“And you, my son Solomon, learn to know your father’s God. Serve the Lord wholeheartedly and willingly because he searches every heart and understands every thought ⌞we have⌟. If you dedicate your life to serving him, he will accept you. But if you abandon him, he will reject you from then on.
So Edom rebelled against Judah’s rule and is still independent today. At the same time Edom rebelled, Libnah rebelled because Jehoram had abandoned the Lord God of his ancestors.
He sacrificed to the gods of Damascus, the gods who had defeated him. He thought, “The gods of the kings of Aram are helping them. I’ll sacrifice to them so that they will help me.” But they ruined him and all Israel.
“How horrible it will be for a nation that sins. ⌞Its⌟ people are loaded down with guilt. They are descendants of evildoers and destructive children. They have abandoned the Lord. They have despised the Holy One of Israel. They have turned their backs on him.
The sinners in Zion are terrified. Trembling seizes the ungodly. Can any of us live through a fire that destroys? Can any of us live through a fire that burns forever?
This is what the Lord says: Where are your mother’s divorce papers? Did I give her any to get rid of her? To which of my creditors did I sell you? You were sold because of your sins. I got rid of your mother because of your rebellion.
But all of you light fires and arm yourselves with flaming torches. So walk in your own light and among the torches you have lit. This is what you will receive from me: You will be tormented.
They look for me every day and want to know my ways. They act as if they were a nation that has done what is right and as if they haven’t disregarded God’s judgment ⌞on them⌟. They ask me for just decrees. They want God to be near them.
We’ve all become unclean, and all our righteous acts are like permanently stained rags. All of us shrivel like leaves, and our sins carry us away like the wind.
You have abandoned the Lord and forgotten my holy mountain. You have prepared a table for the god of good fortune and offered cups full of spiced wine to the goddess of destiny.
People make themselves holy and prepare themselves for their garden rituals. They go into the garden and devour pork, disgusting things, and mice. “They will come to an end at the same time,” declares the Lord.
Then they will go out and look at the corpses of those who have rebelled against me. The worms that eat them will not die. The fire that burns them will not go out. All humanity will be disgusted by them.
O Lord, the Hope of Israel, all who abandon you will be put to shame. Those who turn away from you will be written in dust, because they abandon the Lord, the fountain of life-giving water.
I will take away from Judah those who are left, those who were determined to go to live in Egypt. They will die in Egypt. All of them, from the least important to the most important, will die in wars or be brought to an end by famines. They will become something cursed, ridiculed, and disgraced.
Wise people will understand these things. A person with insight will recognize them. The Lord’s ways are right. Righteous people live by them. Rebellious people stumble over them.
When people say, “Everything is safe and sound!” destruction will suddenly strike them. It will be as sudden as labor pains come to a pregnant woman. They won’t be able to escape.
By God’s word, the present heaven and earth are designated to be burned. They are being kept until the day ungodly people will be judged and destroyed.
But cowardly, unfaithful, and detestable people, murderers, sexual sinners, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars will find themselves in the fiery lake of burning sulfur. This is the second death.”