Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
Wishing to Be Near God
A song of David when he was in the desert of Judah.
63 God, you are my God.
I want to follow you.
My whole being
thirsts for you,
like a man in a dry, empty land
where there is no water.
2 I have seen you in the Temple.
I have seen your strength and glory.
3 Your love is better than life.
I will praise you.
4 I will praise you as long as I live.
I will lift up my hands in prayer to your name.
5 I will be content as if I had eaten the best foods.
My lips will sing. My mouth will praise you.
6 I remember you while I’m lying in bed.
I think about you through the night.
7 You are my help.
Because of your protection, I sing.
8 I stay close to you.
You support me with your right hand.
9 Some people are trying to kill me.
But they will go down to the grave.
10 They will be killed with swords.
They will be eaten by wild dogs.
11 But the king will rejoice in his God.
All who make promises in his name will praise him.
But the mouths of liars will be shut.
7 The Lord used his name, the Pride of Jacob, to make a promise. He said, “I will never forget what these people did.
8 The whole land will shake because of it.
Everyone who lives in the land will cry for those who died.
The whole land will rise like the Nile.
It will be shaken, and then it will fall
like the Nile River in Egypt.”
9 The Lord God says:
“At that time I will cause the sun to go down at noon.
I will make the earth dark on a clear day.
10 I will change your festivals into days of crying for the dead.
All your songs will become songs of sadness for the dead.
I will make all of you wear rough cloth to show your sadness.
You will shave your heads to show sadness.
I will make that day like the crying for the death of an only son.
Its end will be very painful.”
11 The Lord God says: “The days are coming
when I will cause a time of hunger in the land.
The people will not be hungry for bread or thirsty for water.
But they will be hungry for words from the Lord.
12 People will wander from the Mediterranean Sea to the Dead Sea.
They will wander from the north to the east.
They will search for the word of the Lord.
But they won’t find it.
13 At that time the beautiful young women and the young men
will become weak from thirst.
14 They made promises by the idol in Samaria.
They said, ‘As surely as the god of Dan lives . . .’
And they said, ‘As surely as the god of Beersheba[a] lives, we promise . . .’
So they will fall
and never get up again.”
20 Brothers, do not think like children. In evil things be like babies. But in your thinking you should be like full-grown men. 21 It is written in the Scriptures:
“I will use strange words and foreign languages
to speak to these people.
But even then they will not listen.” Isaiah 28:11-12
That is what the Lord says.
22 So the gift of speaking in different kinds of languages is a sign for those who do not believe, not for those who believe. And prophecy is for people who believe, not for those who do not believe. 23 Suppose the whole church meets together and everyone speaks in different languages. If some people come in who are without understanding or do not believe, they will say you are crazy. 24 But suppose everyone is prophesying and someone comes in who does not believe or is without understanding. If everyone is prophesying, his sin will be shown to him, and he will be judged by all that he hears. 25 The secret things in his heart will be made known. So he will bow down and worship God. He will say, “Truly, God is with you.”
The Holy Bible, International Children’s Bible® Copyright© 1986, 1988, 1999, 2015 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission.