He built towers in the desert and dug many cisterns, for he owned many herds in the lowlands ¹  and on the plain. He had workers in the fields and vineyards in the hills and in Carmel, ²  for he loved agriculture. ³ 

He ordered the altars of the Baals to be torn down, ¹  and broke the incense altars that were above them. He smashed the Asherah poles, idols and images, crushed them up and sprinkled the dust over the tombs of those who had sacrificed to them.

He built a hedge around it, ¹  removed its stones, and planted a vine. He built a tower in the middle of it, and constructed a winepress. He waited for it to produce edible grapes, but it produced sour ones instead. ² 

I said, ¹  “I will weep and mourn ²  for the grasslands on the mountains, ³  I will sing a mournful song for the pastures in the wilderness because they are so scorched no one travels through them. The sound of livestock is no longer heard there. Even the birds in the sky and the wild animals in the fields have fled and are gone.”

The mother who had seven children ¹  will grow faint. All the breath will go out of her. ²  Her pride and joy will be taken from her in the prime of their life. It will seem as if the sun had set while it was still day. ³  She will suffer shame and humiliation. ⁴  I will cause any of them who are still left alive to be killed in war by the onslaughts of their enemies,” ⁵  says the Lord.

The terror you inspire in others ¹  and the arrogance of your heart have deceived you. You may make your home in the clefts of the rocks; you may occupy the highest places in the hills. ²  But even if you made your home where the eagles nest, I would bring you down from there,” says the Lord.

and say to the scrub land of the Negev, ‘Hear the word of the Lord: This is what the sovereign Lord says: Look here, ¹  I am about to start a fire in you, ²  and it will devour every green tree and every dry tree in you. The flaming fire will not be extinguished, and the whole surface of the ground from the Negev to the north will be scorched by it.

Foreigners from the most terrifying nations have cut it down and left it to lie there on the mountains. In all the valleys its branches have fallen, and its boughs lie broken in the ravines of the land. All the peoples of the land ¹  have departed ²  from its shade and left it.

“All the leaders of the north are there, along with all the Sidonians; despite their might they have gone down in shameful terror with the dead. They lie uncircumcised with those killed by the sword, and bear their shame with those who descend to the pit.

Therefore when they all ¹  heard the sound of the horn, flute, zither, trigon, harp, pipes, ²  and all kinds of music, all the peoples, nations, and language groups began bowing down and paying homage to the golden statue that King Nebuchadnezzar had erected.

“After these things, as I was watching in the night visions ¹  a fourth beast appeared – one dreadful, terrible, and very strong. ²  It had two large rows ³  of iron teeth. It devoured and crushed, and anything that was left it trampled with its feet. It was different from all the beasts that came before it, and it had ten horns.

“I withheld rain from you three months before the harvest. ¹  I gave rain to one city, but not to another. One field ²  would get rain, but the field that received no rain dried up.

All her carved idols will be smashed to pieces; all her metal cult statues will be destroyed by fire. ¹  I will make a waste heap ²  of all her images. Since ³  she gathered the metal ⁴  as a prostitute collects her wages, the idols will become a prostitute’s wages again.” ⁵ 

When he saw ¹  Jesus, he cried out, fell ²  down before him, and shouted with a loud voice, “Leave me alone, ³  Jesus, Son of the Most High ⁴  God! I beg you, do not torment ⁵  me!”

I tell you, even though the man inside ¹  will not get up and give him anything because he is his friend, yet because of the first man’s ²  sheer persistence ³  he will get up and give him whatever he needs.

Both Paul and Barnabas replied courageously, ¹  “It was necessary to speak the word of God ²  to you first. Since you reject it and do not consider yourselves worthy ³  of eternal life, we ⁴  are turning to the Gentiles. ⁵ 

If then I am in the wrong ¹  and have done anything that deserves death, I am not trying to escape dying, ²  but if not one of their charges against me is true, ³  no one can hand me over to them. ⁴  I appeal to Caesar!” ⁵ 

I am writing to you, fathers, that ¹  you have known him who has been from the beginning. I am writing to you, young people, that ²  you have conquered the evil one. ³ 

and when he had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders threw themselves to the ground ¹  before the Lamb. Each ²  of them had a harp and golden bowls full of incense (which are the prayers of the saints). ³