Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
5 Now I will sing to my Beloved a song of my Beloved to His vineyard. My Beloved had a vineyard on a very fruitful hill.
2 And He hedged it and gathered out the stones from it. And he planted it with the best plants. And he built a tower in its midst, and made a winepress therein. Then He expected it to bring forth grapes. But it brought forth sour grapes.
3 “Now therefore, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, judge, please, between Me and My vineyard.
4 “What more could I have done to My vineyard that I have not done to it? Why, when I expected it to bring forth grapes, has it brought forth sour grapes?
5 “And now I will tell you what I will do to My vineyard. I will take away its hedge, and it shall be eaten up. I will break its wall, and it shall be trodden down.
6 “And I will lay it waste. It shall be neither cut nor dug, but briers and thorns shall grow up. I will also Command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it.”
7 Surely the vineyard of the LORD of Hosts is the House of Israel. And the men of Judah are His pleasant plant. And he looked for judgment—but behold, oppression; for righteousness—but behold, a crying.
7 Turn us again, O God of Hosts. Cause Your face to shine, and we shall be saved.
8 You have brought a vine out of Egypt. You have cast out the heathen and planted it.
9 You made room for it, and caused it to take root, and it filled the land.
10 The mountains were covered with the shadow of it; and the boughs thereof were like the pleasant cedars.
11 She stretched out her branches to the sea, and her boughs to the river.
12 Why have You broken down her hedges, so that all those who pass by the way have plucked her?
13 The wild boar, out of the wood, has destroyed it; and the wild beasts of the field have eaten it up.
14 Return, we beg You, O God of Hosts! Look down from Heaven and behold, and visit this vine
15 and the vineyard that Your right hand has planted, and the young vine which You made strong for Yourself.
4 though I might also have confidence in the flesh. If anyone else thinks that he might have confidence in the flesh, more so I—
5 circumcised the eighth day; of the kindred of Israel; of the tribe of Benjamin; a Hebrew of Hebrews; by the Law, a Pharisee.
6 Concerning zeal, I persecuted the Church. According to righteousness (which is in the Law), I had become blameless.
7 But whatever things that were gain to me, the same I have counted as loss for Christ’s sake.
8 Indeed, also, I count all things but loss for the sake of the surpassing knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for Whom I have counted all things loss and judge them to be garbage, so that I may gain Christ
9 and be found in Him—that is, not having my own righteousness (which is of the Law) but that which is through faith in Christ (the righteousness which is from God by faith) —
10 so that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His suffering and be conformed to His death
11 (if by any means I might attain to the resurrection from the dead).
12 Not that I have already attained to it or been perfected. But I follow so that I may seize that for which I also was seized by Christ Jesus.
13 Brothers, I do not count myself as having seized it. But one thing I do: I forget that which is behind and stretch forward toward that which is ahead;
14 and follow hard toward the mark, for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
33 “Hear another parable. There was a certain landowner who planted a vineyard and fenced it in. And he made a winepress therein, and built a tower, and let it out to tenant farmers, and went away to a strange country.
34 “And when the time of the fruit drew near, he sent his servants to the farmers to receive the fruits thereof.
35 “And the farmers took his servants and beat one, killed another, and stoned another.
36 “Again, he sent other servants (more than the first) and they did likewise to them.
37 “But last of all he sent his own son to them, saying, ‘They will revere my son’.
38 “But when the farmers saw the son, they said among themselves, ‘This is the heir. Come, let us kill him. And let us take his inheritance.’
39 “So they took him, and cast him out of the vineyard, and killed him.
40 “Therefore, when the Lord of the vineyard shall come, what will he do to those farmers?”
41 They said to Him, “He will cruelly destroy those wicked men, and will let out his vineyard to other farmers who shall deliver the fruits to him in their seasons.”
42 Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the Scriptures, ‘The stone which the builders refused, the same is made the Cornerstone. This was the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes’?
43 “Therefore I say to you the Kingdom of God shall be taken from you and shall be given to a nation which shall bring forth the fruits thereof.
44 “And the one who shall fall on this stone, shall be broken. But on whomever it shall fall, it will grind to powder.
45 And when the chief priests and Pharisees had heard His parables, they perceived that He spoke of them.
46 And they, seeking to lay hands on Him, feared the people. Because they took Him as a Prophet.
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