“Ah, stubborn children,” declares the LORD,
    “who carry out a plan, but not mine,
    and who make an alliance, but not of my Spirit,
        that they may add sin to sin;
    who set out to go down to Egypt,
        without asking for my direction,
    to take refuge in the protection of Pharaoh
        and to seek shelter in the shadow of Egypt!
    Therefore shall the protection of Pharaoh turn to your shame,
        and the shelter in the shadow of Egypt to your humiliation.
    For though his officials are at Zoan
        and his envoys reach Hanes,
    everyone comes to shame
        through a people that cannot profit them,
    that brings neither help nor profit,
        but shame and disgrace.”
    
    
      An oracle on the beasts of the Negeb.

    Through a land of trouble and anguish,
        from where come the lioness and the lion,
        the adder and the flying fiery serpent,
    they carry their riches on the backs of donkeys,
        and their treasures on the humps of camels,
        to a people that cannot profit them.
    Egypt’s help is worthless and empty;
        therefore I have called her
        “Rahab who sits still.”
    
    
        And now, go, write it before them on a tablet
        and inscribe it in a book,
    that it may be for the time to come
        as a witness forever.
    For they are a rebellious people,
        lying children,
    children unwilling to hear
        the instruction of the LORD;
    who say to the seers, “Do not see,”
        and to the prophets, “Do not prophesy to us what is right;
    speak to us smooth things,
        prophesy illusions,
    leave the way, turn aside from the path,
        let us hear no more about the Holy One of Israel.”
    Therefore thus says the Holy One of Israel,
    “Because you despise this word
        and trust in oppression and perverseness
        and rely on them,
    therefore this iniquity shall be to you
        like a breach in a high wall, bulging out and about to collapse,
        whose breaking comes suddenly, in an instant;
    and its breaking is like that of a potter’s vessel
        that is smashed so ruthlessly
    that among its fragments not a shard is found
        with which to take fire from the hearth,
        or to dip up water out of the cistern.”
    
    
    For thus said the Lord GOD, the Holy One of Israel,
    “In returning and rest you shall be saved;
        in quietness and in trust shall be your strength.”
    But you were unwilling, and you said,
    “No! We will flee upon horses”;
        therefore you shall flee away;
    and, “We will ride upon swift steeds”;
        therefore your pursuers shall be swift.
    A thousand shall flee at the threat of one;
        at the threat of five you shall flee,
    till you are left
        like a flagstaff on the top of a mountain,
        like a signal on a hill.
    
    
        Therefore the LORD waits to be gracious to you,
        and therefore he exalts himself to show mercy to you.
    For the LORD is a God of justice;
        blessed are all those who wait for him.
    
    
      For a people shall dwell in Zion, in Jerusalem; you shall weep no more. He will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry. As soon as he hears it, he answers you. And though the Lord give you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, yet your Teacher will not hide himself anymore, but your eyes shall see your Teacher. And your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, “This is the way, walk in it,” when you turn to the right or when you turn to the left. Then you will defile your carved idols overlaid with silver and your gold-plated metal images. You will scatter them as unclean things. You will say to them, “Be gone!”

  And he will give rain for the seed with which you sow the ground, and bread, the produce of the ground, which will be rich and plenteous. In that day your livestock will graze in large pastures, and the oxen and the donkeys that work the ground will eat seasoned fodder, which has been winnowed with shovel and fork. And on every lofty mountain and every high hill there will be brooks running with water, in the day of the great slaughter, when the towers fall. Moreover, the light of the moon will be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun will be sevenfold, as the light of seven days, in the day when the LORD binds up the brokenness of his people, and heals the wounds inflicted by his blow.

    Behold, the name of the LORD comes from afar,
        burning with his anger, and in thick rising smoke;
    his lips are full of fury,
        and his tongue is like a devouring fire;
    his breath is like an overflowing stream
        that reaches up to the neck;
    to sift the nations with the sieve of destruction,
        and to place on the jaws of the peoples a bridle that leads astray.
    
