The Bible, quoted
in its own voices.

I am faint and severely bruised. I have groaned by reason of the anguish of my heart. Lord, all my desire is before you. My groaning is not hidden from you. My heart throbs. My strength fails me. As for the light of my eyes, it has also left me. My lovers and my friends stand aloof from my plague. My kinsmen stand far away. They also who seek after my life lay snares. Those who seek my hurt speak mischievous things, and meditate deceits all day long. But I, as a deaf man, don’t hear. I am as a mute man who doesn’t open his mouth. Yes, I am as a man who doesn’t hear, in whose mouth are no reproofs. For I hope in you, LORD. You will answer, Lord my God.

My soul faints for your salvation. I hope in your word. My eyes fail for your word. I say, “When will you comfort me?” For I have become like a wineskin in the smoke. I don’t forget your statutes. How many are the days of your servant? When will you execute judgment on those who persecute me? The proud have dug pits for me, contrary to your law. All of your commandments are faithful. They persecute me wrongfully. Help me! They had almost wiped me from the earth, but I didn’t forsake your precepts. Preserve my life according to your loving kindness, so I will obey the statutes of your mouth.

The LORD said to me, “Go, and buy yourself a linen belt, and put it on your waist, and don’t put it in water.” So I bought a belt according to the LORD’s word, and put it on my waist. The LORD’s word came to me the second time, saying, “Take the belt that you have bought, which is on your waist, and arise, go to the Euphrates, and hide it there in a cleft of the rock.” So I went and hid it by the Euphrates, as the LORD commanded me. After many days, the LORD said to me, “Arise, go to the Euphrates, and take the belt from there, which I commanded you to hide there.”

“Therefore behold, the days come,” says the LORD, “that it will no more be said, ‘As the LORD lives, who brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt;’ but, ‘As the LORD lives, who brought up the children of Israel from the land of the north, and from all the countries where he had driven them.’ I will bring them again into their land that I gave to their fathers. “Behold, I will send for many fishermen,” says the LORD, “and they will fish them up. Afterward I will send for many hunters, and they will hunt them from every mountain, from every hill, and out of the clefts of the rocks. For my eyes are on all their ways. They are not hidden from my face. Their iniquity isn’t concealed from my eyes. First I will recompense their iniquity and their sin double, because they have polluted my land with the carcasses of their detestable things, and have filled my inheritance with their abominations.”

It will happen in that day that the LORD will thresh from the flowing stream of the Euphrates to the brook of Egypt; and you will be gathered one by one, children of Israel. It will happen in that day that a great trumpet will be blown; and those who were ready to perish in the land of Assyria, and those who were outcasts in the land of Egypt, shall come; and they will worship the LORD in the holy mountain at Jerusalem.

It is indeed unnecessary for me to write to you concerning the service to the saints, for I know your readiness, of which I boast on your behalf to those of Macedonia, that Achaia has been prepared for the past year. Your zeal has stirred up very many of them. But I have sent the brothers so that our boasting on your behalf may not be in vain in this respect, that, just as I said, you may be prepared, lest by any means, if anyone from Macedonia comes there with me and finds you unprepared, we (to say nothing of you) would be disappointed in this confident boasting. I thought it necessary therefore to entreat the brothers that they would go before to you and arrange ahead of time the generous gift that you promised before, that the same might be ready as a matter of generosity, and not of greediness.

“All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth. Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I commanded you. Behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

A man void of understanding strikes hands, and becomes collateral in the presence of his neighbor. He who loves disobedience loves strife. One who builds a high gate seeks destruction. One who has a perverse heart doesn’t find prosperity, and one who has a deceitful tongue falls into trouble. He who becomes the father of a fool grieves. The father of a fool has no joy. A cheerful heart makes good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.

When I prophesied, Pelatiah the son of Benaiah died. Then I fell down on my face, and cried with a loud voice, and said, “Ah Lord GOD! Will you make a full end of the remnant of Israel?” The LORD’s word came to me, saying, “Son of man, your brothers, even your brothers, the men of your relatives, and all the house of Israel, all of them, are the ones to whom the inhabitants of Jerusalem have said, ‘Go far away from the LORD. This land has been given to us for a possession.’ “Therefore say, ‘The Lord GOD says: “Whereas I have removed them far off among the nations, and whereas I have scattered them among the countries, yet I will be to them a sanctuary for a little while in the countries where they have come.”’ “Therefore say, ‘The Lord GOD says: “I will gather you from the peoples, and assemble you out of the countries where you have been scattered, and I will give you the land of Israel.”

But whenever someone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all, with unveiled face seeing the glory of the Lord as in a mirror, are transformed into the same image from glory to glory, even as from the Lord, the Spirit.