Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
Praise God Who Helps the Weak
146 Praise the Lord!
My whole being, praise the Lord.
2 I will praise the Lord all my life;
I will sing praises to my God as long as I live.
3 Do not put your trust in princes
or other people, who cannot save you.
4 When people die, they are buried.
Then all of their plans come to an end.
5 Happy are those who are helped by the God of Jacob.
Their hope is in the Lord their God.
6 He made heaven and earth,
the sea and everything in it.
He remains loyal forever.
7 He does what is fair for those who have been wronged.
He gives food to the hungry.
The Lord sets the prisoners free.
8 The Lord gives sight to the blind.
The Lord lifts up people who are in trouble.
The Lord loves those who do right.
9 The Lord protects the foreigners.
He defends the orphans and widows,
but he blocks the way of the wicked.
10 The Lord will be King forever.
Jerusalem, your God is everlasting.
Praise the Lord!
Land for Zelophehad’s Daughters
36 The leaders of Gilead’s family group went to talk to Moses and the leaders of the families of Israel. (Gilead was the son of Makir, the son of Manasseh, the son of Joseph.) 2 They said, “The Lord commanded you, our master, to give the land to the Israelites by throwing lots, and the Lord commanded you to give the land of Zelophehad, our brother, to his daughters. 3 But if his daughters marry men from other tribes of Israel, then that land will leave our family, and the people of the other tribes will get that land. So we will lose some of our land. 4 When the time of Jubilee comes for the Israelites, their land will go to the tribes of the people they marry; their land will be taken away from us, the land we received from our fathers.”
5 Then Moses gave the Israelites this command from the Lord: “These men from the tribe of Joseph are right. 6 This is the Lord’s command to Zelophehad’s daughters: You may marry anyone you wish, as long as the person is from your own tribe. 7 In this way the Israelites’ land will not pass from tribe to tribe, and each Israelite will keep the land in the tribe that belonged to his ancestors. 8 A woman who inherits her father’s land may marry, but she must marry someone from her own tribe. In this way every Israelite will keep the land that belonged to his ancestors. 9 The land must not pass from tribe to tribe, and each Israelite tribe will keep the land it received from its ancestors.”
10 Zelophehad’s daughters obeyed the Lord’s command to Moses.
11 So Zelophehad’s daughters—Mahlah, Tirzah, Hoglah, Milcah, and Noah—married their cousins, their father’s relatives. 12 Their husbands were from the tribe of Manasseh son of Joseph, so their land stayed in their father’s family group and tribe.
13 These were the laws and commands that the Lord gave to the Israelites through Moses on the plains of Moab by the Jordan River, across from Jericho.
6 When we were unable to help ourselves, at the right time, Christ died for us, although we were living against God. 7 Very few people will die to save the life of someone else. Although perhaps for a good person someone might possibly die. 8 But God shows his great love for us in this way: Christ died for us while we were still sinners.
9 So through Christ we will surely be saved from God’s anger, because we have been made right with God by the blood of Christ’s death. 10 While we were God’s enemies, he made us his friends through the death of his Son. Surely, now that we are his friends, he will save us through his Son’s life. 11 And not only that, but now we are also very happy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we are now God’s friends again.
The Holy Bible, New Century Version®. Copyright © 2005 by Thomas Nelson, Inc.