Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
Bet
The Benefits of the Word
9 How can a young man keep his behavior pure?
By guarding it in accordance with your word.
10 I have sought you with all of my heart;
do not let me drift away from your commands.
11 I have stored what you have said[a] in my heart,
so I won’t sin against you.
12 Blessed are you, Lord!
Teach me your statutes.
13 I have spoken with my lips
about all your decrees that you have announced.[b]
14 I find joy in the path of your decrees,
as if I owned all kinds of riches.
15 I will meditate on your precepts,
and I will respect your ways.
16 I am delighted with your statutes;
I will not forget your word.[c]
The Benefits of Embracing Wisdom
2 My son, if you accept my words,
and treasure my instructions[a]—
2 making your ear attentive to wisdom,
and turning your heart to understanding—
3 if, indeed, you call out for insight
and raise your voice for understanding,
4 if you seek it like silver
and search for it like hidden treasure,
5 then you will understand the fear of the Lord
and learn to know God.
6 For the Lord gives wisdom,
and from his mouth come knowledge and understanding.
7 He stores up sound wisdom for the upright
and is a shield to those who walk in integrity—
8 guarding the paths of the just
and protecting the way of his faithful ones.
9 Then you will understand what is right, just,
and upright—every good path.
10 For wisdom will enter your heart,
and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul.
11 Discretion[b] will protect you;
understanding will watch over you,
12 delivering you from the way of evil,
from men who speak perverse things,
13 and from those who abandon the right[c] path
to travel along the ways of darkness;
14 who delight in doing evil,
and rejoice in the perverseness of evil;
15 whose paths are crooked
and who are devious in their ways,
Teaching about Divorce(A)
19 When Jesus had finished saying these things,[a] he left Galilee and went to the territory of Judea on the other side[b] of the Jordan. 2 Large crowds followed him, and he healed them there.
3 Some Pharisees came to him in order to test him. They asked, “Is it lawful for a man[c] to divorce his wife for any reason?”
4 He answered them, “Haven’t you read that the one who made[d] them at the beginning ‘made them male and female’[e] 5 and said, ‘That is why a man will leave his father and mother and be united with his wife, and the two will become one flesh’?[f] 6 So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, man must never separate.”
7 They asked him, “Why, then, did Moses order us ‘to give a certificate of divorce and divorce her’?”[g]
8 He told them, “It was because of your hardness of heart that Moses allowed you to divorce your wives. But from the beginning it was not this way. 9 I tell you that whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery.”[h]
10 His disciples asked him, “If that is the relationship of a man with his wife, it’s not worth getting married!”
11 “Not everyone can accept this saying,” he replied, “except those to whom celibacy[i] has been granted, 12 because some men are celibate from birth,[j] while some are celibate because they have been made that way by others. Still others are celibate because they have made themselves that way for the sake of the kingdom from[k] heaven. Let anyone accept this who can.”
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