Longing for the Temple Worship.

For the music director; ^[a]on the Gittith. A Psalm of the sons of Korah.

The Whole Creation Invoked to Praise the Lord.

A Bride for Isaac

24 Now ^(A)Abraham was old, advanced in age; and the Lord had ^(B)blessed Abraham in every way. ² Abraham said to his servant, the oldest of his household who was in ^(C)charge of all that he owned, “^(D)Please place your hand under my thigh, ³ and I will make you swear by the Lord, ^(E)the God of heaven and the God of earth, that you ^(F)shall not take a wife for my son from the daughters of ^(G)the Canaanites, among whom I live; ⁴ but you will go to ^(H)my country and to my relatives, and take a wife for my son Isaac.” ⁵ The servant said to him, “Suppose the woman is not willing to follow me to this land; should I take your son back to the land from where you came?” ⁶ Then Abraham said to him, “^(I)Beware that you do not take my son back there! ^7 (J)The Lord, the God of heaven, who took me from my father’s house and from the land of my birth, and who spoke to me and who swore to me, saying, ‘^(K)To your ^[a]descendants I will give this land’—He will send ^(L)His angel ahead of you, and you will take a wife for my son from there. ⁸ But if the woman is not willing to follow you, then you will ^(M)be free of this oath of mine; ^(N)only do not take my son back there.” ⁹ So the servant ^(O)placed his hand under the thigh of his master Abraham, and swore to him concerning this matter.

¹⁰ Then the servant took ten camels from the camels of his master, and went out with a variety of ^(P)good things of his master’s in his hand; so he set out and went to ^[b]Mesopotamia, to ^(Q)the city of Nahor. ¹¹ He made the camels kneel down outside the city by ^(R)the well of water ^[c]when it was evening, ^(S)the time when women go out to draw water. ¹² And he said, “^(T)Lord, God of my master Abraham, please ^[d](U)grant me success today, and show kindness to my master Abraham. ¹³ Behold, ^(V)I am standing by the ^[e]spring, and the daughters of the men of the city are coming out to draw water; ¹⁴ now may it be that the young woman to whom I say, ‘Please let down your jar so that I may drink,’ and ^[f]who answers, ‘Drink, and I will water your camels also’—may she be the one whom You have appointed for Your servant Isaac; and by this I will know that You have shown kindness to my master.”

Rebekah Is Chosen

¹⁵ And it came about, ^(W)before he had finished speaking, that behold, ^(X)Rebekah, who was born to Bethuel the son of ^(Y)Milcah, the wife of Abraham’s brother Nahor, came out with her jar on her shoulder. ¹⁶ The young woman was ^(Z)very beautiful, a virgin; no man had ^[g]had relations with her. She went down to the spring, filled her jar, and came up. ¹⁷ Then the servant ran to meet her, and said, “^(AA)Please let me drink a little water from your jar.” ¹⁸ And ^(AB)she said, “Drink, my lord”; then she quickly lowered her jar to her hand, and gave him a drink. ¹⁹ Now when she had finished giving him a drink, ^(AC)she said, “I will also draw water for your camels until they have finished drinking.” ²⁰ So she quickly emptied her jar into the trough, and ran back to the well to draw, and she drew for all his camels. ^21 (AD)Meanwhile, the man was taking a close look at her ^[h]in silence, to find out whether the Lord had made his journey successful or not.

²² When the camels had finished drinking, the man took a ^(AE)gold ring weighing a ^[i]half-shekel, and two bracelets for her ^[j]wrists weighing ten shekels in gold, ²³ and he said, “Whose daughter are you? Please tell me, is there room for us to stay overnight at your father’s house?” ²⁴ She said to him, “^(AF)I am the daughter of Bethuel, Milcah’s son, whom she bore to Nahor.” ²⁵ Again she said to him, “We have plenty of both straw and feed, and room to stay overnight.” ²⁶ Then the man ^(AG)bowed low and worshiped the Lord. ²⁷ And he said, “^(AH)Blessed be the Lord, the God of my master Abraham, who has not abandoned ^(AI)His kindness and His trustworthiness toward my master; as for me, ^(AJ)the Lord has guided me in the way to the house of my master’s brothers.”

³ For ^(A)consider Him who has endured such hostility by sinners against Himself, so that you will not grow weary ^[a](B)and lose heart.

A Father’s Discipline

^4 (C)You have not yet resisted ^[b](D)to the point of shedding blood in your striving against sin; ⁵ and you have forgotten the exhortation which is addressed to you as sons,

⁷ It is for discipline that you endure; ^(I)God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline? ⁸ But if you are without discipline, ^(J)of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. ⁹ Furthermore, we had ^[c]earthly fathers to discipline us, and we ^(K)respected them; shall we not much more be subject to ^(L)the Father of ^[d]spirits, and ^(M)live? ¹⁰ For they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but He disciplines us for our good, ^(N)so that we may share His holiness. ^11 (O)For the moment, all discipline seems not to be pleasant, but painful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterward it yields the ^(P)peaceful fruit of righteousness.

Jesus Teaches at the Feast

7 After these things Jesus ^(A)was walking in Galilee, for He was unwilling to walk in Judea because ^(B)the Jews ^(C)were seeking to kill Him. ² Now the feast of the Jews, ^(D)the Feast of Booths, was near. ³ So His ^(E)brothers said to Him, “Move on from here and go into Judea, so that Your ^(F)disciples also may see Your works which You are doing. ⁴ For no one does anything in secret ^[a]when he himself is striving to be known publicly. If You are doing these things, show Yourself to the world.” ⁵ For not even His ^(G)brothers believed in Him. ⁶ So Jesus *said to them, “^(H)My time is not yet here, but your time is always ready. ^7 (I)The world cannot hate you, but it hates Me because I testify about it, that ^(J)its deeds are evil. ⁸ Go up to the feast yourselves; I am not going up to this feast, because ^(K)My time has not yet fully arrived.” ⁹ Now having said these things to them, He stayed in Galilee.

¹⁰ But when His ^(L)brothers had gone up to the feast, then He Himself also went up, not publicly, but as though in secret. ^11 (M)So the Jews ^(N)were looking for Him at the feast and saying, “Where is He?” ¹² And there was a great deal of talk about Him in secret among the crowds: ^(O)some were saying, “He is a good man”; others were saying, “No, on the contrary, He is misleading the people.” ¹³ However, no one was speaking openly about Him, for ^(P)fear of ^[b]the Jews.