Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

⁶ Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever; a sceptre of uprightness is the sceptre of thy kingdom:

⁷ Thou hast loved righteousness, and hated wickedness; therefore God, thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy companions.

⁸ Myrrh and aloes, cassia, are all thy garments; out of ivory palaces stringed instruments have made thee glad.

⁹ Kings' daughters are among thine honourable women; upon thy right hand doth stand the queen in gold of Ophir.

¹⁰ Hearken, daughter, and see, and incline thine ear; and forget thine own people and thy father's house:

¹¹ And the king will desire thy beauty; for he is thy Lord, and worship thou him.

¹² And the daughter of Tyre with a gift, the rich ones among the people, shall court thy favour.

¹³ All glorious is the king's daughter within; her clothing is of wrought gold:

¹⁴ She shall be brought unto the king in raiment of embroidery; the virgins behind her, her companions, shall be brought in unto thee:

¹⁵ With joy and gladness shall they be brought; they shall enter into the king's palace.

¹⁶ Instead of thy fathers shall be thy sons; princes shalt thou make them in all the earth.

¹⁷ I will make thy name to be remembered throughout all generations; therefore shall the peoples praise thee for ever and ever.

14 O Israel, return unto Jehovah thy God; for thou hast fallen by thine iniquity.

² Take with you words, and turn to Jehovah; say unto him, Forgive all iniquity, and receive [us] graciously; so will we render the calves of our lips.

³ Assyria shall not save us; we will not ride upon horses: neither will we say any more to the work of our hands, [Thou art] our God; because in thee the fatherless findeth mercy.

⁴ I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely; for mine anger is turned away from him.

⁵ I will be as the dew unto Israel: he shall blossom as the lily, and cast forth his roots as Lebanon.

⁶ His shoots shall spread, and his beauty shall be as the olive-tree, and his smell as Lebanon.

⁷ They shall return and sit under his shadow; they shall revive [as] corn, and blossom as the vine: the renown thereof shall be as the wine of Lebanon.

⁸ Ephraim [shall say], What have I to do any more with idols? (I answer [him], and I will observe him.) I am like a green fir-tree.—From me is thy fruit found.

⁹ Who is wise, and he shall understand these things? intelligent, and he shall know them? For the ways of Jehovah are right, and the just shall walk in them; but the transgressors shall fall therein.

11 Would that ye would bear with me [in] a little folly; but indeed bear with me.

² For I am jealous as to you with a jealousy [which is] of God; for I have espoused you unto one man, to present [you] a chaste virgin to Christ.

³ But I fear lest by any means, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craft, [so] your thoughts should be corrupted from simplicity as to the Christ.

⁴ For if indeed he that comes preaches another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or ye get a different Spirit, which ye have not got, or a different glad tidings, which ye have not received, ye might well bear with [it].

⁵ For I reckon that in nothing I am behind those who are in surpassing degree apostles.

⁶ But if [I am] a simple person in speech, yet not in knowledge, but in everything making [the truth] manifest in all things to you.

⁷ Have I committed sin, abasing myself in order that *ye* might be exalted, because I gratuitously announced to you the glad tidings of God?

⁸ I spoiled other assemblies, receiving hire for ministry towards you.

⁹ And being present with you and lacking, I did not lazily burden any one, (for the brethren who came from Macedonia supplied what I lacked,) and in everything I kept myself from being a burden to you, and will keep myself.

¹⁰ [The] truth of Christ is in me that this boasting shall not be stopped as to me in the regions of Achaia.

¹¹ Why? because I do not love you? God knows.

¹² But what I do, I will also do, that I may cut off the opportunity of those wishing [for] an opportunity, that wherein they boast they may be found even as we.

¹³ For such [are] false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into apostles of Christ.

¹⁴ And [it is] not wonderful, for Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light.

¹⁵ It is no great thing therefore if his ministers also transform themselves as ministers of righteousness; whose end shall be according to their works.