A Call to Repentance

(Joel 1:13–20, Zephaniah 2:1–3, Luke 13:1–5)

4 For this is what the LORD says to the house of Israel:

“Seek Me and live!

5 Do not seek Bethel or go to Gilgal;

do not journey to Beersheba,

for Gilgal will surely go into exile,

and Bethel will come to nothing.[fn]

6 Seek the LORD and live,

or He will sweep like fire through the house of Joseph;

it will devour everything,

with no one at Bethel to extinguish it.

7 There are those who turn justice into wormwood

and cast righteousness to the ground.

8 He who made the Pleiades and Orion,

who turns darkness into dawn

and darkens day into night,

who summons the waters of the sea

and pours them over the face of the earth—

the LORD is His name—

9 He flashes destruction on the strong,

so that fury comes upon the stronghold.

10 There are those who hate the one who reproves in the gate

and despise him who speaks with integrity.

11 Therefore, because you trample on the poor

and exact from him a tax of grain,

you will never live

in the stone houses you have built;

you will never drink the wine

from the lush vineyards you have planted.

12 For I know [that] your transgressions are many

and your sins are numerous.

You oppress the righteous by taking bribes;

{you deprive} the poor of justice in the gate.

13 Therefore, the prudent keep silent in such times,

for the days are evil.

14 Seek good, not evil,

so that you may live.

And the LORD, the God of Hosts,

will be with you, as you have claimed.

15 Hate evil and love good;

establish justice in the gate.

Perhaps the LORD, the God of Hosts,

will be gracious to the remnant of Joseph.”