Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
6 God, your throne will last forever and ever.
You will rule your kingdom with fairness.
7 You love right and hate evil.
So God has chosen you to rule those with you.
Your God has given you much joy.
8 Your clothes smell like myrrh, aloes and cassia.
From palaces of ivory
music comes to make you happy.
9 Kings’ daughters are among your honored women.
Your bride stands at your right side
wearing gold from Ophir.
10 Listen to me, daughter. Look and pay attention.
Forget your people and your father’s family.
11 The king loves your beauty.
Because he is your master, you should obey him.
12 People from the city of Tyre have brought a gift.
Wealthy people will want to meet you.
13 The princess is very beautiful.
Her gown is woven with gold.
14 In her beautiful clothes she is brought to the king.
Her bridesmaids follow behind her.
And they are also brought to him.
15 They come with happiness and joy.
They enter the king’s palace.
16 You will have sons to take the place of your ancestors.
You will make them rulers through all the land.
17 I will make your name famous from now on.
People will praise you forever and ever.
Hosea Buys Gomer Back
3 The Lord said to me, “Go, show your love to your wife again. She has had other lovers and has been unfaithful to you. But you must keep on loving her the way the Lord loves the people of Israel. This is true even though the Israelites worship other gods. They love to eat the raisin cakes.”[a]
2 So I bought Gomer for six ounces of silver and about ten bushels of barley. 3 Then I told her, “You must wait for me for many days. You must not be a prostitute. You must not be any other man’s lover. I, in turn, will wait for you.”
4 In the same way Israel will live many days without a king or leader. They will not have sacrifices or holy stone pillars. They will be without the holy vest or an idol. 5 After this, the people of Israel will return to the Lord their God. They will follow the Lord and the king from David’s family. In the last days they will come to the Lord. And he will bless them.
23 I tell you this, and I ask God to be my witness that this is true: The reason I did not come back to Corinth was that I did not want to punish or hurt you. 24 I do not mean that we are trying to control your faith. You are strong in faith. But we are workers with you for your own happiness.
2 So I decided that my next visit to you would not be another visit to make you sad. 2 If I make you sad, who will make me happy? Only you can make me happy—you whom I made sad. 3 I wrote you a letter for this reason: that when I came to you I would not be made sad by the people who should make me happy. I felt sure of all of you. I felt sure that you would share my joy. 4 When I wrote to you before, I was very troubled and unhappy in my heart. I wrote with many tears. I did not write to make you sad, but to let you know how much I love you.
Forgive the Sinner
5 Someone there among you has caused sadness. He caused this not to me, but to all of you—I mean he caused sadness to all in some way. (I do not want to make it sound worse than it really is.) 6 The punishment that most of you gave him is enough for him. 7 But now you should forgive him and comfort him. This will keep him from having too much sadness and giving up completely. 8 So I beg you to show him that you love him. 9 This is why I wrote to you. I wanted to test you and see if you obey in everything. 10 If you forgive someone, I also forgive him. And what I have forgiven—if I had anything to forgive—I forgave it for you, and Christ was with me. 11 I did this so that Satan would not win anything from us. We know very well what Satan’s plans are.
The Holy Bible, International Children’s Bible® Copyright© 1986, 1988, 1999, 2015 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission.