Zephaniah 2:1-15

Gather together, gather, you unwanted people. Do it before it’s too late, before you are blown away like chaff, before the LORD’s terrible anger reaches you, before the day of the LORD’s anger comes to you. Come to the LORD, all you who are not proud, who obey his laws. Do what is right. Learn to be humble. Maybe you will escape on the day the LORD shows his anger. No one will be left in the city of Gaza, and the city of Ashkelon will be destroyed. Ashdod will be empty by noon, and the people of Ekron will be chased away. How terrible it will be for you who live by the Mediterranean Sea, you Philistines! The word of the LORD is against you, Canaan, land of the Philistines. “I will destroy you so that no one will be left.” The land by the Mediterranean Sea, in which you live, will become pastures, fields for shepherds, and pens for sheep. It will belong to the descendants of Judah who are left alive. There they will let their sheep eat grass. At night they will sleep in the houses of Ashkelon. The LORD their God will pay attention to them and will make their life good again. “I have heard the insults of the country of Moab and the threats of the people of Ammon. They have insulted my people and have taken their land.” So the LORD All-Powerful, the God of Israel, says, “As surely as I live, Moab will be destroyed like Sodom, and Ammon will be destroyed like Gomorrah— a heap of weeds, a pit of salt, and a ruin forever. Those of my people who are left alive will take whatever they want from them; those who are left from my nation will take their land.” This is what Moab and Ammon get for being proud, because they insulted and made fun of the people of the LORD All-Powerful. The LORD will frighten them, because he will destroy all the gods of the earth. Then everyone in faraway places will worship him wherever they are. “You Cushites also will be killed by my sword.” Then the LORD will turn against the north and destroy Assyria. He will make Nineveh a ruin as dry as a desert. Flocks and herds will lie down there, and all wild animals. The owls and crows will sit on the stone pillars. The owl will hoot through the windows, trash will be in the doorways, and the wooden boards of the buildings will be gone. This is the happy and safe city that thinks there is no one else as strong as it is. But what a ruin it will be, a place where wild animals live. All those who pass by will make fun and shake their fists.