Nehemiah 9:29

Hear, you mountains, Yahweh’s controversy, and you enduring foundations of the earth; for Yahweh has a controversy with his people, and he will contend with Israel.

Assemble to me all the elders of your tribes and your officers, that I may speak these words in their ears, and call heaven and earth to witness against them.

Give ear, you heavens, and I will speak. Let the earth hear the words of my mouth.

but have done evil above all who were before you, and have gone and made for yourself other gods, molten images, to provoke me to anger, and have cast me behind your back;

You, Solomon my son, know the God of your father, and serve him with a perfect heart and with a willing mind; for Yahweh searches all hearts, and understands all the imaginations of the thoughts. If you seek him, he will be found by you; but if you forsake him, he will cast you off forever.

since you hate instruction, and throw my words behind you?

Hear, heavens, and listen, earth; for Yahweh has spoken: “I have nourished and brought up children and they have rebelled against me.

“I have struck your children in vain. They received no correction. Your own sword has devoured your prophets, like a destroying lion.

“Isn’t my word like fire?” says Yahweh; “and like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces?

if the wicked restore the pledge, give again that which he had taken by robbery, walk in the statutes of life, committing no iniquity; he will surely live. He will not die.

I will reach out my hand and strike Egypt with all my wonders which I will do among them, and after that he will let you go.

that the land not vomit you out also, when you defile it, as it vomited out the nation that was before you.

It shall be, if you shall forget Yahweh your God, and walk after other gods, and serve them and worship them, I testify against you today that you shall surely perish.

and Yahweh’s anger be kindled against you, and he shut up the sky so that there is no rain, and the land doesn’t yield its fruit; and you perish quickly from off the good land which Yahweh gives you.

I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. Therefore choose life, that you may live, you and your descendants,

(In earlier times in Israel, when a man went to inquire of God, he said, “Come! Let’s go to the seer;” for he who is now called a prophet was before called a seer.)

then I will cut off Israel out of the land which I have given them; and I will cast this house, which I have made holy for my name, out of my sight; and Israel will be a proverb and a byword among all peoples.

“See how Ahab humbles himself before me? Because he humbles himself before me, I will not bring the evil in his days; but I will bring the evil on his house in his son’s day.”

until Yahweh removed Israel out of his sight, as he said by all his servants the prophets. So Israel was carried away out of their own land to Assyria to this day.

“But they and our fathers behaved proudly, hardened their neck, didn’t listen to your commandments,

Yes, when they had made themselves a molded calf, and said, ‘This is your God who brought you up out of Egypt,’ and had committed awful blasphemies;

He who keeps the commandment keeps his soul, but he who is contemptuous in his ways shall die.

Behold, I have today set you over the nations and over the kingdoms, to uproot and to tear down, to destroy and to overthrow, to build and to plant.”

“Be astonished, you heavens, at this and be horribly afraid. Be very desolate,” says Yahweh.

Hear, earth! Behold, I will bring evil on this people, even the fruit of their thoughts, because they have not listened to my words; and as for my law, they have rejected it.

You have done evil more than your fathers, for behold, you each walk after the stubbornness of his evil heart, so that you don’t listen to me.

“Now therefore, speak to the men of Judah, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, saying, ‘Yahweh says: “Behold, I frame evil against you, and devise a plan against you. Everyone return from his evil way now, and amend your ways and your doings.” ’

who performed signs and wonders in the land of Egypt, even to this day, both in Israel and among other men; and made yourself a name, as it is today;

has walked in my statutes, and has kept my ordinances, to deal truly; he is just, he shall surely live,” says the Lord Yahweh.

“You, his son, Belshazzar, have not humbled your heart, though you knew all this,

“Now, Lord our God, who has brought your people out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand, and have gotten yourself renown, as it is today; we have sinned. We have done wickedly.

I have also spoken to the prophets, and I have multiplied visions; and by the ministry of the prophets I have used parables.

But they refused to listen, and turned their backs, and stopped their ears, that they might not hear.

