Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
12 Blessed is the nation whose God is Adonai,
the people He chose for His own inheritance.
13 Adonai looks down from heaven.
He observes all humanity.
14 From His dwelling place He gazes
on all the inhabitants of the earth—
15 He who fashions the hearts of all,
who discerns all their deeds.
16 No king is saved by his great army,
no warrior is delivered by great strength.
17 A horse is a false hope for victory,
nor can its great strength save.
18 Behold, the eyes of Adonai are on those who fear Him,
waiting for His love,
19 to deliver their souls from death,
and to keep them alive in famine.
20 Our soul waits for Adonai—
He is our help and our shield.
21 Our heart rejoices in Him,
because we trusted in His holy Name.
22 Let Your lovingkindness, Adonai,
be upon us, as we have waited for You.
Futility of Living Without God
6 There is a misery that I have seen under the sun, and it is heavy upon humanity. 2 God gives a man riches, wealth and honor, so that he lacks nothing that his heart desires, yet God does not enable him to eat from it—instead a foreigner will eat it. This is fruitless—an agonizing illness.
3 Even if a man should father a hundred children and live many years, however many the days of his years may be, yet his soul is never satisfied with his prosperity and he does not have a proper burial, then I say that it is better for the stillborn than him. 4 Even though it comes in futility and departs into darkness, though its name is shrouded in darkness, 5 though it has never seen or experienced the sun, it has more rest than the other. 6 Even if the other man were to live a thousand years twice and never enjoy good things—do not all go to the same place?
7 Then the kohen gadol said, “Are these things so?”
2 Stephen declared, “Brothers and fathers, listen. The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he lived in Haran. 3 He said to him, ‘Leave your country and your relatives, and come here to the land that I will show you.’ 4 Then he left the land of the Chaldeans and settled in Haran. From there, after his father died, God moved him to this land where you now live. 5 He gave him no inheritance in it—not even a foothold—yet He promised ‘to give it to him as a possession to him and to his descendants after him,’ even though he had no child.
6 “But God spoke in this way, that his ‘descendants would be foreigners in a land belonging to others, and they would enslave and mistreat them for four hundred years. 7 But I will judge the nation they serve as slaves,’ God said, ‘and afterward they shall come out and serve Me in this place.’[a]
8 “Then God gave Abraham the covenant of circumcision.[b] So he became the father of Isaac and circumcised him on the eighth day, and so Isaac with Jacob, and Jacob with the twelve patriarchs.
Tree of Life (TLV) Translation of the Bible. Copyright © 2015 by The Messianic Jewish Family Bible Society.