Category
VERSES ABOUT NATURE
Think about this: God created everything. The earth, the sky, the whole world—it all belongs to Him. He made it all, just like Exodus 20:11 says: "For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it." He created it all perfectly, and He deserves all the praise for the amazing things He's done.
You know, we should really stand in awe of God and give Him glory. The time is coming when He will judge the world, so let's worship the One who made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and the springs of water.
When you're out enjoying nature – at the beach, in the mountains, or just looking at a beautiful tree – remember who made it all so beautiful and perfect. Let's give God all the glory He deserves.
An upright man has thought for the life of his beast, but the hearts of evil-doers are cruel.
And God said, Let us make man in our image, like us: and let him have rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over the cattle and over all the earth and over every living thing which goes flat on the earth.
He makes the grass come up for the cattle, and plants for the use of man; so that bread may come out of the earth;
But put now a question to the beasts, and get teaching from them; or to the birds of the heaven, and they will make it clear to you;Or to the things which go flat on the earth, and they will give you wisdom; and the fishes of the sea will give you news of it.Who does not see by all these that the hand of the Lord has done this?In whose hand is the soul of every living thing, and the breath of all flesh of man.
See the birds of heaven; they do not put seeds in the earth, they do not get in grain, or put it in store-houses; and your Father in heaven gives them food. Are you not of much more value than they?
Take care to have knowledge about the condition of your flocks, looking well after your herds;
If you see the ass of one who has no love for you bent down to the earth under the weight which is put on it, you are to come to its help, even against your desire.
Your righteousness is like the mountains of God; your judging is like the great deep; O Lord, you give life to man and beast.
But the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God; on that day you are to do no work, you or your son or your daughter, your man-servant or your woman-servant, your cattle or the man from a strange country who is living among you:
Truly, I will make my agreement with you and with your seed after you,And with every living thing with you, all birds and cattle and every beast of the earth which comes out of the ark with you.
The wolf and the lamb will take their food together, and the lion will make a meal of grass like the ox: but dust will be the snake's food. There will be no cause of pain or destruction in all my holy mountain, says the Lord.
Go to the ant, you hater of work; give thought to her ways and be wise:Having no chief, overseer, or ruler,She gets her meat in the summer, storing up food at the time of the grain-cutting.
Are not five sparrows given in exchange for two farthings? and God has every one of them in mind.
O Lord, how great is the number of your works! in wisdom you have made them all; the earth is full of the things you have made.
And in that day I will make an agreement for them with the beasts of the field and the birds of heaven and the things which go low on the earth; I will put an end to the bow and the sword and war in all the land, and will make them take their rest in peace.
And am I not to have mercy on Nineveh, that great town, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons without the power of judging between right and left, as well as much cattle?
If by chance you see a place which a bird has made for itself in a tree or on the earth, with young ones or eggs, and the mother bird seated on the young ones or on the eggs, do not take the mother bird with the young:See that you let the mother bird go, but the young ones you may take; so it will be well for you and your life will be long.
For six days do your work, and on the seventh day keep the Sabbath; so that your ox and your ass may have rest, together with the son of your servant and the man from a strange land living among you.
And the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to do work in it and take care of it.
And the wolf will be living with the lamb, and the leopard will take his rest with the young goat; and the lion will take grass for food like the ox; and the young lion will go with the young ones of the herd; and a little child will be their guide.
And for your cattle and the beasts on the land; all the natural increase of the land will be for food.
Who gives in the evening the meat he is searching for, when his young ones are crying to God; when the young lions with loud noise go wandering after their food?
But in the seventh year let the land have a rest and be unplanted; so that the poor may have food from it: and let the beasts of the field take the rest. Do the same with your vine-gardens and your olive-trees.
You may not have as food anything which has come to a natural death; the man from another country who is living with you may take it for food, or you may get a price for it from one of another nation; for you are a holy people to the Lord your God. The young goat is not to be cooked in its mother's milk.
For every beast of the woodland is mine, and the cattle on a thousand hills.I see all the birds of the mountains, and the beasts of the field are mine.
He will give food to his flock like a keeper of sheep; with his arm he will get it together, and will take up the lambs on his breast, gently guiding those which are with young.
