Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
God Avenges His Own
94 God of vengeance,
Lord God of vengeance,
display your splendor![a]
2 Stand up, judge of the earth,
and repay the proud.
3 How long will the wicked, Lord,
how long will the wicked continue to triumph?
4 When they speak, they spew arrogance.
Everyone who practices iniquity brags about it.[b]
5 Lord, they have crushed your people,
afflicting your heritage.
6 The wicked[c] kill widows and foreigners;
they murder orphans.
7 They say, “The Lord cannot see,
and the God of Jacob will not notice.”
8 Pay attention, you dull ones among the crowds!
You fools! Will you ever become wise?
9 The one who formed[d] the ear can hear, can he not?
The one who made the eyes can see, can he not?
10 The one who disciplines nations can rebuke them, can he not?
The one who teaches mankind can discern, can he not?
11 The Lord knows the thoughts of human beings—
that they are futile.
12 How blessed is the man whom you instruct, Lord,
whom you teach from your Law,
13 keeping him calm when times are troubled
until a pit has been dug for the wicked.
14 For the Lord will not forsake his people;
he will not abandon his heritage.
15 Righteousness will be restored with justice,
and all the pure of heart will follow it.
16 Who will rise up for me against the wicked?
Who will stand for me against those who practice iniquity?
17 If the Lord had not been my helper,
I would have quickly become silent.
18 When I say that my foot is shaking,
your gracious love, Lord, will sustain me.
19 When my anxious inner thoughts become overwhelming,
your comfort encourages me.
20 Will destructive national leaders,[e]
who plan wicked things through misuse of the Law,
be allied with you?
21 They gather together against the righteous,
condemning the innocent to death.
22 But the Lord is my stronghold,
and my God, the rock, is my refuge.
23 He will repay them for their sin;
he will annihilate them because of their evil.
The Lord our God will annihilate them.
7 During Israel’s earlier history,[a] all things concerning redeeming or changing inheritances were confirmed by a man taking off his sandal and giving it to the other party,[b] thereby creating a public[c] record in Israel. 8 So when the nearer related redeemer told Boaz, “Make the purchase yourself,” he then took off his sandal.
Boaz’s Public Commitment
9 At this, Boaz addressed the elders and all of the people: “You all are witnesses today that I hereby redeem everything from Naomi that belonged to Elimelech, including what belonged to Chilion and Mahlon, 10 along with Mahlon’s wife Ruth the Moabite woman. I will marry her to continue the family name as an inheritance, so that the name of the deceased does not disappear from among his relatives, nor from the public record.[d] You are all witnesses today!”
11 Then all of the assembled people,[e] including the elders who were there, said, “We are witnesses! May the Lord make this woman who enters your house like Rachel and Leah, who together established the house of Israel. May you prosper in Ephrathah, and may you excel in Bethlehem! 12 Moreover, may your house be like the house of Perez, whom Tamar bore for Judah, from the offspring that the Lord gives you from this young woman.”
The Marriage of Boaz and Ruth
13 So Boaz took Ruth to be his wife, and when he had marital relations with her, the Lord made her conceive, and she bore a son. 14 Then the women of Bethlehem[f] told Naomi, “May the Lord be blessed,[g] who has not left you today without a related redeemer. May his name become famous throughout Israel! 15 And he will restore your life for you and will support you in your old age, because your daughter-in-law, who loves you and who has borne him, is better for you than seven sons!”
16 Naomi took care of the child, taking him to her breast and becoming his nurse. 17 So her women neighbors gave the child a nickname, which is “Naomi has a son!” They named him Obed. He became the father of Jesse, who was the father of David.
The Ancestry of David
18 This is the genealogy of Perez: Perez fathered Hezron, 19 Hezron fathered Ram, and Ram fathered Amminadab. 20 Amminadab fathered Nahshon, and Nahshon fathered Salmon. 21 Salmon fathered Boaz, and Boaz fathered Obed. 22 Then Obed fathered Jesse, who fathered David.
Jesus is Rejected at Nazareth(A)
16 Then Jesus[a] came to Nazareth, where he had been raised. As was his custom, he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day. When he stood up to read, 17 the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling the scroll, he found the place where it was written,
18 “The Spirit of the Lord[b] is upon me;
he has anointed me to tell
the good news to the poor.
He has sent me to announce release to the prisoners
and recovery of sight to the blind,
to set oppressed people free,
19 and to announce the year of the Lord’s[c] favor.”[d]
20 Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. While the eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fixed on him, 21 he began to say to them, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled, as you’ve heard it read aloud.”[e]
22 All the people began to speak well of him and to wonder at the gracious words that flowed from his mouth. They said, “This is Joseph’s son, isn’t it?”
23 So he told them, “You will probably quote this proverb to me, ‘Doctor, heal yourself! Do everything here in your hometown that we hear you did in Capernaum.’”
24 He added, “I tell all of you[f] with certainty, a prophet is not accepted in his hometown. 25 I’m telling you the truth—there were many widows in Israel in Elijah’s time, when it didn’t rain[g] for three years and six months and there was a severe famine everywhere in the land. 26 Yet Elijah wasn’t sent to a single one of those widows except to one at Zarephath in Sidon. 27 There were also many lepers in Israel in the prophet Elisha’s time, yet not one of them was cleansed except Naaman the Syrian.”
28 All the people in the synagogue became furious when they heard this. 29 They got up, forced Jesus[h] out of the city, and led him to the edge of the hill on which their city was built, intending to throw him off. 30 But he walked right through the middle of them and went away.
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