Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
Trust in God’s Love
52 Why do you take pride in wrong-doing, O powerful man? The loving-kindness of God lasts all day long. 2 Your tongue makes plans to destroy like a sharp knife, you who lie. 3 You love what is bad more than what is good, and you speak lies more than you speak the truth. 4 You love all words that destroy, O lying tongue.
5 But God will destroy you forever. He will pick you up and pull you away from your tent. He will pull up your roots from the land of the living. 6 And those who are right will see and be afraid. They will laugh at him, saying, 7 “Look, the man who would not make God his safe place, but trusted in his many riches and was strong in his sinful desire.”
8 But I am like a green olive tree in the house of God. I trust in the loving-kindness of God forever and ever. 9 I will give You thanks forever because of what You have done. And I will hope in Your name, for it is good to be where those who belong to You are.
Words against Judah
11 “Then say to those of the house of the king of Judah, ‘Hear the Word of the Lord, 12 O house of David, the Lord says, “Do what is right every morning. Take the person who has been robbed away from the one who has made it hard for him. So My anger will not go out like fire and burn with no one to put it out, because of the sinful things you have done.
13 “See, I am against you, O you who live in the valley, O rock of the plain,” says the Lord, “you who say, ‘Who will come down against us? Or who will come into our houses?’ 14 I will punish you for what has come of what you have done,” says the Lord. “I will start a fire among your trees, and it will destroy all that is around it.”’”
22 I did not see a house of God in the city. The All-powerful Lord God and the Lamb are the house of God in this city. 23 There is no need for the sun and moon to shine in the city. The shining-greatness of God makes it full of light. The Lamb is its light. 24 The nations will walk by its light. The kings of the earth will bring their greatness into it. 25 The gates are open all day. They will never be shut. There will be no night there. 26 The greatness and honor of all the nations will be brought into it. 27 Nothing sinful will go into the city. No one who is sinful-minded or tells lies can go in. Only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life can go in.
More About the New Jerusalem
22 Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life. It was as clear as glass and came from the throne of God and of the Lamb. 2 It runs down the center of the street in the city. On each side of the river was the tree of life. It gives twelve different kinds of fruit. It gives this fruit twelve times a year, new fruit each month. Its leaves are used to heal the nations.
3 There will be nothing in the city that is sinful. The place where God and the Lamb sit will be there. The servants He owns will serve Him. 4 They will see His face and His name will be written on their foreheads. 5 There will be no night there. There will be no need for a light or for the sun. Because the Lord God will be their light. They will be leaders forever.
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