Isaiah 23; Isaiah 24; Isaiah 25; Philippians 1

Isaiah 23

1 This is a message about Tyre. Howl with grief, you sailors out on the ocean! Your home port of Tyre has been destroyed; its houses and its harbor are in ruins. As your ships return from Cyprus, you learn the news.

2 Wail, you merchants of Sidon! You sent agents

3 across the sea to buy and sell the grain that grew in Egypt and to do business with all the nations.

4 City of Sidon, you are disgraced! The sea and the great ocean depths disown you and say, "I never had any children. I never raised sons or daughters.

5 Even the Egyptians will be shocked and dismayed when they learn that Tyre has been destroyed.

6 Howl with grief, you people of Phoenicia! Try to escape to Spain!

7 Can this be the joyful city of Tyre, founded so long ago? Is this the city that sent settlers across the sea to establish colonies?

8 Who was it that planned to bring all this on Tyre, that imperial city, whose merchant princes were the most honored men on earth?

9 The Lord Almighty planned it. He planned it in order to put an end to their pride in what they had done and to humiliate their honored ones.

10 Go and farm the land, you people in the colonies in Spain! There is no one to protect you any more.

11 The Lord has stretched out his hand over the sea and overthrown kingdoms. He has commanded that the Phoenician centers of commerce be destroyed.

12 City of Sidon, your happiness has ended, and your people are oppressed. Even if they escape to Cyprus, they will still not be safe.

13 (It was the Babylonians, not the Assyrians, who let the wild animals overrun Tyre. It was the Babylonians who put up siege towers, tore down the fortifications of Tyre, and left the city in ruins. )

14 Howl with grief, you sailors out on the ocean! The city you relied on has been destroyed

15 A time is coming when Tyre will be forgotten for seventy years, the lifetime of a king. When those years are over, Tyre will be like the prostitute in the song:

16 Take your harp, go round the town, you poor forgotten whore! Play and sing your songs again to bring men back once more.

17 When the seventy years are over, the Lord will let Tyre go back to her old trade, and she will hire herself out to all the kingdoms of the world.

18 The money she earns by commerce will be dedicated to the Lord. She will not store it away, but those who worship the Lord will use her money to buy the food and the clothing they need.

Isaiah 24

1 The Lord is going to devastate the earth and leave it desolate. He will twist the earth's surface and scatter its people.

2 Everyone will meet the same fate - the priests and the people, slaves and masters, buyers and sellers, lenders and borrowers, rich and poor.

3 The earth will lie shattered and ruined. The Lord has spoken and it will be done.

4 The earth dries up and withers; the whole world grows weak; both earth and sky decay.

5 The people have defiled the earth by breaking God's laws and by violating the covenant he made to last forever.

6 So God has pronounced a curse on the earth. Its people are paying for what they have done. Fewer and fewer remain alive.

7 The grapevines wither, and wine is becoming scarce. Everyone who was once happy is now sad,

8 and the joyful music of their harps and drums has ceased.

9 There is no more happy singing over wine; no one enjoys its taste any more.

10 In the city everything is in chaos, and people lock themselves in their houses for safety.

11 People shout in the streets because there is no more wine. Happiness is gone forever; it has been banished from the land.

12 The city is in ruins, and its gates have been broken down.

13 This is what will happen in every nation all over the world. It will be like the end of harvest, when the olives have been beaten off every tree and the last grapes picked from the vines.

14 Those who survive will sing for joy. Those in the West will tell how great the Lord is,

15 and those in the East will praise him. The people who live along the sea will praise the Lord, the God of Israel.

16 From the most distant parts of the world we will hear songs in praise of Israel, the righteous nation. But there is no hope for me! I am wasting away! Traitors continue to betray, and their treachery grows worse and worse.

17 Listen to me, everyone! There are terrors, pits, and traps waiting for you.

18 Anyone who tries to escape from the terror will fall in a pit, and anyone who escapes from the pit will be caught in a trap. Torrents of rain will pour from the sky, and earth's foundations will shake.

19 The earth will crack and shatter and split open.

20 The earth itself will stagger like a drunk, sway like a hut in a storm. The world is weighed down by its sins; it will collapse and never rise again.

21 A time is coming when the Lord will punish the powers above and the rulers of the earth.

22 God will crowd kings together like prisoners in a pit. He will shut them in prison until the time of their punishment comes.

23 The moon will grow dark, and the sun will no longer shine, for the Lord Almighty will be king. He will rule in Jerusalem on Mount Zion, and the leaders of the people will see his glory.

