Daily Lectionary

Isaiah 33:1-24

¹ Ah, you destroyer, who yourself have not been destroyed, you traitor, whom none has betrayed! When you have ceased to destroy, you will be destroyed; and when you have finished betraying, they will betray you.
² O LORD, be gracious to us; we wait for you. Be our arm every morning, our salvation in the time of trouble.
³ At the tumultuous noise peoples flee; when you lift yourself up, nations are scattered,
⁴ and your spoil is gathered as the caterpillar gathers; as locusts leap, it is leapt upon.
⁵ The LORD is exalted, for he dwells on high; he will fill Zion with justice and righteousness,
⁶ and he will be the stability of your times, abundance of salvation, wisdom, and knowledge; the fear of the LORD is Zion’s treasure.
⁷ Behold, their heroes cry in the streets; the envoys of peace weep bitterly.
⁸ The highways lie waste; the traveler ceases. Covenants are broken; cities are despised; there is no regard for man.
⁹ The land mourns and languishes; Lebanon is confounded and withers away; Sharon is like a desert, and Bashan and Carmel shake off their leaves.
¹⁰ “Now I will arise,” says the LORD, “now I will lift myself up; now I will be exalted.
¹¹ You conceive chaff; you give birth to stubble; your breath is a fire that will consume you.
¹² And the peoples will be as if burned to lime, like thorns cut down, that are burned in the fire.”
¹³ Hear, you who are far off, what I have done; and you who are near, acknowledge my might.
¹⁴ The sinners in Zion are afraid; trembling has seized the godless: “Who among us can dwell with the consuming fire? Who among us can dwell with everlasting burnings?”
¹⁵ He who walks righteously and speaks uprightly, who despises the gain of oppressions, who shakes his hands, lest they hold a bribe, who stops his ears from hearing of bloodshed and shuts his eyes from looking on evil,
¹⁶ he will dwell on the heights; his place of defense will be the fortresses of rocks; his bread will be given him; his water will be sure.
¹⁷ Your eyes will behold the king in his beauty; they will see a land that stretches afar.
¹⁸ Your heart will muse on the terror: “Where is he who counted, where is he who weighed the tribute? Where is he who counted the towers?”
¹⁹ You will see no more the insolent people, the people of an obscure speech that you cannot comprehend, stammering in a tongue that you cannot understand.
²⁰ Behold Zion, the city of our appointed feasts! Your eyes will see Jerusalem, an untroubled habitation, an immovable tent, whose stakes will never be plucked up, nor will any of its cords be broken.
²¹ But there the LORD in majesty will be for us a place of broad rivers and streams, where no galley with oars can go, nor majestic ship can pass.
²² For the LORD is our judge; the LORD is our lawgiver; the LORD is our king; he will save us.
²³ Your cords hang loose; they cannot hold the mast firm in its place or keep the sail spread out. Then prey and spoil in abundance will be divided; even the lame will take the prey.
²⁴ And no inhabitant will say, “I am sick”; the people who dwell there will be forgiven their iniquity. (ESV)

Revelation 4:1-11

¹ After this I looked, and behold, a door standing open in heaven! And the first voice, which I had heard speaking to me like a trumpet, said, “Come up here, and I will show you what must take place after this.”
² At once I was in the Spirit, and behold, a throne stood in heaven, with one seated on the throne.
³ And he who sat there had the appearance of jasper and carnelian, and around the throne was a rainbow that had the appearance of an emerald.
⁴ Around the throne were twenty-four thrones, and seated on the thrones were twenty-four elders, clothed in white garments, with golden crowns on their heads.
⁵ From the throne came flashes of lightning, and rumblings and peals of thunder, and before the throne were burning seven torches of fire, which are the seven spirits of God,
⁶ and before the throne there was as it were a sea of glass, like crystal. And around the throne, on each side of the throne, are four living creatures, full of eyes in front and behind:
⁷ the first living creature like a lion, the second living creature like an ox, the third living creature with the face of a man, and the fourth living creature like an eagle in flight.
⁸ And the four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all around and within, and day and night they never cease to say, “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come!”
⁹ And whenever the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to him who is seated on the throne, who lives forever and ever,
¹⁰ the twenty-four elders fall down before him who is seated on the throne and worship him who lives forever and ever. They cast their crowns before the throne, saying,
¹¹ “Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.” (ESV)