By reason of the exceeding greatness of the revelations, that I should not be exalted excessively, a thorn in the flesh was given to me: a messenger of Satan to torment me, that I should not be exalted excessively.

And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God;

Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time,

You shall therefore keep my statutes and my ordinances, which if a man does, he shall live in them. I am Yahweh.

Now, Israel, listen to the statutes and to the ordinances which I teach you, to do them; that you may live, and go in and possess the land which Yahweh, the God of your fathers, gives you.

What great nation is there that has statutes and ordinances so righteous as all this law which I set before you today?

Yahweh will send on you cursing, confusion, and rebuke in all that you put your hand to do, until you are destroyed and until you perish quickly, because of the evil of your doings, by which you have forsaken me.

Yahweh rooted them out of their land in anger, in wrath, and in great indignation, and thrust them into another land, as it is today.”

when you disobey the covenant of Yahweh your God, which he commanded you, and go and serve other gods, and bow down yourselves to them. Then Yahweh’s anger will be kindled against you, and you will perish quickly from off the good land which he has given to you.”

for when Jezebel cut off Yahweh’s prophets, Obadiah took one hundred prophets, and hid them by fifty in a cave, and fed them with bread and water.)

He said, “I have been very jealous for Yahweh, the God of Armies; for the children of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away.”

because your heart was tender, and you humbled yourself before Yahweh, when you heard what I spoke against this place, and against its inhabitants, that they should become a desolation and a curse, and have torn your clothes, and wept before me; I also have heard you,’ says Yahweh.

and showed signs and wonders against Pharaoh, and against all his servants, and against all the people of his land; for you knew that they dealt proudly against them, and made a name for yourself, as it is today.

“Nevertheless they were disobedient, and rebelled against you, cast your law behind their back, killed your prophets that testified against them to turn them again to you, and they committed awful blasphemies.

Keep my commandments and live! Guard my teaching as the apple of your eye.

Then I said, “Lord, how long?” He answered, “Until cities are waste without inhabitant, houses without man, the land becomes utterly waste,

Therefore Yahweh, the God of Armies says, “Because you speak this word, behold, I will make my words in your mouth fire, and this people wood, and it will devour them.

To whom should I speak and testify, that they may hear? Behold, their ear is uncircumcised, and they can’t listen. Behold, Yahweh’s word has become a reproach to them. They have no delight in it.

Since the day that your fathers came out of the land of Egypt to this day, I have sent to you all my servants the prophets, daily rising up early and sending them.

They have turned back to the iniquities of their forefathers, who refused to hear my words. They have gone after other gods to serve them. The house of Israel and the house of Judah have broken my covenant which I made with their fathers.

Say to the king and to the queen mother, “Humble yourselves. Sit down, for your crowns have come down, even the crown of your glory.

O earth, earth, earth, hear Yahweh’s word!

“Behold, siege ramps have come to the city to take it. The city is given into the hand of the Chaldeans who fight against it, because of the sword, of the famine, and of the pestilence. What you have spoken has happened. Behold, you see it.

I have sent also to you all my servants the prophets, rising up early and sending them, saying, ‘Every one of you must return now from his evil way, amend your doings, and don’t go after other gods to serve them, then you will dwell in the land which I have given to you and to your fathers:’ but you have not inclined your ear, nor listened to me.

Thus Yahweh could no longer bear it, because of the evil of your doings, and because of the abominations which you have committed. Therefore your land has become a desolation, and an astonishment, and a curse, without inhabitant, as it is today.

I will make the land a desolation and an astonishment. The pride of her power will cease. The mountains of Israel will be desolate, so that no one will pass through.

therefore, you mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Lord Yahweh: The Lord Yahweh says to the mountains and to the hills, to the watercourses and to the valleys, to the desolate wastes and to the cities that are forsaken, which have become a prey and derision to the residue of the nations that are all around;

I know Ephraim, and Israel is not hidden from me; for now, Ephraim, you have played the prostitute. Israel is defiled.

Hear, you peoples, all of you. Listen, O earth, and all that is therein: and let the Lord Yahweh be witness against you, the Lord from his holy temple.

