Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

A Prayer to Be Saved from Death

88 O Lord, the God Who saves me, I have cried out before You day and night. ² Let my prayer come to You. Listen to my cry. ³ For my soul is filled with troubles. And my life comes near the grave. ⁴ I am added among those who go down into the deep hole. I am like a man without strength. ⁵ I am left among the dead, like those who have been killed and lie in the grave, whom You remember no more. They are cut off from Your help. ⁶ You have put me in the deepest hole, in a dark and deep place. ⁷ Your anger has rested upon me. And You have troubled me with all Your waves. ⁸ You have taken my good friends far from me. You have made me hated by them. I am shut in and cannot go out. ⁹ My eyes have become weak because of trouble. I have called to You every day, O Lord. I have spread out my hands to You.

¹⁰ Will You show Your great works to the dead? Will the dead rise and praise You? ¹¹ Will Your loving-kindness be told about in the grave, and how faithful You are in the place that destroys? ¹² Will Your great works be known in the darkness, and Your right and good works in the land where all is forgotten?

¹³ But I have cried to You for help, O Lord. My prayer comes to You in the morning. ¹⁴ O Lord, why do You turn away from me? Why do You hide Your face from me? ¹⁵ I have been troubled and near death since I was young. I have suffered Your punishment. And I cannot win. ¹⁶ Your burning anger has passed over me. The punishment You have sent destroys me. ¹⁷ They gather around me like water all day long. Together they close in upon me. ¹⁸ You have taken my friend and loved one far from me. Friends that were near to me are in darkness.

¹⁹ ‘When a woman has something flowing from her body, and if it is blood, she will be unclean for seven days. Whoever touches her will be unclean until evening. ²⁰ Everything she lies on while she is unclean will be unclean. And everything she sits on will be unclean. ²¹ Whoever touches her bed must wash his clothes and wash himself in water and be unclean until evening. ²² Whoever touches anything she sits on must wash his clothes and wash himself in water and be unclean until evening. ²³ If he touches anything on her bed or where she sat, he will be unclean until evening. ²⁴ If a man lies with her so that her blood is on him, he will be unclean for seven days. And every bed he lies on will be unclean.

²⁵ ‘If a woman has a flow of blood for many days, at a different time than when it happens each month, or if the blood flows longer at that time, all the days the blood flows she will be unclean. It will be as if it were the time when she is unclean each month. She will be unclean. ²⁶ Any bed she lies on while her blood is flowing will be like the bed during the time she is unclean and whatever she sits on will be unclean. ²⁷ Whoever touches them will be unclean. He must wash his clothes and wash himself in water and be unclean until evening. ²⁸ When she becomes clean from her flow, she will wait seven days. After that she will be clean. ²⁹ On the eighth day she will take two turtle-doves or two young pigeons, and bring them to the religious leader at the door of the meeting tent. ³⁰ The religious leader will give one for a sin gift and the other for a burnt gift. In this way the woman will be clean before the Lord from the flow of blood that made her unclean.’

³¹ “In this way you will keep the people of Israel away from whatever makes them unclean or they will die because of making My meeting tent unclean that is among them.”

Giving to Help Other Christians

9 I do not need to write to you about helping those who belong to Christ. ² I know you want to do it. I have told the people in the country of Macedonia that you were ready to send money last year. Your desire has started most of them to give. ³ I am sending these Christian brothers so the words I said about you will prove to be true and you will be ready to help. ⁴ What if some of the people of Macedonia came with me and found you were not ready to send your gift of money? We would all be ashamed since we have talked of you so much. ⁵ That is why I asked these men to go ahead of me. They can see that the gift you promised is ready. In that way, it will be a true gift and not something you were made to do.