“Simon, ¹  Simon, pay attention! ²  Satan has demanded to have you all, ³  to sift you like wheat, ⁴ 

“For look, I am giving a command and I will shake the family of Israel together with all the nations. It will resemble a sieve being shaken, when not even a pebble falls to the ground. ¹ 

His battle cry overwhelms like a flooding river ¹  that reaches one’s neck. He shakes the nations in a sieve that isolates the chaff; ²  he puts a bit into the mouth of the nations and leads them to destruction. ³ 

The lips of the wise spread ¹  knowledge, but not so the heart of fools. ² 

You carefully observe me when I travel or when I lie down to rest; ¹  you are aware of everything I do. ² 

A naive person ¹  believes everything, but the shrewd person discerns his steps. ² 

A wise king separates out ¹  the wicked; he turns the threshing wheel over them. ² 

The Lord spoke to Gideon again, “There are still too many men. ¹  Bring them down to the water and I will thin the ranks some more. ²  When I say, ‘This one should go with you,’ pick him to go; ³  when I say, ⁴  ‘This one should not go with you,’ do not take him.” ⁵ 

They ¹  entered the house under the pretense of getting wheat and mortally wounded him ²  in the stomach. Then Recab and his brother Baanah escaped.

I also thought to myself, “It is ¹  for the sake of people, ²  so God can clearly ³  show ⁴  them that they are like animals.

At that time ¹  the sovereign master ²  will wash the excrement ³  from Zion’s women, he will rinse the bloodstains from Jerusalem’s midst, ⁴  as he comes to judge and to bring devastation. ⁵ 

All the sinners among my people will die by the sword – the ones who say, ‘Disaster will not come near, it will not confront us.’

Now, announce to the men, ¹  ‘Whoever is shaking with fear ²  may turn around and leave Mount Gilead.’” ³  Twenty-two thousand men ⁴  went home; ⁵  ten thousand remained.

For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any double-edged sword, piercing even to the point of dividing soul from spirit, and joints from marrow; it is able to judge the desires and thoughts of the heart.