“People will run from fear, but they will fall into the pits. Anyone who climbs out of the pits will be caught in the traps. I will bring the year of punishment to Moab,” says the Lord.
The rest of them ran away to the city of Aphek, where a city wall fell on twenty-seven thousand of them. Ben-Hadad also ran away to the city and hid in a room.
How will you explain the things you have done? What will you do when your destruction comes from far away? Where will you run for help? Where will you hide your riches then?
Anyone who tries to escape from the sound of terror will fall into a hole. Anyone who climbs out of the hole will be caught in a trap. The clouds in the sky will pour out rain, and the foundations of the earth will shake.
“I will soon send for many fishermen to come to this land,” says the Lord. “And they will catch the people of Judah. After that, I will send for many hunters to come to this land. And they will hunt the people of Judah on every mountain and hill and in the cracks of the rocks.
“So they will be in danger. They will be forced into darkness where they will be defeated. I will bring disaster on them in the year I punish them,” says the Lord.
The hired soldiers in Egypt’s army are like fat calves, because even they all turn and run away together; they do not stand strong against the attack. Their time of destruction is coming; they will soon be punished.
You people living in the town of Dedan, run away and hide in deep caves, because I will bring disaster on the people of Esau. It is time for me to punish them.
Kill all the young men in Babylon; let them be killed like animals. How terrible it will be for them, because the time has come for their defeat; it is time for them to be punished.
They should be ashamed of the terrible way they act, but they are not ashamed at all. They don’t even know how to blush about their sins. So they will fall, along with everyone else. They will be thrown to the ground when I punish them, says the Lord.
The time of punishment has come, the time to pay for sins. Let Israel know this: You think the prophet is a fool, and you say the spiritual person is crazy. You have sinned very much, and your hatred is great.
It will be like someone who runs from a lion and meets a bear, or like someone who goes into his house and puts his hand on the wall, and then is bitten by a snake.
Even the best of them is like a thornbush; the most honest of them is worse than a prickly plant. The day that your watchmen warned you about has come. Now they will be confused.