Proverbs 6:16The MessageHere are six things God hates, and one more that he loathes with a passion: eyes that are arrogant, a tongue that lies, hands that murder the innocent, a heart that hatches evil plots, feet that race down a wicked track, a mouth that lies under oath, a troublemaker in the family. See the chapter |
There are four small creatures, wisest of the wise they are— ants—frail as they are, get plenty of food in for the winter; marmots—vulnerable as they are, manage to arrange for rock-solid homes; locusts—leaderless insects, yet they strip the field like an army regiment; lizards—easy enough to catch, but they sneak past vigilant palace guards.
God’s Message: “Because of the three great sins of Edom —make that four—I’m not putting up with her any longer. She hunts down her brother to murder him. She has no pity, she has no heart. Her anger rampages day and night. Her meanness never takes a timeout. For that, I’m burning down her capital, Teman, burning up the forts of Bozrah.”
God’s Message: “Because of the three great sins of Damascus —make that four—I’m not putting up with her any longer. She pounded Gilead to a pulp, pounded her senseless with iron hammers and mauls. For that, I’m setting the palace of Hazael on fire. I’m torching Ben-hadad’s forts. I’m going to smash the Damascus gates and banish the crime king who lives in Sin Valley, the vice boss who gives orders from Paradise Palace. The people of the land will be sent back to where they came from—to Kir.” God’s Decree.
God’s Message: “Because of the three great sins of Gaza —make that four—I’m not putting up with her any longer. She deported whole towns and then sold the people to Edom. For that, I’m burning down the walls of Gaza, burning up all her forts. I’ll banish the crime king from Ashdod, the vice boss from Ashkelon. I’ll raise my fist against Ekron, and what’s left of the Philistines will die.” God’s Decree.
God’s Message: “Because of the three great sins of Moab —make that four—I’m not putting up with her any longer. She violated the corpse of Edom’s king, burning it to cinders. For that, I’m burning down Moab, burning down the forts of Kerioth. Moab will die in the shouting, go out in the blare of war trumpets. I’ll remove the king from the center and kill all his princes with him.” God’s Decree.
God’s Message: “Because of the three great sins of Judah —make that four—I’m not putting up with them any longer. They rejected God’s revelation, refused to keep my commands. But they swallowed the same old lies that got their ancestors onto dead-end roads. For that, I’m burning down Judah, burning down all the forts of Jerusalem.”
God’s Message: “Because of the three great sins of Israel —make that four—I’m not putting up with them any longer. They buy and sell upstanding people. People for them are only things—ways of making money. They’d sell a poor man for a pair of shoes. They’d sell their own grandmother! They grind the penniless into the dirt, shove the luckless into the ditch. Everyone and his brother sleeps with the ‘sacred whore’— a sacrilege against my Holy Name. Stuff they’ve extorted from the poor is piled up at the shrine of their god, While they sit around drinking wine they’ve conned from their victims.