Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
12 Happy is the nation whose God is the Lord.
Happy are the people he chose for his very own.
13 The Lord looks down from heaven.
He sees every person.
14 From his throne he watches
everyone who lives on earth.
15 He made their hearts.
He understands everything they do.
16 No king is saved by his great army.
No warrior escapes by his great strength.
17 Horses can’t bring victory.
They can’t save by their strength.
18 But the Lord looks after those who fear him.
He watches over those who put their hope in his love.
19 He saves them from death.
He spares their lives in times of hunger.
20 So our hope is in the Lord.
He is our help, our shield to protect us.
21 We rejoice in him.
We trust his holy name.
22 Lord, show your love to us
as we put our hope in you.
6 I have seen something else unfair here on earth. It causes serious problems for people. 2 God gives some people great wealth, riches and honor. They have everything they want. But God does not let them enjoy such things. Someone else enjoys them instead. This is unfair and senseless. 3 It is sad when a person can’t enjoy the good things God gives him. Such a person might have 100 children. He might live a long time. But what good is it if he can’t enjoy the good God gives him? I say a baby who is born dead is better off than he is. 4 It is useless for such a baby to be born. It ends up in the darkness of the grave without even a name. 5 That baby never saw the sun. It never knew anything. But it finds more rest than the person who never gets to enjoy the good things God gives him. 6 Even if he lives 2,000 years, it is sad if a person can’t enjoy the good things God gives him. After all, both he and the baby born dead go to the same place—the grave.
Stephen’s Speech
7 The high priest said to Stephen, “Are these things true?”
2 Stephen answered, “Brothers and fathers, listen to me. Our glorious God appeared to Abraham, our ancestor. Abraham was in Mesopotamia before he lived in Haran. 3 God said to Abraham, ‘Leave your country and your relatives. Go to the land I will show you.’[a] 4 So Abraham left the country of Chaldea and went to live in Haran. After Abraham’s father died, God sent him to this place where you now live. 5 God did not give Abraham any of this land, not even a foot of it. But God promised that he would give him and his descendants this land. (This was before Abraham had any descendants.) 6 This is what God said to him: ‘Your descendants will be strangers in a land they don’t own. The people there will make them slaves. And they will do cruel things to them for 400 years. 7 But I will punish the nation where they are slaves. Then your descendants will leave that land. Then they will worship me in this place.’[b] 8 God made an agreement with Abraham; the sign for this agreement was circumcision. And so when Abraham had his son Isaac, Abraham circumcised him when he was eight days old. Isaac also circumcised his son Jacob. And Jacob did the same for his sons, the 12 ancestors[c] of our people.
The Holy Bible, International Children’s Bible® Copyright© 1986, 1988, 1999, 2015 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission.