Isaiah 24:1-8

1Understand this! The Lord is ready to destroy the earth. It will become a desert. He will spoil the ground. He will chase away all the people who live on it.

2It will be the same for all people: priests as well as ordinary people, masters as well as their servants, rich ladies as well as their servant girls, sellers as well as buyers, people who lend money as well as those who borrow it, rich people as well as poor people.

3The whole earth will become empty. Nothing will remain. The Lord has said that this punishment will certainly happen.

4The earth becomes dry and all the plants die. The whole world becomes weak and helpless. Its important people also become weak.

5The people who live on the earth have caused it to become unclean. They have not obeyed God's laws. They have turned against his teaching. They have not obeyed the covenant that God made with them for ever.

6That is why a curse is destroying the land. The people who live on it are guilty and God is punishing them. They become fewer and fewer. Only a very few of them remain.

7There is no new wine and the vines are dying. The people who were happy to drink the wine are now sad.

8The happy sound of tambourines has stopped. The noise from parties has finished. The harps no longer make any happy music.