Isaiah 40:24

Three times in a year all of your males shall appear before Yahweh your God in the place which he chooses: in the feast of unleavened bread, in the feast of weeks, and in the feast of booths. They shall not appear before Yahweh empty.

The wicked are not so, but are like the chaff which the wind drives away.

Therefore Yahweh says concerning Jehoiakim king of Judah: “He will have no one to sit on David’s throne. His dead body will be cast out in the day to the heat, and in the night to the frost.

“Ephraim, what shall I do to you? Judah, what shall I do to you? For your love is like a morning cloud, and like the dew that disappears early.

“Be glad then, you children of Zion, and rejoice in Yahweh, your God; for he gives you the early rain in just measure, and he causes the rain to come down for you, the early rain and the latter rain, as before.

He will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the earth with a curse.”

For the word of God is living and active, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and is able to discern the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

I will scatter you among the nations, and I will draw out the sword after you. Your land will be a desolation, and your cities shall be a waste.

A nation which you don’t know will eat the fruit of your ground and all of your work. You will only be oppressed and crushed always,

Will you harass a driven leaf? Will you pursue the dry stubble?

He will not depart out of darkness. The flame will dry up his branches. He will go away by the breath of God’s mouth.

Terrors have turned on me. They chase my honor as the wind. My welfare has passed away as a cloud.

You have rebuked the nations. You have destroyed the wicked. You have blotted out their name forever and ever.

Let them be as chaff before the wind, Yahweh’s angel driving them on.

As smoke is driven away, so drive them away. As wax melts before the fire, so let the wicked perish at the presence of God.

For the wind passes over it, and it is gone. Its place remembers it no more.

They surrounded me like bees. They are quenched like the burning thorns. In Yahweh’s name I cut them off.

If only you, God, would kill the wicked. Get away from me, you bloodthirsty men!

The burden of the wilderness of the sea. As whirlwinds in the South sweep through, it comes from the wilderness, from an awesome land.

His breath is as an overflowing stream that reaches even to the neck, to sift the nations with the sieve of destruction. A bridle that leads to ruin will be in the jaws of the peoples.

Who has raised up one from the east? Who called him to his foot in righteousness? He hands over nations to him and makes him rule over kings. He gives them like the dust to his sword, like the driven stubble to his bow.

He has made my mouth like a sharp sword. He has hidden me in the shadow of his hand. He has made me a polished shaft. He has kept me close in his quiver.

The Lord Yahweh’s Spirit is on me, because Yahweh has anointed me to preach good news to the humble. He has sent me to bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and release to those who are bound,

Yahweh of Armies says, “Behold, evil will go out from nation to nation, and a great storm will be raised up from the uttermost parts of the earth.”

Behold, Yahweh’s storm, his wrath, has gone out, a sweeping storm: it will burst on the head of the wicked.

I will send to Babylon strangers, who will winnow her. They will empty her land; for in the day of trouble they will be against her all around.

Tell the people of the land, ‘The Lord Yahweh says concerning the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and the land of Israel: “They will eat their bread with fearfulness, and drink their water in dismay, that her land may be desolate, and all that is therein, because of the violence of all those who dwell therein.

But it was plucked up in fury. It was cast down to the ground, and the east wind dried up its fruit. Its strong branches were broken off and withered. The fire consumed them.

yet I will rejoice in Yahweh. I will be joyful in the God of my salvation!

“Is it a time for you yourselves to dwell in your paneled houses, while this house lies waste?

Then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord will kill with the breath of his mouth, and destroy by the manifestation of his coming;

Out of his mouth proceeds a sharp, double-edged sword, that with it he should strike the nations. He will rule them with an iron rod. He treads the wine press of the fierceness of the wrath of God, the Almighty.

Yahweh will scatter you among the peoples, and you will be left few in number among the nations where Yahweh will lead you away.

Yahweh will scatter you among all peoples, from one end of the earth to the other end of the earth. There you will serve other gods which you have not known, you nor your fathers, even wood and stone.

According to what I have seen, those who plow iniquity, and sow trouble, reap the same.

He will have neither son nor grandson among his people, nor any remaining where he lived.

You shall break them with a rod of iron. You shall dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.”

He sent out his arrows, and scattered them; Yes, great lightning bolts, and routed them.

He will judge the poor of the people. He will save the children of the needy, and will break the oppressor in pieces.

My heart is blighted like grass, and withered, for I forget to eat my bread.

Let his posterity be cut off. In the generation following let their name be blotted out.

For as the crackling of thorns under a pot, so is the laughter of the fool. This also is vanity.

He will surely wind you around and around, and throw you like a ball into a large country. There you will die, and there the chariots of your glory will be, you shame of your lord’s house.

It will happen in that day that a great trumpet will be blown; and those who were ready to perish in the land of Assyria, and those who were outcasts in the land of Egypt, shall come; and they will worship Yahweh in the holy mountain at Jerusalem.

You will winnow them, and the wind will carry them away, and the whirlwind will scatter them. You will rejoice in Yahweh. You will glory in the Holy One of Israel.

All the offspring of Israel will be justified in Yahweh, and will rejoice!

For, behold, Yahweh will come with fire, and his chariots will be like the whirlwind; to render his anger with fierceness, and his rebuke with flames of fire.

At that time it will be said to this people and to Jerusalem, “A hot wind from the bare heights in the wilderness toward the daughter of my people, not to winnow, nor to cleanse;

I have winnowed them with a fan in the gates of the land. I have bereaved them of children. I have destroyed my people. They didn’t return from their ways.

I will scatter them as with an east wind before the enemy. I will show them the back, and not the face, in the day of their calamity.

