14. Make it your aim to do what is right, not what is evil, so that you may live. Then the Lord God Almighty really will be with you, as you claim he is.
15. Hate what is evil, love what is right, and see that justice prevails in the courts. Perhaps the Lord will be merciful to the people of this nation who are still left alive.
16. And so the Sovereign Lord Almighty says, “There will be wailing and cries of sorrow in the city streets. Even farmers will be called to mourn the dead along with those who are paid to mourn.
17. There will be wailing in all the vineyards. All this will take place because I am coming to punish you.” The Lord has spoken.
18. How terrible it will be for you who long for the day of the Lord! What good will that day do you? For you it will be a day of darkness and not of light.
19. It will be like someone who runs from a lion and meets a bear! Or like someone who comes home and puts his hand on the wall — only to be bitten by a snake!
20. The day of the Lord will bring darkness and not light; it will be a day of gloom, without any brightness.
21. The Lord says, “I hate your religious festivals; I cannot stand them!
22. When you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them; I will not accept the animals you have fattened to bring me as offerings.
23. Stop your noisy songs; I do not want to listen to your harps.
24. Instead, let justice flow like a stream, and righteousness like a river that never goes dry.
25. “People of Israel, I did not demand sacrifices and offerings during those forty years that I led you through the desert.
26. But now, because you have worshipped images of Sakkuth, your king god, and of Kaiwan, your star god, you will have to carry those images