Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

Joy of Being Forgiven

32 How happy he is whose wrong-doing is forgiven, and whose sin is covered! ² How happy is the man whose sin the Lord does not hold against him, and in whose spirit there is nothing false.

³ When I kept quiet about my sin, my bones wasted away from crying all day long. ⁴ For day and night Your hand was heavy upon me. My strength was dried up as in the hot summer. ⁵ I told my sin to You. I did not hide my wrong-doing. I said, “I will tell my sins to the Lord.” And You forgave the guilt of my sin. ⁶ So let all who are God-like pray to You while You may be found, because in the floods of much water, they will not touch him. ⁷ You are my hiding place. You keep me safe from trouble. All around me are your songs of being made free.

⁸ I will show you and teach you in the way you should go. I will tell you what to do with My eye upon you. ⁹ Do not be like the horse or the donkey which have no understanding. They must be made to work by using bits and leather ropes or they will not come to you. ¹⁰ Many are the sorrows of the sinful. But loving-kindness will be all around the man who trusts in the Lord. ¹¹ Be glad in the Lord and be full of joy, you who are right with God! Sing for joy all you who are pure in heart!

³⁰ So I am against those who tell what is going to happen in the future,” says the Lord, “who steal My words from each other. ³¹ See, I am against these men,” says the Lord, “who use their tongues and say, ‘This is what the Lord says.’ ³² I am against those who have told false dreams,” says the Lord, “and have led My people the wrong way by their lies and foolish words of pride. I did not send them or tell them what to say, so they do not help these people at all,” says the Lord.

³³ “When these people, or the one who speaks in My name, or a religious leader asks you, ‘What heavy load has the Lord placed on us?’ then you say to them, ‘You are the heavy load. And I will throw you off, says the Lord.’ ³⁴ As for the man who speaks in My name, or the religious leader, or anyone of the people, who say, ‘The heavy load of the Lord,’ I will punish that man and those of his house. ³⁵ Each of you say to his neighbor and to his brother, ‘What has the Lord answered?’ or, ‘What has the Lord said?’ ³⁶ But you must not say, ‘The heavy load of the Lord,’ any more. For every man’s own word will be the weight upon himself. And you have made sinful the words of the living God, the Lord of All, our God. ³⁷ This is what you should say to the man who speaks in My name: ‘What answer has the Lord given you?’ and, ‘What has the Lord said?’ ³⁸ But if you say, ‘The heavy load of the Lord,’ then the Lord says, ‘You have said, “The heavy load of the Lord,” when I told you not to say it.’ ³⁹ So I will pick you up and throw you away from Me, together with the city which I gave to you and your fathers. ⁴⁰ I will put you to shame forever. You will always be ashamed, and it will not be forgotten.”

The Spirits Must Be Tested

4 Dear Christian friends, do not believe every spirit. But test the spirits to see if they are from God for there are many false preachers in the world. ² You can tell if the spirit is from God in this way: Every spirit that says Jesus Christ has come in a human body is from God. ³ And every spirit that does not say Jesus has come in a human body is not from God. It is the teaching of the false-christ. You have heard that this teaching is coming. It is already here in the world. ⁴ My children, you are a part of God’s family. You have stood against these false preachers and had power over them. You had power over them because the One Who lives in you is stronger than the one who is in the world. ⁵ Those false teachers are a part of the world. They speak about the things of the world. The world listens to them. ⁶ We are a part of God’s family. The person who knows God will listen to us. The person who is not a part of God’s family will not listen to us. In this way, we can tell what is the spirit of truth and what is the spirit of false teaching.