Joel 3

¹ For behold, in those days and at that time,
when I restore the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem,

² I will gather all the nations
and bring them down to the Valley of Jehoshaphat.
I will enter into judgment with them there
concerning my people and my inheritance Israel,
whom they have scattered among the nations.
They divided up my land.

³ They cast lots for my people;
they traded a boy for a prostitute
and sold a girl for wine, and drank it.

⁴ What are you to me, Tyre and Sidon
and all the regions of Philistia?
Are you paying me back for something?
If you are paying me back,
I will swiftly and speedily return
your payment on your own heads.

⁵ For you have taken my silver and my gold
and carried my finest treasures into your temples.

⁶ You have sold the people of Judah and Jerusalem
to the Greeks,
removing them far from their own border.

⁷ Behold, I am going to rouse them
from the place where you have sold them,
and I will return your payment on your own heads.

⁸ I will sell your sons and your daughters
into the hand of the people of Judah,
and they will sell them to the Sabeans,
to a nation far away,
for the LORD has spoken.

⁹ Proclaim this among the nations:
Consecrate for war!
Rouse the warriors!
Let all the men of war draw near; let them come up.

¹⁰ Beat your plowshares into swords
and your pruning hooks into spears.
Let the weak say, "I am a warrior!"

¹¹ Hurry and come,
all you surrounding nations,
and gather yourselves there.
Bring down your warriors, O LORD.

¹² Let the nations be roused
and come up to the Valley of Jehoshaphat,
for there I will sit to judge
all the surrounding nations.

¹³ Put in the sickle,
for the harvest is ripe.
Come, trample,
for the winepress is full;
the vats overflow,
for their evil is great.

¹⁴ Multitudes, multitudes
in the valley of decision!
For the day of the LORD is near
in the valley of decision.

¹⁵ The sun and moon grow dark,
and the stars withdraw their brightness.

¹⁶ The LORD roars from Zion
and thunders from Jerusalem,
and the heavens and the earth quake.
But the LORD is a refuge for his people,
a stronghold for the people of Israel.

¹⁷ Then you will know that I am the LORD your God,
dwelling in Zion, my holy mountain.
Jerusalem will be holy,
and strangers will never again pass through her.

¹⁸ And it will come about in that day
that the mountains will drip with sweet wine,
the hills will flow with milk,
and all the streambeds of Judah will flow with water.
A fountain will go out from the house of the LORD
and will water the Valley of Shittim.

¹⁹ Egypt will become a desolation,
and Edom a desolate wilderness,
because of the violence done to the people of Judah,
in whose land they shed innocent blood.

²⁰ But Judah will be inhabited forever,
and Jerusalem to all generations.

²¹ I will avenge their blood,
blood I have not yet avenged,
for the LORD dwells in Zion.