Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

¹⁴ “So I, the Lord, will speak romantic words to her. I will lead her into the desert and speak tender words. ¹⁵ There I will give her vineyards. I will give her Achor Valley as a doorway of hope. Then she will answer as she did when she came out of the land of Egypt.” ¹⁶ This is what the Lord says.

“At that time you will call me ‘My husband.’ You will not call me ‘My Baal.’^{[a] 17} I will take the names of those false gods out of her mouth. Then people will not use those names again.

¹⁸ “At that time I will make an agreement for the Israelites with the animals of the field, the birds of the sky, and the crawling things on the ground. I will break the bow, the sword, and the weapons of war in that land. I will make the land safe, so the people of Israel can lie down in peace. ¹⁹ And I will make you my bride forever. I will make you my bride with goodness and justice and with love and mercy. ²⁰ I will make you my faithful bride. Then you will really know the Lord.

A song of David.

Servants of God’s New Agreement

3 Why are we beginning again to tell you all these good things about ourselves? Do we need letters of introduction to you or from you, like some other people? ² No, you yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts. It is known and read by all people. ³ You show that you are a letter from Christ that he sent through us. This letter is not written with ink but with the Spirit of the living God. It is not written on stone^[a] tablets but on human hearts.

⁴ We can say this, because through Christ we feel sure before God. ⁵ I don’t mean that we are able to do anything good ourselves. It is God who makes us able to do all that we do. ⁶ He made us able to be servants of a new agreement from himself to his people. It is not an agreement of written laws, but it is of the Spirit. The written law brings death, but the Spirit gives life.

Levi (Matthew) Follows Jesus^(A)

¹³ Jesus went to the lake again, and many people followed him there. So Jesus taught them. ¹⁴ He was walking beside the lake, and he saw a man named Levi, son of Alphaeus. Levi was sitting at his place for collecting taxes. Jesus said to him, “Follow me.” Then Levi stood up and followed Jesus.

¹⁵ Later that day, Jesus and his followers ate at Levi’s house. There were also many tax collectors and others with bad reputations eating with them. (There were many of these people who followed Jesus.) ¹⁶ When some teachers of the law who were Pharisees saw Jesus eating with such bad people, they asked his followers, “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?”

¹⁷ When Jesus heard this, he said to them, “It is the sick people who need a doctor, not those who are healthy. I did not come to invite good people. I came to invite sinners.”

Jesus Is Not Like Other Religious Leaders^(B)

¹⁸ The followers of John and the Pharisees were fasting. Some people came to Jesus and said, “John’s followers fast, and the followers of the Pharisees fast. But your followers don’t fast. Why?”

¹⁹ Jesus answered, “At a wedding the friends of the bridegroom are not sad while he is with them. They cannot fast while the bridegroom is still there. ²⁰ But the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them. Then they will fast.

²¹ “When someone sews a patch over a hole in an old coat, they never use a piece of cloth that is not yet shrunk. If they do, the patch will shrink and pull away from the coat. Then the hole will be worse. ²² Also, no one ever pours new wine into old wineskins. The wine would break them, and the wine would be ruined along with the wineskins. You always put new wine into new wineskins.”