The wind will feed all your shepherds, and your lovers will go into captivity. Surely then you will be ashamed and confounded for all your wickedness.

The king of Babylon killed the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes. He also killed all the princes of Judah in Riblah.

I looked, and behold, a stormy wind came out of the north: a great cloud, with flashing lightning, and a brightness around it, and out of the middle of it as it were glowing metal, out of the middle of the fire.

Yes, behold, being planted, will it prosper? Won’t it utterly wither when the east wind touches it? It will wither in the beds where it grew.” ’ ”

Then the iron, the clay, the bronze, the silver, and the gold were broken in pieces together, and became like the chaff of the summer threshing floors. The wind carried them away, so that no place was found for them. The stone that struck the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth.

For they sow the wind, and they will reap the whirlwind. He has no standing grain. The stalk will yield no head. If it does yield, strangers will swallow it up.

Be confounded, you farmers! Wail, you vineyard keepers; for the wheat and for the barley; for the harvest of the field has perished.

He rebukes the sea, and makes it dry, and dries up all the rivers. Bashan languishes, and Carmel; and the flower of Lebanon languishes.

before the appointed time when the day passes as the chaff, before the fierce anger of Yahweh comes on you, before the day of Yahweh’s anger comes on you.

His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will thoroughly cleanse his threshing floor. He will gather his wheat into the barn, but the chaff he will burn up with unquenchable fire.”

With the blast of your nostrils, the waters were piled up. The floods stood upright as a heap. The deeps were congealed in the heart of the sea.

Then the channels of waters appeared. The foundations of the world were laid bare at your rebuke, Yahweh, at the blast of the breath of your nostrils.

My God, make them like tumbleweed, like chaff before the wind.

Shall the throne of wickedness have fellowship with you, which brings about mischief by statute?

The nations will rush like the rushing of many waters: but he will rebuke them, and they will flee far off, and will be chased like the chaff of the mountains before the wind, and like the whirling dust before the storm.

He heard news concerning Tirhakah king of Ethiopia, “He has come out to fight against you.” When he heard it, he sent messengers to Hezekiah, saying,

But I will kindle a fire in the wall of Rabbah, and it will devour its palaces, with shouting in the day of battle, with a storm in the day of the whirlwind;

Then the channels of the sea appeared. The foundations of the world were laid bare by Yahweh’s rebuke, at the blast of the breath of his nostrils.

He will give Israel up because of the sins of Jeroboam, which he has sinned, and with which he has made Israel to sin.”

So Jehu struck all that remained of Ahab’s house in Jezreel, with all his great men, his familiar friends, and his priests, until he left him no one remaining.

By the breath of God they perish. By the blast of his anger are they consumed.

His roots are wrapped around the rock pile. He sees the place of stones.

How often is it that they are as stubble before the wind, as chaff that the storm carries away?

Before your pots can feel the heat of the thorns, he will sweep away the green and the burning alike.

when calamity overtakes you like a storm, when your disaster comes on like a whirlwind, when distress and anguish come on you.

When the whirlwind passes, the wicked is no more; but the righteous stand firm forever.

but he will judge the poor with righteousness, and decide with equity for the humble of the earth. He will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth; and with the breath of his lips he will kill the wicked.

In the day of your planting, you hedge it in. In the morning, you make your seed blossom, but the harvest flees away in the day of grief and of desperate sorrow.

Behold, I will put a spirit in him and he will hear news, and will return to his own land. I will cause him to fall by the sword in his own land.” ’ ”

The grass withers, the flower fades, because Yahweh’s breath blows on it. Surely the people are like grass.

Behold, they are like stubble. The fire will burn them. They won’t deliver themselves from the power of the flame. It won’t be a coal to warm at or a fire to sit by.

When you cry, let those whom you have gathered deliver you; but the wind will take them. a breath will carry them all away: but he who takes refuge in me will possess the land, and will inherit my holy mountain.”

Yahweh says, “Record this man as childless, a man who will not prosper in his days; for no more will a man of his offspring prosper, sitting on David’s throne, and ruling in Judah.”

Behold, Yahweh’s storm, his wrath, has gone out. Yes, a whirling storm: It will burst on the head of the wicked.

Ephraim is struck. Their root has dried up. They will bear no fruit. Even though they give birth, yet I will kill the beloved ones of their womb.”

Therefore they will be like the morning mist, and like the dew that passes away early, like the chaff that is driven with the whirlwind out of the threshing floor, and like the smoke out of the chimney.

Though he is fruitful among his brothers, an east wind will come, the breath of Yahweh coming up from the wilderness; and his spring will become dry, and his fountain will be dried up. He will plunder the storehouse of treasure.

Yahweh has commanded concerning you: “No more descendants will bear your name. Out of the house of your gods, I will cut off the engraved image and the molten image. I will make your grave, for you are vile.”

“You looked for much, and, behold, it came to little; and when you brought it home, I blew it away. Why?” says Yahweh of Armies, “Because of my house that lies waste, while each of you is busy with his own house.

“but I will scatter them with a whirlwind among all the nations which they have not known. Thus the land was desolate after them, so that no man passed through nor returned: for they made the pleasant land desolate.”

Yahweh will be seen over them; and his arrow will go flash like lightning; and the Lord Yahweh will blow the trumpet, and will go with whirlwinds of the south.

“For, behold, the day comes, it burns as a furnace; and all the proud, and all who work wickedness, will be stubble; and the day that comes will burn them up,” says Yahweh of Armies, “that it shall leave them neither root nor branch.

As they passed by in the morning, they saw the fig tree withered away from the roots.

For his burning place has long been ready. Yes, for the king it is prepared. He has made its pyre deep and large with fire and much wood. Yahweh’s breath, like a stream of sulfur, kindles it.