Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

Psalm 92

A Psalm. A song for the Sabbath day.

¹ It is a good and delightful thing to give thanks to the Lord, to sing praises [with musical accompaniment] to Your name, O Most High,

² To show forth Your loving-kindness in the morning and Your faithfulness by night,

³ With an instrument of ten strings and with the lute, with a solemn sound upon the lyre.

⁴ For You, O Lord, have made me glad by Your works; at the deeds of Your hands I joyfully sing.

⁵ How great are Your doings, O Lord! Your thoughts are very deep.

⁶ A man in his rude and uncultivated state knows not, neither does a [self-confident] fool understand this:

⁷ That though the wicked spring up like grass and all evildoers flourish, they are doomed to be destroyed forever.

⁸ But You, Lord, are on high forever.

⁹ For behold, Your adversaries, O Lord, for behold, Your enemies shall perish; all the evildoers shall be scattered.

¹⁰ But my horn (emblem of excessive strength and stately grace) You have exalted like that of a wild ox; I am anointed with fresh oil.

¹¹ My eye looks upon those who lie in wait for me; my ears hear the evildoers that rise up against me.

¹² The [uncompromisingly] righteous shall flourish like the palm tree [be long-lived, stately, upright, useful, and fruitful]; they shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon [majestic, stable, durable, and incorruptible].

¹³ Planted in the house of the Lord, they shall flourish in the courts of our God.

¹⁴ [Growing in grace] they shall still bring forth fruit in old age; they shall be full of sap [of spiritual vitality] and [rich in the] verdure [of trust, love, and contentment].

¹⁵ [They are living memorials] to show that the Lord is upright and faithful to His promises; He is my Rock, and there is no unrighteousness in Him.^(A)

²³ The desire of the [consistently] righteous brings only good, but the expectation of the wicked brings wrath.

²⁴ There are those who [generously] scatter abroad, and yet increase more; there are those who withhold more than is fitting or what is justly due, but it results only in want.

²⁵ The liberal person shall be enriched, and he who waters shall himself be watered.^(A)

²⁶ The people curse him who holds back grain [when the public needs it], but a blessing [from God and man] is upon the head of him who sells it.

²⁷ He who diligently seeks good seeks [God’s] favor, but he who searches after evil, it shall come upon him.

²⁸ He who leans on, trusts in, and is confident in his riches shall fall, but the [uncompromisingly] righteous shall flourish like a green bough.

²⁹ He who troubles his own house shall inherit the wind, and the foolish shall be servant to the wise of heart.

³⁰ The fruit of the [uncompromisingly] righteous is a tree of life, and he who is wise captures human lives [for God, as a fisher of men—he gathers and receives them for eternity].^(B)

¹⁰ Then the disciples came to Him and said, Why do You speak to them in parables?

¹¹ And He replied to them, To you it has been given to know the secrets and mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given.

¹² For whoever has [spiritual knowledge], to him will more be given and he will ^[a]be furnished richly so that he will have abundance; but from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away.

¹³ This is the reason that I speak to them in parables: because ^[b]having the power of seeing, they do not see; and ^[c]having the power of hearing, they do not hear, nor do they grasp and understand.

¹⁴ In them indeed is ^[d]the process of fulfillment of the prophecy of Isaiah, which says: You shall indeed hear and hear but never grasp and understand; and you shall indeed look and look but never see and perceive.

¹⁵ For this nation’s heart has grown gross (fat and dull), and their ears heavy and difficult of hearing, and their eyes they have tightly closed, lest they see and perceive with their eyes, and hear and comprehend the sense with their ears, and grasp and understand with their heart, and turn and I should heal them.^(A)

¹⁶ But blessed (happy, fortunate, and ^[e]to be envied) are your eyes because they do see, and your ears because they do hear.

¹⁷ Truly I tell you, many prophets and righteous men [men who were upright and in right standing with God] yearned to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.