Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
ה (Heh)
33 Teach me, Adonai, the way of your laws;
keeping them will be its own reward for me.
34 Give me understanding; then I will keep your Torah;
I will observe it with all my heart.
35 Guide me on the path of your mitzvot,
for I take pleasure in it.
36 Bend my heart toward your instructions
and not toward selfish gain.
37 Turn my eyes away from worthless things;
with your ways, give me life.
38 Fulfill your promise, which you made to your servant,
which you made to those who fear you.
39 Avert the disgrace which I dread,
for your rulings are good.
40 See how I long for your precepts;
in your righteousness, give me life!
24 The word of Adonai came to me on the tenth day of the tenth month of the ninth year: 2 “Human being, write down today’s date; because on this very day the king of Bavel has begun his attack on Yerushalayim. 3 And tell this allegory to these rebels; say that Adonai Elohim says:
‘Put a pot on the fire;
put it there, pour water in it;
4 Put in it pieces of meat,
all the best parts — the thigh, the shoulder;
fill it with the choicest cuts,
5 taken from the pick of the flock,
and pile the bones underneath.
Bring it to a rolling boil,
till it’s all cooked, even the bones.’
6 “Therefore Adonai Elohim says:
‘Woe to the city drenched with blood,
to the pot whose scum is in it,
and whose scum has not been removed.
Empty it piece by piece,
without troubling to draw lots.
7 For her blood is still in her;
she poured it on bare rock;
she did not pour it on the ground,
to cover it with dust.
8 So in order to rouse my fury
and excite my vengeance,
I have fixed her blood there on the bare rock,
where it will not be covered.’
9 “Therefore Adonai Elohim says this:
‘Woe to the city drenched with blood!
I myself will make a huge bonfire,
10 heap on the wood, light it,
cook the meat and add the spices —
the bones can just be burned.
11 Put the empty pot on the coals,
heat it till its copper bottom glows,
till its impurity melts inside it,
and its scum is burned away.
12 But the effort is in vain:
its layers of scum will not leave it;
so into the fire with its scum!
13 Because of your filthy lewdness,
because you refused to be purified
when I wanted to purify you;
now you will not be purified from your filth
until I have satisfied my fury on you.
14 “‘I, Adonai, have spoken it, and it will happen. I will do it, I will not turn back, I will not refrain or spare or relent. They will judge you as your ways and deeds deserve,’ says Adonai Elohim.”
11 I have behaved like a fool, but you forced me to do it — you who should have been commending me. For I am in no way inferior to the “super-emissaries,” even if I am nothing. 12 The things that prove I am an emissary — signs, wonders and miracles — were done in your presence, despite what I had to endure. 13 Is there any way in which you have been behind any of the other congregations, other than in my not having been a burden to you? For this unfairness, please forgive me!
14 Look, I am ready this third time to come and visit you; and I will not be a burden to you; for it is not what you own that I want, but you! Children are not supposed to save up for their parents, but parents for their children. 15 And as for me, I will most gladly spend everything I have and be spent myself too for your sakes. If I love you more, am I to be loved less?
16 Let it be granted, then, that I was not a burden to you; but, crafty fellow that I am, I took you with trickery! 17 Was it perhaps through someone I sent you 18 that I took advantage of you? I urged Titus to go and sent the brother with him; Titus didn’t take advantage of you, did he? Didn’t we live by the same Spirit and show you the same path?
19 Perhaps you think that all this time we have been defending ourselves before you. No, we have been speaking in the sight of God, as those united with the Messiah should; and, my dear friends, it is all for your upbuilding. 20 For I am afraid of coming and finding you not the way I want you to be, and also of not being found the way you want me to be. I am afraid of finding quarreling and jealousy, anger and rivalry, slander and gossip, arrogance and disorder. 21 I am afraid that when I come again, my God may humiliate me in your presence, and that I will be grieved over many of those who sinned in the past and have not repented of the impurity, fornication and debauchery that they have engaged in.
Copyright © 1998 by David H. Stern. All rights reserved.