“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets, and stones those who are sent to her! How often I would have gathered your children together, even as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you would not!

They will fall by the edge of the sword, and will be led captive into all the nations. Jerusalem will be trampled down by the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled.

But the chief priests conspired to put Lazarus to death also,

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.

Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he will exalt you.

Yet many years you put up with them, and testified against them by your Spirit through your prophets. Yet they would not listen. Therefore you gave them into the hand of the peoples of the lands.

He who is often rebuked and stiffens his neck will be destroyed suddenly, with no remedy.

But they didn’t listen or turn their ear, but walked in their own counsels and in the stubbornness of their evil heart, and went backward, and not forward.

then Azariah the son of Hoshaiah, Johanan the son of Kareah, and all the proud men spoke, saying to Jeremiah, “You speak falsely. Yahweh our God has not sent you to say, ‘You shall not go into Egypt to live there;’

Moses and Aaron went in to Pharaoh, and said to him, “This is what Yahweh, the God of the Hebrews, says: ‘How long will you refuse to humble yourself before me? Let my people go, that they may serve me.

Now I know that Yahweh is greater than all gods because of the way that they treated people arrogantly.”

I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that you will soon utterly perish from off the land which you go over the Jordan to possess it. You will not prolong your days on it, but will utterly be destroyed.

It will happen, when many evils and troubles have come on them, that this song will testify before them as a witness; for it will not be forgotten out of the mouths of their descendants; for I know their ways and what they are doing today, before I have brought them into the land which I promised them.”

Yet Yahweh testified to Israel, and to Judah, by every prophet, and every seer, saying, “Turn from your evil ways, and keep my commandments and my statutes, according to all the law which I commanded your fathers, and which I sent to you by my servants the prophets.”

Yet he sent prophets to them, to bring them again to Yahweh, and they testified against them; but they would not listen.

He also rebelled against king Nebuchadnezzar, who had made him swear by God; but he stiffened his neck, and hardened his heart against turning to Yahweh, the God of Israel.

Yahweh, the God of their fathers, sent to them by his messengers, rising up early and sending, because he had compassion on his people, and on his dwelling place;

In those days I saw some men treading wine presses on the Sabbath in Judah, bringing in sheaves, and loading donkeys; also with wine, grapes, figs, and all kinds of burdens, which they brought into Jerusalem on the Sabbath day; and I testified against them in the day in which they sold food.

You have rebuked the proud who are cursed, who wander from your commandments.

But they rebelled and grieved his Holy Spirit. Therefore he turned and became their enemy, and he himself fought against them.

Yet they didn’t listen to me or incline their ear, but made their neck stiff. They did worse than their fathers.

Yet they didn’t obey, nor turn their ear, but everyone walked in the stubbornness of their evil heart. Therefore I brought on them all the words of this covenant, which I commanded them to do, but they didn’t do them.’ ”

But they didn’t listen. They didn’t turn their ear, but made their neck stiff, that they might not hear, and might not receive instruction.

“Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel says, ‘Behold, I will bring on this city and on all its towns all the evil that I have pronounced against it, because they have made their neck stiff, that they may not hear my words.’ ”

They are not humbled even to this day, neither have they feared, nor walked in my law, nor in my statutes, that I set before you and before your fathers.’

I gave them my statutes, and showed them my ordinances, which if a man does, he will live in them.

But when his heart was lifted up, and his spirit was hardened so that he dealt proudly, he was deposed from his kingly throne, and they took his glory from him.

Therefore I have cut them to pieces with the prophets; I killed them with the words of my mouth. Your judgments are like a flash of lightning.

He said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but one, that is, God. But if you want to enter into life, keep the commandments.”

He said to him, “You have answered correctly. Do this, and you will live.”

But when some were hardened and disobedient, speaking evil of the Way before the multitude, he departed from them, and separated the disciples, reasoning daily in the school of Tyrannus.

For Moses writes about the righteousness of the law, “The one who does them will live by them.”

The law is not of faith, but, “The man who does them will live by them.”