Isaiah 10

Too bad for crooked judges
Who write their crooked laws.
2You rob justice from people who need it most.
You steal their rights away.
You make money from humbled widows,
And target orphans like they’re prey.
3What will you do when you face judgment,
When trouble comes calling, from far away?
Where will you go for help?
Where will you hide your money? [1]
4How can you avoid getting arrested?
How will you miss getting killed?
Even after that happens
The LORD will still be angry,
Still on the attack.

Too bad for Assyria,
Even though they’re the club I’m using to punish nations.
6I send Assyrians to war against an ungodly nation. [2]
They’ll punish the people who made me so angry,
Steal from them whatever they want,
And stomp them like walking on dirt.
7But this isn’t what their king has in mind.
He has another agenda.
He wants to destroy.
He wants to conquer the nations.
8He brags:
“Kings command soldiers in my army. [3]
9We captured one city kingdom after another:
Calno and Carchemish,
Hamath and Arpad,
Samaria and Damascus.
10I’ve overpowered the idols and gods
Of kingdoms greater than Jerusalem and Samaria.
11What’s going to stop me
From doing to Jerusalem and her gods
What I did to Samaria and her gods?”

This Assyrian king brags:
“I alone have conquered these nations.
I did it with my strength, wisdom, and insight.
I erased their national boundaries.
I took their treasures.
And like a bull in a palace,
I knocked kings off their thrones.
14I took their wealth,
Cleaning out their nest eggs
Like stealing eggs from a nest.
Not one bird flapped a feather,
Chirped, or peeped.
No protest but frozen silence.”

What’s more important?
The ax or the one who holds it?
Can a defensive club lift the person who carries it?
Can a wooden staff do that, too? [5]
16So, here’s what’s going to happen.
The LORD of everyone
Is going to plague the Assyrian army
With a sickness that will sap their strength
and leave them skinny and weak. [6]
Assyrian’s glory will go up in flames.
17God is Israel’s Guiding Light.
But that Holy Light
Is going to torch their enemies
They’ll burn like thorns in a brushfire.
18He’ll scorch the earth where their forests grew.
Their pride will die, and their lives will follow.
He’ll destroy their bodies and leave their shells.
19So little of their forests will survive the fires
That a child can count the trees.

When that day comes,
Israel’s survivors, descendants of Jacob,
Will no longer need allies who hurt them.
For in God, they’ll trust.
And in Israel’s Holy LORD
They’ll find all they need.
21Yet only part of the nation will survive,
And return to their great God.
22Israel was once a huge nation
With a lot of people,
Like sand on a beach.
But only some survive to come back home.
God defended goodness
By destroying evil among them.
23It’s coming. The LORD God of all is bringing it.
He said he would decimate the Promised Land,
He’s going to do it.

This is from the Lord, the God of everyone:
“My dear children in Jerusalem,
Don’t fear the Assyrians.
Don’t be intimidated when they hit you with sticks
Like the Egyptians did to your ancestors.
25Soon, you’ll give me no reason for anger.
Then, I’ll turn my anger on them.
26The LORD of all the world will crack a whip.
He’ll knock them down like he did the Midianites
At the famous Rock of Oreb, [7]
Or like Egyptians he drowned in the sea. [8]
27When that happens,
He’ll lift a weight from your shoulders,
The weight of oppression and slavery.

On a march to Jerusalem,
He [9] came to Aiath [10] town.
He passed through the city of Migron.
He stockpiled supplies at Michmash,
29Then moved on through the pass,
And camped a night at Geba.
Neighbors in Ramah were terrified to hear it.
People in Gibeah, King Saul’s hometown,
Took off and ran for their lives.
30Scream if you live in Gallim.
Listen if you live in Laishah.
Echo the screams if you live in Anathoth.
Answer the painful cry.
31People in Madmenah are already running.
Gebim is on the run, too.
32When he reaches the city of Nob he’ll stop
And shake a fist at Jerusalem’s hill.
33Watch what happens next
When the LORD of all the earth arrives.
He’s going to cut them down
Like chopping wood.
Their tallest trees will fall.
34He’ll swing his ax through their forests,
Those towering cedars of Lebanon.
Every tree snaps and every tree falls,
By the ax of the Almighty One. [11]