Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

⁹ Because you have made the Lord your safe place, and the Most High the place where you live, ¹⁰ nothing will hurt you. No trouble will come near your tent.

¹¹ For He will tell His angels to care for you and keep you in all your ways. ¹² They will hold you up in their hands. So your foot will not hit against a stone. ¹³ You will walk upon the lion and the snake. You will crush under your feet the young lion and the snake.

¹⁴ Because he has loved Me, I will bring him out of trouble. I will set him in a safe place on high, because he has known My name. ¹⁵ He will call upon Me, and I will answer him. I will be with him in trouble. I will take him out of trouble and honor him. ¹⁶ I will please him with a long life. And I will show him My saving power.

Babylon Is Punished

47 “Come down and sit in the dust, O pure daughter of Babylon. Sit on the ground without a throne, O people of the Babylonians. For you will no longer be called soft and gentle. ² Take the heavy stones and grind grain. Take off your face-covering and your clothing. Take the covering off your legs, and cross the rivers. ³ Your body will not be covered, and your shame will be seen. I will punish, and will not show pity to any man.” ⁴ The One Who bought us and saves us, the Lord of All is His name, the Holy One of Israel. ⁵ “Sit and be quiet, and go into darkness, O people of the Babylonians. For you will no more be called the queen of nations. ⁶ I was angry with My people. I made My chosen nation unclean, and gave them into your hand. You did not show loving-kindness to them. On the older people you made your load very heavy. ⁷ You said, ‘I will be a queen forever.’ So you did not think about these things, or remember what might happen.

⁸ “So now hear this, you who love the desires of the body, who live without fear of danger. You say in your heart, ‘I am, and there is no one besides me. I will not sit as a woman whose husband has died, and I will not lose my children.’ ⁹ But these two things will come upon you all at once in one day. You will lose your children and your husband. All this trouble will come to you, even with all your witchcraft and the strong power of your sinful secret ways.

The Sinful Woman

17 Then one of the seven angels who had the seven jars came to me. He said, “Come! I will show you how the powerful woman who sells the use of her body will be punished. She sits on the many waters of the world. ² The kings of the earth have done sex sins with her. People of the world have been made drunk with the wine of her sex sins.”

³ I was carried away in the Spirit by the angel to a desert. I saw a woman sitting on a red wild animal. It had seven heads and ten horns. All over the red wild animal was written bad names which spoke against God. ⁴ The woman was wearing purple and red clothes. She was wearing gold and pearls and stones worth much money. She had in her hand a gold cup full of sinful things from her sex sins. ⁵ There was a name written on her forehead which had a secret meaning. It said, “The big and powerful Babylon, mother of all women who sell the use of their bodies and mother of everything sinful of the earth.” ⁶ I looked at the woman. She was drunk with the blood of God’s people and those who had been killed for telling about Jesus. When I saw her, I wondered very much.

⁷ The angel asked me, “Why do you wonder? I will tell you the secret about this woman and the red wild animal that carries her. It is the red wild animal with seven heads and ten horns. ⁸ The red wild animal you saw was alive but is now dead. He will come up from the hole without a bottom and be destroyed. The people of the earth, whose names have not been written in the book of life from the beginning of the world, will be surprised as they look at the red wild animal. He was alive, but not now, but will yet come.

⁹ “Here is where we need wisdom. The seven heads of the animal are mountains where the woman sits. ¹⁰ They are seven kings also. Five of them are no longer kings. The sixth one is now king. The seventh one will be king, but only for a little while. ¹¹ The red wild animal that died is the eighth king. He belongs to the first seven kings, but he will be destroyed also.

¹² “The ten horns of the red wild animal which you saw are ten kings. They have not become leaders yet. But they will be given the right and the power to lead their nations for one hour with the red wild animal. ¹³ They agree to give the right and the power to the red wild animal. ¹⁴ These kings will fight and make war with the Lamb. But the Lamb will win the war because He is Lord of lords and King of kings. His people are the called and chosen and faithful ones.”

¹⁵ Then the angel said to me, “You saw the waters where the woman who sold the use of her body is sitting. The waters are people and large groups of people and nations and languages. ¹⁶ The ten horns you saw and the red wild animal will hate the woman who sold the use of her body. They will take everything from her and even her clothes. They will eat her flesh and burn her with fire. ¹⁷ God put in their minds a plan that would carry out His desire. They will agree to give their nation to the red wild animal until the words of God have been completed. ¹⁸ The woman you saw is the big and powerful city that has power over the kings of the earth.”