    
      You shall have a song as in the night when a holy feast is kept, and gladness of heart, as when one sets out to the sound of the flute to go to the mountain of the LORD, to the Rock of Israel. And the LORD will cause his majestic voice to be heard and the descending blow of his arm to be seen, in furious anger and a flame of devouring fire, with a cloudburst and storm and hailstones. The Assyrians will be terror-stricken at the voice of the LORD, when he strikes with his rod. And every stroke of the appointed staff that the LORD lays on them will be to the sound of tambourines and lyres. Battling with brandished arm, he will fight with them. For a burning place has long been prepared; indeed, for the king it is made ready, its pyre made deep and wide, with fire and wood in abundance; the breath of the LORD, like a stream of sulfur, kindles it.

    Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help
        and rely on horses,
    who trust in chariots because they are many
        and in horsemen because they are very strong,
    but do not look to the Holy One of Israel
        or consult the LORD!
    And yet he is wise and brings disaster;
        he does not call back his words,
    but will arise against the house of the evildoers
        and against the helpers of those who work iniquity.
    The Egyptians are man, and not God,
        and their horses are flesh, and not spirit.
    When the LORD stretches out his hand,
        the helper will stumble, and he who is helped will fall,
        and they will all perish together.
    
    
    For thus the LORD said to me,
    “As a lion or a young lion growls over his prey,
        and when a band of shepherds is called out against him
    he is not terrified by their shouting
        or daunted at their noise,
    so the LORD of hosts will come down
        to fight on Mount Zion and on its hill.
    Like birds hovering, so the LORD of hosts
        will protect Jerusalem;
    he will protect and deliver it;
        he will spare and rescue it.”
    
    
      Turn to him from whom people have deeply revolted, O children of Israel. For in that day everyone shall cast away his idols of silver and his idols of gold, which your hands have sinfully made for you.

    “And the Assyrian shall fall by a sword, not of man;
        and a sword, not of man, shall devour him;
    and he shall flee from the sword,
        and his young men shall be put to forced labor.
    His rock shall pass away in terror,
        and his officers desert the standard in panic,”
    declares the LORD, whose fire is in Zion,
        and whose furnace is in Jerusalem. (ESV)

And after five days the high priest Ananias came down with some elders and a spokesman, one Tertullus. They laid before the governor their case against Paul. And when he had been summoned, Tertullus began to accuse him, saying:

  “Since through you we enjoy much peace, and since by your foresight, most excellent Felix, reforms are being made for this nation, in every way and everywhere we accept this with all gratitude. But, to detain you no further, I beg you in your kindness to hear us briefly. For we have found this man a plague, one who stirs up riots among all the Jews throughout the world and is a ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes. He even tried to profane the temple, but we seized him. By examining him yourself you will be able to find out from him about everything of which we accuse him.”

  The Jews also joined in the charge, affirming that all these things were so.

  And when the governor had nodded to him to speak, Paul replied:

  “Knowing that for many years you have been a judge over this nation, I cheerfully make my defense. You can verify that it is not more than twelve days since I went up to worship in Jerusalem, and they did not find me disputing with anyone or stirring up a crowd, either in the temple or in the synagogues or in the city. Neither can they prove to you what they now bring up against me. But this I confess to you, that according to the Way, which they call a sect, I worship the God of our fathers, believing everything laid down by the Law and written in the Prophets, having a hope in God, which these men themselves accept, that there will be a resurrection of both the just and the unjust. So I always take pains to have a clear conscience toward both God and man. Now after several years I came to bring alms to my nation and to present offerings. While I was doing this, they found me purified in the temple, without any crowd or tumult. But some Jews from Asia—they ought to be here before you and to make an accusation, should they have anything against me. Or else let these men themselves say what wrongdoing they found when I stood before the council, other than this one thing that I cried out while standing among them: ‘It is with respect to the resurrection of the dead that I am on trial before you this day.’”

  But Felix, having a rather accurate knowledge of the Way, put them off, saying, “When Lysias the tribune comes down, I will decide your case.” Then he gave orders to the centurion that he should be kept in custody but have some liberty, and that none of his friends should be prevented from attending to his needs.

  After some days Felix came with his wife Drusilla, who was Jewish, and he sent for Paul and heard him speak about faith in Christ Jesus. And as he reasoned about righteousness and self-control and the coming judgment, Felix was alarmed and said, “Go away for the present. When I get an opportunity I will summon you.” At the same time he hoped that money would be given him by Paul. So he sent for him often and conversed with him. When two years had elapsed, Felix was succeeded by Porcius Festus. And desiring to do the Jews a favor, Felix left Paul in prison. (ESV)