Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

Psalm 120

A Song of ^[a]Ascents.

¹ In my distress I cried to the Lord, and He answered me.

² Deliver me, O Lord, from lying lips and from deceitful tongues.

³ What shall be given to you? Or what more shall be done to you, you deceitful tongue?—

⁴ Sharp arrows of a [mighty] warrior, with [glowing] coals of the broom tree!

⁵ Woe is me that I sojourn with Meshech, that I dwell beside the tents of Kedar [as if among notoriously barbarous people]!^(A)

⁶ My life has too long had its dwelling with him who hates peace.

⁷ I am for peace; but when I speak, they are for war.

1 Now in the first year of ^[a]Cyrus king of Persia [almost seventy years after the first Jewish captives were taken to Babylon], that the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah might begin to be accomplished, the Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia so that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom and put it also in writing:^(A)

² Thus says Cyrus king of Persia: The Lord, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and He has charged me to build Him a house at Jerusalem in Judah.

³ Whoever is among you of all His people, may his God be with him, and let him go up to Jerusalem in Judah and rebuild the house of the Lord, the God of Israel, in Jerusalem; He is God.

⁴ And in any place where a survivor [of the Babylonian captivity of the Jews] sojourns, let the men of that place assist him with silver and gold, with goods and beasts, besides freewill offerings for the house of God in Jerusalem.

⁵ Then rose up the heads of the fathers’ houses of Judah and Benjamin, and the priests and Levites, with all those whose spirits God had stirred up, to go up to rebuild the house of the Lord in Jerusalem.

⁶ And all those who were around them aided them with vessels of silver, with gold, goods, beasts, and precious things, besides all that was willingly and freely offered.

⁷ Also Cyrus the king brought out the vessels of the house of the Lord, which Nebuchadnezzar had brought from Jerusalem [when he took that city] and had put in the house of his gods.

⁸ These Cyrus king of Persia directed Mithredath the treasurer to bring forth and count out to Sheshbazzar [who is Zerubbabel, recognized as the legitimate heir to the throne of David] the prince of Judah.

⁹ And they numbered: 30 basins of gold; 1,000 basins of silver; 29 sacrificial dishes;

¹⁰ Of gold bowls, 30; another sort of silver bowl, 410; and other vessels, 1,000.

¹¹ All the vessels of gold and of silver were 5,400. All these Sheshbazzar [the governor] brought with the people of the captivity from Babylon to Jerusalem.

¹² It is a reason for pride and exultation to which our conscience testifies that we have conducted ourselves in the world [generally] and especially toward you, with devout and pure motives and godly sincerity, not in fleshly wisdom but by the grace of God (the unmerited favor and ^[a]merciful kindness by which God, exerting His holy influence upon souls, turns them to Christ, and keeps, strengthens, and increases them in Christian virtues).

¹³ For we write you nothing else but simply what you can read and understand [there is no double meaning to what we say], and I hope that you will become thoroughly acquainted [with ^[b]divine things] and know and understand [them] accurately and well to the end,

¹⁴ [Just] as you have [already] partially known and understood and acknowledged us and recognized that you can [honestly] be proud of us, even as we [can be proud] of you on the day of our Lord Jesus.

¹⁵ It was with assurance of this that I wanted and planned to visit you first [of all], so that you might have a double favor and token of grace (goodwill).

¹⁶ [I wanted] to visit you on my way to Macedonia, and [then] to come again to you [on my return trip] from Macedonia and have you send me forward on my way to Judea.

¹⁷ Now because I changed my original plan, was I being unstable and capricious? Or what I plan, do I plan according to the flesh [like a worldly man], ready to say Yes, yes, [when it may mean] No, no?

¹⁸ As surely as God is trustworthy and faithful and means what He says, our speech and message to you have not been Yes [that might mean] No.

¹⁹ For the Son of God, Christ Jesus (the Messiah), Who has been preached among you by us, by myself, Silvanus, and Timothy, was not Yes and No; but in Him it is [always the divine] Yes.