Isaiah 25

1 Lord, you are my God; I will honor you and praise your name. You have done amazing things; you have faithfully carried out the plans you made long ago.

2 You have turned cities into ruins and destroyed their fortifications. The palaces which our enemies built are gone forever.

3 The people of powerful nations will praise you; you will be feared in the cities of cruel nations.

4 The poor and the helpless have fled to you and have been safe in times of trouble. You give them shelter from storms and shade from the burning heat. Cruel enemies attack like a winter storm,

5 like drought in a dry land. But you, Lord, have silenced our enemies; you silence the shouts of cruel people, as a cloud cools a hot day.

6 Here on Mount Zion the Lord Almighty will prepare a banquet for all the nations of the world - a banquet of the richest food and the finest wine.

7 Here he will suddenly remove the cloud of sorrow that has been hanging over all the nations.

8 The Sovereign Lord will destroy death forever! He will wipe away the tears from everyone's eyes and take away the disgrace his people have suffered throughout the world. The Lord himself has spoken.

9 When it happens, everyone will say, "He is our God! We have put our trust in him, and he has rescued us. He is the Lord! We have put our trust in him, and now we are happy and joyful because he has saved us."

10 The Lord will protect Mount Zion, but the people of Moab will be trampled down the way straw is trampled in manure.

11 They will reach out their hands as if they were trying to swim, but God will humiliate them, and their hands will sink helplessly.

12 He will destroy the fortresses of Moab with their high walls and bring them tumbling down into the dust.

Philippians 1

1 From Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus - To all God's people in Philippi who are in union with Christ Jesus, including the church leaders and helpers:

2 May God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ give you grace and peace.

3 I thank my God for you every time I think of you;

4 and every time I pray for you all, I pray with joy

5 because of the way in which you have helped me in the work of the gospel from the very first day until now.

6 And so I am sure that God, who began this good work in you, will carry it on until it is finished on the Day of Christ Jesus.

7 You are always in my heart! And so it is only right for me to feel as I do about you. For you have all shared with me in this privilege that God has given me, both now that I am in prison and also while I was free to defend the gospel and establish it firmly.

8 God is my witness that I tell the truth when I say that my deep feeling for you all comes from the heart of Christ Jesus himself.

9 I pray that your love will keep on growing more and more, together with true knowledge and perfect judgment,

10 so that you will be able to choose what is best. Then you will be free from all impurity and blame on the Day of Christ.

11 Your lives will be filled with the truly good qualities which only Jesus Christ can produce, for the glory and praise of God.

12 I want you to know, my friends, that the things that have happened to me have really helped the progress of the gospel.

13 As a result, the whole palace guard and all the others here know that I am in prison because I am a servant of Christ.

14 And my being in prison has given most of the believers more confidence in the Lord, so that they grow bolder all the time to preach the message fearlessly.

15 Of course some of them preach Christ because they are jealous and quarrelsome, but others from genuine good will.

16 These do so from love, because they know that God has given me the work of defending the gospel.

17 The others do not proclaim Christ sincerely, but from a spirit of selfish ambition; they think that they will make more trouble for me while I am in prison.

18 It does not matter! I am happy about it - just so Christ is preached in every way possible, whether from wrong or right motives. And I will continue to be happy,

19 because I know that by means of your prayers and the help which comes from the Spirit of Jesus Christ I shall be set free.

20 My deep desire and hope is that I shall never fail in my duty, but that at all times, and especially right now, I shall be full of courage, so that with my whole being I shall bring honor to Christ, whether I live or die.

21 For what is life? To me, it is Christ. Death, then, will bring more.

22 But if by continuing to live I can do more worthwhile work, then I am not sure which I should choose.

23 I am pulled in two directions. I want very much to leave this life and be with Christ, which is a far better thing;

24 but for your sake it is much more important that I remain alive.

25 I am sure of this, and so I know that I will stay. I will stay on with you all, to add to your progress and joy in the faith,

26 so that when I am with you again, you will have even more reason to be proud of me in your life in union with Christ Jesus.

27 Now, the important thing is that your way of life should be as the gospel of Christ requires, so that, whether or not I am able to go and see you, I will hear that you are standing firm with one common purpose and that with only one desire you are fighting together for the faith of the gospel.

28 Don't be afraid of your enemies; always be courageous, and this will prove to them that they will lose and that you will win, because it is God who gives you the victory.

29 For you have been given the privilege of serving Christ, not only by believing in him, but also by suffering for him.

30 Now you can take part with me in the battle. It is the same battle you saw me fighting in the past, and as you hear, the one I am fighting still.