You have made him ruler over the works of your hands; you have put all things under his feet;All sheep and oxen, and all the beasts of the field;The birds of the air and the fish of the sea, and whatever goes through the deep waters of the seas.
And he said to them, Which of you, whose ox or ass has got into a water-hole, will not straight away get him out on the Sabbath?
Will the ox of the mountains be your servant? or is his night's resting-place by your food-store?Will he be pulling your plough with cords, turning up the valleys after you?Will you put your faith in him, because his strength is great? will you give the fruit of your work into his care?Will you be looking for him to come back, and get in your seed to the crushing-floor?
The beasts of the field will give me honour, the jackals and the ostriches: because I send out waters in the waste land, and rivers in the dry country, to give drink to the people whom I have taken for myself:
And came to him and put clean linen round his wounds, with oil and wine; and he put him on his beast and took him to a house and took care of him.
For it says in the law of Moses, It is not right to keep the ox from taking the grain when he is crushing it. Is it for the oxen that God is giving orders?
I will not take up a cause against you because of your offerings, or because of your burned offerings, which are ever before me.I will take no ox out of your house, or he-goats from your flocks;
Because the fate of the sons of men and the fate of the beasts is the same. As is the death of one so is the death of the other, and all have one spirit. Man is not higher than the beasts; because all is to no purpose.
The arrowsnake will make her hole and put her eggs there, and get her young together under her shade: there the hawks will come together by twos.
And he said to them, Which of you, having a sheep, if it gets into a hole on the Sabbath day, will not put out a helping hand and get it back?Of how much more value is a man than a sheep! For this reason it is right to do good on the Sabbath day.
By his hand the heaven is covered with clouds and rain is stored up for the earth; he makes the grass tall on the mountains.
Do you go after food for the she-lion, or get meat so that the young lions may have enough,
If a man makes a hole in the earth without covering it up, and an ox or an ass dropping into it comes to its death;The owner of the hole is responsible; he will have to make payment to their owner, but the dead beast will be his.
I will give them good grass-land for their food, and their safe place will be the mountains of the high place of Israel: there they will take their rest in a good place, and on fat grass-land they will take their food on the mountains of Israel.
And from the earth the Lord God made every beast of the field and every bird of the air, and took them to the man to see what names he would give them: and whatever name he gave to any living thing, that was its name.
If I had need of food, I would not give you word of it; for the earth is mine and all its wealth.
Let your mouth be open for those who have no voice, in the cause of those who are ready for death.
Give thought to the ravens; they do not put seeds into the earth, or get together grain; they have no store-houses or buildings; and God gives them their food: of how much greater value are you than the birds!
And God gave them his blessing and said to them, Be fertile and have increase, and make the earth full and be masters of it; be rulers over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing moving on the earth.
And I will let you be in the waste land, you and all the fish of your streams: you will go down on the face of the land; you will not be taken up or put to rest in the earth; I have given you for food to the beasts of the field and the birds of the heaven.
There will be no cause of pain or destruction in all my holy mountain: for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the sea is covered by the waters.
How good is your loving mercy, O God! the children of men take cover under the shade of your wings.
Who gives us more knowledge than the beasts of the earth, and makes us wiser than the birds of the heaven?
But those who are waiting for the Lord will have new strength; they will get wings like eagles: running, they will not be tired, and walking, they will have no weariness.
The little birds have places for themselves, where they may put their young, even your altars, O Lord of armies, my King and my God.
And God kept Noah in mind, and all the living things and the cattle which were with him in the ark: and God sent a wind over the earth, and the waters went down.
And the angel of the Lord said to him, Why have you given your ass blows these three times? See, I have come out against you to keep you back, because your purpose is not pleasing to me.And the ass saw me, turning to one side from me three times: if she had not gone to one side, I would certainly have put you to death and kept her safe.
And you will take with you into the ark two of every sort of living thing, and keep them safe with you; they will be male and female.Two of every sort of bird and cattle and of every sort of living thing which goes on the earth will you take with you to keep them from destruction.
If you see your brother's ox or his ass falling down on the road, do not go by without giving him help in lifting it up again.
In the same way with your oxen and your sheep: for seven days let the young one be with its mother; on the eighth day give it to me.
