Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

6 No, Lord! Don’t punish me in the heat of your anger. ² Pity me, O Lord, for I am weak. Heal me, for my body is sick, ³ and I am upset and disturbed. My mind is filled with apprehension and with gloom. Oh, restore me soon.

⁴ Come, O Lord, and make me well. In your kindness save me. ⁵ For if I die, I cannot give you glory by praising you before my friends.^{[a] 6} I am worn out with pain; every night my pillow is wet with tears. ⁷ My eyes are growing old and dim with grief because of all my enemies.

⁸ Go, leave me now, you men of evil deeds, for the Lord has heard my weeping ⁹ and my pleading. He will answer all my prayers. ¹⁰ All my enemies shall be suddenly dishonored, terror-stricken, and disgraced. God will turn them back in shame.

38 But when Shephatiah (son of Mattan) and Gedaliah (son of Pashhur) and Jucal (son of Shelemiah) and Pashhur (son of Malchiah) heard what Jeremiah had been telling the people— ² that everyone remaining in Jerusalem would die by sword, starvation, or disease, but anyone surrendering to the Babylonians would live, ³ and that the city of Jerusalem would surely be captured by the king of Babylon— ⁴ they went to the king and said: “Sir, this fellow must die. That kind of talk will undermine the morale of the few soldiers we have left, and of all the people too. This man is a traitor.”

⁵ So King Zedekiah agreed. “All right,” he said. “Do as you like—I can’t stop you.”

⁶ They took Jeremiah from his cell and lowered him by ropes into an empty cistern in the prison yard. (It belonged to Malchiah, a member of the royal family.) There was no water in it, but there was a thick layer of mire at the bottom, and Jeremiah sank down into it.

⁷ When Ebed-melech the Ethiopian, an important palace official, heard that Jeremiah was in the cistern, ⁸ he rushed out to the Gate of Benjamin where the king was holding court.

⁹ “My lord the king,” he said, “these men have done a very evil thing in putting Jeremiah into the cistern. He will die of hunger, for almost all the bread in the city is gone.”

¹⁰ Then the king commanded Ebed-melech to take thirty men with him and pull Jeremiah out before he died. ¹¹ So Ebed-melech took thirty men and went to a palace depot for discarded supplies where used clothing was kept. There he found some old rags and discarded garments which he took to the cistern and lowered to Jeremiah on a rope. ¹² Ebed-melech called down to Jeremiah, “Use these rags under your armpits to protect you from the ropes.” Then, when Jeremiah was ready, ¹³ they pulled him out and returned him to the palace prison, where he remained.

⁵ Jesus sent them out with these instructions: “Don’t go to the Gentiles or the Samaritans, ⁶ but only to the people of Israel—God’s lost sheep. ⁷ Go and announce to them that the Kingdom of Heaven is near.^{[a] 8} Heal the sick, raise the dead, cure the lepers, and cast out demons. Give as freely as you have received!

⁹ “Don’t take any money with you; ¹⁰ don’t even carry a duffle bag with extra clothes and shoes, or even a walking stick; for those you help should feed and care for you. ¹¹ Whenever you enter a city or village, search for a godly man and stay in his home until you leave for the next town. ¹² When you ask permission to stay, be friendly, ¹³ and if it turns out to be a godly home, give it your blessing; if not, keep the blessing. ¹⁴ Any city or home that doesn’t welcome you—shake off the dust of that place from your feet as you leave. ¹⁵ Truly, the wicked cities of Sodom and Gomorrah will be better off at Judgment Day than they.

¹⁶ “I am sending you out as sheep among wolves. Be as wary as serpents and harmless as doves. ¹⁷ But beware! For you will be arrested and tried, and whipped in the synagogues. ¹⁸ Yes, and you must stand trial before governors and kings for my sake. This will give you the opportunity to tell them about me, yes, to witness to the world.

¹⁹ “When you are arrested, don’t worry about what to say at your trial, for you will be given the right words at the right time. ²⁰ For it won’t be you doing the talking—it will be the Spirit of your heavenly Father speaking through you!

²¹ “Brother shall betray brother to death, and fathers shall betray their own children. And children shall rise against their parents and cause their deaths. ²² Everyone shall hate you because you belong to me. But all of you who endure to the end shall be saved.

²³ “When you are persecuted in one city, flee to the next! I^[b] will return before you have reached them all!