אֲנִי

This carefree city that dwells securely, that thinks to herself: “I am it, and there is none besides me,” what a ruin she has become, a resting place for beasts. Everyone who passes by her hisses and shakes his fist.

Haggai, the messenger of the LORD, delivered the message of the LORD to the people: “I am with you,” declares the LORD.

But now be strong, O Zerubbabel, declares the LORD. Be strong, O Joshua son of Jehozadak, the high priest. And be strong, all you people of the land, declares the LORD. Work! For I am with you, declares the LORD of Hosts.

For this is what the LORD of Hosts says: “Once more, in a little while, I will shake the heavens and the earth, the sea and the dry land.

“Tell Zerubbabel governor of Judah that I am about to shake the heavens and the earth:

“What are these, my lord?” I asked. And the angel who was speaking with me replied, “I will show you what they are.”

…but I am fiercely angry with the nations that are at ease. For I was a little angry, but they have added to the calamity.’

For I will be a wall of fire around it, declares the LORD, and I will be the glory within it.’”

“What do you see?” asked the angel. “I see a flying scroll,” I replied, “twenty cubits long and ten cubits wide.”

“Ask all the people of the land and the priests, ‘When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months for these seventy years, was it really for Me that you fasted?

I will bring them back to dwell in Jerusalem, where they will be My people, and I will be their faithful and righteous God.”

But now I will not treat the remnant of this people as I did in the past,” declares the LORD of Hosts.

…and the residents of one city will go to another, saying: ‘Let us go at once to plead before the LORD and to seek the LORD of Hosts. I myself am going.’

I will strengthen the house of Judah and save the house of Joseph. I will restore them because I have compassion on them, and they will be as though I had not rejected them. For I am the LORD their God, and I will answer them.

This third I will bring through the fire; I will refine them like silver and test them like gold. They will call on My name, and I will answer them. I will say, ‘They are My people,’ and they will say, ‘The LORD is our God.’”

Though Edom may say, “We have been devastated, but we will rebuild the ruins,” this is what the LORD of Hosts says: “They may build, but I will demolish. They will be called the Land of Wickedness, and a people with whom the LORD is indignant forever.

“A son honors his father, and a servant his master. But if I am a father, where is My honor? And if I am a master, where is your fear of Me?” says the LORD of Hosts to you priests who despise My name. “But you ask, ‘How have we despised Your name?’

“But cursed is the deceiver who has an acceptable male in his flock and vows to give it, but sacrifices a defective animal to the Lord. For I am a great King,” says the LORD of Hosts, “and My name is to be feared among the nations.

“So I in turn have made you despised and humiliated before all the people, because you have not kept My ways, but have shown partiality in matters of the law.”

“Because I, the LORD, do not change, you descendants of Jacob have not been destroyed.

“They will be Mine,” says the LORD of Hosts, “on the day when I prepare My treasured possession. And I will spare them as a man spares his own son who serves him.

Then you will trample the wicked, for they will be ashes under the soles of your feet on the day I am preparing,” says the LORD of Hosts.