By his hand the heaven is covered with clouds and rain is stored up for the earth; he makes the grass tall on the mountains.He gives food to every beast, and to the young ravens in answer to their cry.
Say to the children of Israel: These are the living things which you may have for food among all the beasts on the earth.You may have as food any beast which has a division in the horn of its foot, and whose food comes back into its mouth to be crushed again.
If you see your brother's ox or his sheep wandering, do not go by without helping, but take them back to your brother.
There are four things which are little on the earth, but they are very wise:The ants are a people not strong, but they put by a store of food in the summer;
The water of the stream will be your drink, and by my orders the ravens will give you food there.
Of every clean beast you will take seven males and seven females, and of the beasts which are not clean, two, the male and his female;And of the birds of the air, seven males and seven females, so that their seed may still be living on the face of the earth.
You are to put on one side for the Lord every mother's first male child, the first-fruit of her body, and the first young one of every beast; every male is holy to the Lord.
But the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God; on that day do no work, you or your son or your daughter, or your man-servant or your woman-servant, or your ox or your ass or any of your cattle, or the man from a strange country who is living among you; so that your man-servant and your woman-servant may have rest as well as you.
And she had her first son; and folding him in linen, she put him to rest in the place where the cattle had their food, because there was no room for them in the house.
What is man, that you keep him in mind? the son of man, that you take him into account?For you have made him only a little lower than the gods, crowning him with glory and honour.You have made him ruler over the works of your hands; you have put all things under his feet;All sheep and oxen, and all the beasts of the field;The birds of the air and the fish of the sea, and whatever goes through the deep waters of the seas.
Every living and moving thing will be food for you; I give them all to you as before I gave you all green things.But flesh with the life-blood in it you may not take for food.
Do you give strength to the horse? is it by your hand that his neck is clothed with power?Is it through you that he is shaking like a locust, in the pride of his loud-sounding breath?He is stamping with joy in the valley; he makes sport of fear.In his strength he goes out against the arms of war, turning not away from the sword.The bow is sounding against him; he sees the shining point of spear and arrow.Shaking with passion, he is biting the earth; he is not able to keep quiet at the sound of the horn;When it comes to his ears he says, Aha! He is smelling the fight from far off, and hearing the thunder of the captains, and the war-cries.
Keep my laws. Do not let your cattle have offspring by those of a different sort; do not put mixed seed into your field; do not put on a robe made of two sorts of cloth.
There are three things whose steps are good to see, even four whose goings are fair:The lion, which is strongest among beasts, not turning from his way for any;The war-horse, and the he-goat, and the king when his army is with him.
Who is certain that the spirit of the sons of men goes up to heaven, or that the spirit of the beasts goes down to the earth?
And God said, Let the earth give birth to all sorts of living things, cattle and all things moving on the earth, and beasts of the earth after their sort: and it was so.
For the blood is the life of all flesh: and so I have said to the children of Israel, You may not take any sort of blood as food, and any man who does so will be cut of.
He who puts an ox to death puts a man to death; he who makes an offering of a lamb puts a dog to death; he who makes a meal offering makes an offering of pig's blood; he who makes an offering of perfumes for a sign gives worship to an image: as they have gone after their desires, and their soul takes pleasure in their disgusting things;
But put now a question to the beasts, and get teaching from them; or to the birds of the heaven, and they will make it clear to you;
He makes the grass come up for the cattle, and plants for the use of man; so that bread may come out of the earth;And wine to make glad the heart of man, and oil to make his face shining, and bread giving strength to his heart.
For see, I am making a new heaven and a new earth: and the past things will be gone completely out of mind.
Is the wing of the ostrich feeble, or is it because she has no feathers,That she puts her eggs on the earth, warming them in the dust,Without a thought that they may be crushed by the foot, and broken by the beasts of the field?She is cruel to her young ones, as if they were not hers; her work is to no purpose; she has no fear.For God has taken wisdom from her mind, and given her no measure of knowledge.When she is shaking her wings on high, she makes sport of the horse and of him who is seated on him.
The birds of the air have their resting-places by them, and make their song among the branches.
Like the cattle which go down into the valley, they went without falling, the spirit of the Lord guiding them: so you went before your people, to make yourself a great name.