know wisdom and instruction,

To discern the sayings of understanding,

3 To receive instruction in wise behavior,

Righteousness, justice and equity;

4 To give prudence to the naive,

To the youth knowledge and discretion,

5 A wise man will hear and increase in learning,

And a man of understanding will acquire wise counsel,

6 To understand a proverb and a figure,

The words of the wise and their riddles.

7 The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge;

Fools despise wisdom and instruction.

The Enticement of Sinners8 Hear, my son, your father’s instruction

And do not forsake your mother’s teaching;

9 Indeed, they are a graceful wreath to your head

And ornaments about your neck.

10 My son, if sinners entice you,

Do not consent.

11 If they say, “Come with us,

Let us lie in wait for blood,

Let us ambush the innocent without cause;

12 Let us swallow them alive like Sheol,

Even whole, as those who go down to the pit;

13 We will find all kinds of precious wealth,

We will fill our houses with spoil;

14 Throw in your lot with us,

We shall all have one purse,”

15 My son, do not walk in the way with them.

Keep your feet from their path,

16 For their feet run to evil

And they hasten to shed blood.

17 Indeed, it is useless to spread the baited net

In the sight of any bird;

18 But they lie in wait for their own blood;

They ambush their own lives.

19 So are the ways of everyone who gains by violence;

It takes away the life of its possessors.

Wisdom Warns20 Wisdom shouts in the street,

She lifts her voice in the square;

21 At the head of the noisy streets she cries out;

At the entrance of the gates in the city she utters her sayings:

22 “How long, O naive ones, will you love being simple-minded?

And scoffers delight themselves in scoffing

And fools hate knowledge?

23 “Turn to my reproof,

Behold, I will pour out my spirit on you;

I will make my words known to you.

24 “Because I called and you refused,

I stretched out my hand and no one paid attention;

25 And you neglected all my counsel

And did not want my reproof;

26 I will also laugh at your calamity;

I will mock when your dread comes,

27 When your dread comes like a storm

And your calamity comes like a whirlwind,

When distress and anguish come upon you.

28 “Then they will call on me, but I will not answer;

They will seek me diligently but they will not find me,

29 Because they hated knowledge

And did not choose the fear of the LORD.

30 “They would not accept my counsel,

They spurned all my reproof.

31 “So they shall eat of the fruit of their own way

And be satiated with their own devices.

32 “For the waywardness of the naive will kill them,

And the complacency of fools will destroy them.

33 “But he who listens to me shall live securely

And will be at ease from the dread of evil.”

REVELATION 4

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Scene in Heaven  4:1 After these things I looked, and behold, a door standing open in heaven, and the first voice which I had heard, like the sound of a trumpet speaking with me, said, “Come up here, and I will show you what must take place after these things.” 2 Immediately I was in the Spirit; and behold, a throne was standing in heaven, and One sitting on the throne. 3 And He who was sitting was like a jasper stone and a sardius in appearance; and there was a rainbow around the throne, like an emerald in appearance. 4 Around the throne were twenty-four thrones; and upon the thrones I saw twenty-four elders sitting, clothed in white garments, and golden crowns on their heads.
The Throne and Worship of the Creator5 Out from the throne come flashes of lightning and sounds and peals of thunder. And there were seven lamps of fire burning before the throne, which are the seven Spirits of God; 6 and before the throne there was something like a sea of glass, like crystal; and in the center and around the throne, four living creatures full of eyes in front and behind. 7 The first creature was like a lion, and the second creature like a calf, and the third creature had a face like that of a man, and the fourth creature was like a flying eagle. 8 And the four living creatures, each one of them having six wings, are full of eyes around and within; and day and night they do not cease to say, “HOLY, HOLY, HOLY is THE LORD GOD, THE ALMIGHTY, WHO WAS AND WHO IS AND WHO IS TO COME.” 9 And when the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to Him who sits on the throne, to Him who lives forever and ever, 10 the twenty-four elders will fall down before Him who sits on the throne, and will worship Him who lives forever and ever, and will cast their crowns before the throne, saying, 11 “Worthy are You, our Lord and our God, to receive glory and honor and power; for You created all things, and because of Your will they existed, and were created.”