NETfree - Joel - 3

3:1  For look! In those days and at that time I will return the exiles to Judah and Jerusalem.

3:2  Then I will gather all the nations, and bring them down to the valley of Jehoshaphat. I will enter into judgment against them there concerning my people Israel who are my inheritance, whom they scattered among the nations. They partitioned my land,

3:3  and they cast lots for my people. They traded a boy for a prostitute; they sold a little girl for wine so they could drink.

3:4  Why are you doing these things to me, Tyre and Sidon? Are you trying to get even with me, land of Philistia? I will very quickly repay you for what you have done!

3:5  For you took my silver and my gold and brought my precious valuables to your own palaces.

3:6  You sold Judeans and Jerusalemites to the Greeks, removing them far from their own country.

3:7  Look! I am rousing them from that place to which you sold them. I will repay you for what you have done!

3:8  I will sell your sons and daughters to the people of Judah. They will sell them to the Sabeans, a nation far away. Indeed, the LORD has spoken!

3:9  Proclaim this among the nations: "Prepare for a holy war! Call out the warriors! Let all these fighting men approach and attack!

3:10  Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruning hooks into spears! Let the weak say, 'I too am a warrior!'

3:11  Lend your aid and come, all you surrounding nations, and gather yourselves to that place." Bring down, O LORD, your warriors!

3:12  Let the nations be roused and let them go up to the valley of Jehoshaphat, for there I will sit in judgment on all the surrounding nations.

3:13  Rush forth with the sickle, for the harvest is ripe! Come, stomp the grapes, for the winepress is full! The vats overflow. Indeed, their evil is great!

3:14  Crowds, great crowds are in the valley of decision, for the day of the LORD is near in the valley of decision!

3:15  The sun and moon are darkened; the stars withhold their brightness.

3:16  The LORD roars from Zion; from Jerusalem his voice bellows out. The heavens and the earth shake. But the LORD is a refuge for his people; he is a stronghold for the citizens of Israel.

3:17  You will be convinced that I the LORD am your God, dwelling on Zion, my holy mountain. Jerusalem will be holy - conquering armies will no longer pass through it.

3:18  On that day the mountains will drip with sweet wine, and the hills will flow with milk. All the dry stream beds of Judah will flow with water. A spring will flow out from the temple of the LORD, watering the Valley of Acacia Trees.

3:19  Egypt will be desolate and Edom will be a desolate wilderness, because of the violence they did to the people of Judah, in whose land they shed innocent blood.

3:20  But Judah will reside securely forever, and Jerusalem will be secure from one generation to the next.

3:21  I will avenge their blood which I had not previously acquitted. It is the LORD who dwells in Zion!