2 THESSALONIANS

2 Thessalonians 1 From Paul, Silas, and Timothy.
To the church in Thessalonica, the people of God our Father and of the Lord Jesus Christ.
²I pray that God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ will be kind to you and will bless you with peace!

When Christ Returns

³My dear friends, we always have good reason to thank God for you, because your faith in God and your love for each other keep growing all the time. ⁴That's why we brag about you to all of God's churches. We tell them how patient you are and how you keep on having faith, even though you are going through a lot of trouble and suffering.
⁵All of this shows that God judges fairly and that he is making you fit to share in his kingdom for which you are suffering. ⁶It is only right for God to punish everyone who is causing you trouble, ⁷but he will give you relief from your troubles. He will do the same for us, when the Lord Jesus comes from heaven with his powerful angels ⁸and with a flaming fire.
Our Lord Jesus will punish anyone who doesn't know God and won't obey his message. ⁹Their punishment will be eternal destruction, and they will be kept far from the presence of our Lord and his glorious strength. ¹⁰This will happen on that day when the Lord returns to be praised and honored by all who have faith in him and belong to him. This includes you, because you believed what we said.
¹¹God chose you, and we keep praying that God will make you worthy of being his people. We pray for God's power to help you do all the good things that you hope to do and that your faith makes you want to do. ¹²Then, because God and our Lord Jesus Christ are so kind, you will bring honor to the name of our Lord Jesus, and he will bring honor to you.

A Prayer of Thanks to God

Isaiah 25 You, LORD, are my God!
I will praise you for doing the wonderful things
you had planned and promised since ancient times.
²You have destroyed the fortress of our enemies,
leaving their city in ruins.
Nothing in that foreign city will ever be rebuilt.
³Now strong and cruel nations will fear and honor you.

⁴You have been a place of safety for the poor and needy
in times of trouble.
Brutal enemies pounded us like a heavy rain
or the heat of the sun at noon,
but you were our shelter.
⁵Those wild foreigners struck like scorching desert heat.
But you were like a cloud, protecting us from the sun.
You kept our enemies from singing songs of victory.

The LORD Has Saved Us

⁶On this mountain the LORD All-Powerful will prepare
for all nations a feast of the finest foods.
Choice wines and the best meats will be served.
⁷Here the LORD will strip away the burial clothes
that cover the nations.
⁸The LORD All-Powerful will destroy the power of death
and wipe away all tears.
No longer will his people be insulted everywhere.
The LORD has spoken!

⁹At that time, people will say, "The LORD has saved us!
Let's celebrate. We waited and hoped--
now our God is here."
¹⁰The powerful arm of the LORD will protect this mountain.

The Moabites will be put down and trampled on like straw
in a pit of manure.
¹¹They will struggle to get out, but God will humiliate them
no matter how hard they try.
¹²The walls of their fortresses will be knocked down
and scattered in the dirt.

A Song of Victory

Isaiah 26 The time is coming when the people of Judah
will sing this song:
"Our city is protected. The LORD is our fortress,
and he gives us victory.
²Open the city gates for a law-abiding nation
that is faithful to God.
³The LORD gives perfect peace
to those whose faith is firm.
⁴So always trust the LORD
because he is forever our mighty rock.
⁵God has put down our enemies in their mountain city
and rubbed it in the dirt.
⁶Now the poor and abused stomp all over that city."

The LORD Can Be Trusted

⁷Our LORD, you always do right,
and you make the path smooth for those who obey you.
⁸You are the one we trust to bring about justice;
above all else we want your name to be honored.
⁹Throughout the night, my heart searches for you,
because your decisions show everyone on this earth
how to live right.

¹⁰Even when the wicked are treated with mercy
in this land of justice,
they do wrong and are blind to your glory, our LORD.
¹¹Your hand is raised and ready to punish them,
but they don't see it. Put them to shame!
Show how much you care for us
and throw them into the fire intended for your enemies.

¹²You will give us peace, LORD,
because everything we have done was by your power.
¹³Others have ruled over us besides you, our LORD God,
but we obey only you.
¹⁴Those enemies are now dead and can never live again.
You have punished them--
they are destroyed, completely forgotten.
¹⁵Our nation has grown because of you, our LORD.
We have more land than before, and you are honored.

The LORD Gives Life to the Dead

¹⁶When you punished our people,
they turned and prayed to you, our LORD.
¹⁷Because of what you did to us,
we suffered like a woman about to give birth.
¹⁸But instead of having a child,
our terrible pain produced only wind.
We have won no victories, and we have no descendants
to take over the earth.

¹⁹Your people will rise to life!
Tell them to leave their graves
and celebrate with shouts.
You refresh the earth like morning dew;
you give life to the dead.

²⁰Go inside and lock the doors, my people.
Hide there for a little while,
until the LORD is no longer angry.

The Earth and the Sea Will Be Punished

²¹The LORD will come out to punish everyone on earth
for their sins.
And when he does, those who did violent crimes
will be known and punished.

Psalm 117
Come Praise the LORD

¹All of you nations, come praise the LORD!
Let everyone praise him.
²His love for us is wonderful;
his faithfulness never ends.
Shout praises to the LORD!