Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

This psalm is a song that the sons of Korah wrote.

God's holy city^[a]

God makes Naaman well again

5 Naaman was the leader of the king of Syria's army. Naaman's master respected him as a great man. The Lord had used Naaman to help Syria win wars against their enemies. Naaman was a brave soldier, but he had a bad disease of his skin.^[a]

² Groups of soldiers from Syria had gone to attack places in Israel. They had caught a young girl as their prisoner. She became a servant of Naaman's wife. ³ One day, the girl said to her master's wife, ‘I would like my master Naaman to meet the prophet who is in Samaria. The prophet would take away his disease.’

⁴ So Naaman went to see his master, the king of Syria. He told him what the girl from Israel had said. ⁵ The king of Syria replied, ‘Go to meet this prophet! I will send a letter to the king of Israel.’ So Naaman went to Israel. He took with him 30,000 pieces of silver, 6,000 pieces of gold, and 10 sets of clothes. ⁶ He also took the letter for the king of Israel. The message from the king of Syria said, ‘I am sending my servant Naaman to you, with this letter. I want you to take away the disease of his skin.’

⁷ When the king of Israel read the letter, he was very upset. He tore his clothes. He said, ‘I am not God, am I? I cannot kill people or make them alive again. Why does he think that I can make this man well again? I see that he is trying to start a fight with me.’

⁸ Elisha, the man of God, heard that the king of Israel had torn his clothes. So he sent this message to him: ‘You did not have to tear your clothes. Tell the man from Syria to come to me. Then he will know that there is a true prophet in Israel.’

⁹ So Naaman went to see Elisha. He took with him his horses and his chariots. He stood outside the door of Elisha's house. ¹⁰ Elisha sent his servant with a message to Naaman. He said, ‘Go to the Jordan River. Wash yourself seven times in the river. Then your skin will be clean again. You will not have the disease.’

¹¹ But Naaman was angry and he went away. He said, ‘I thought that the prophet would come out of his house to see me. Then he would stand here with me. He would pray in the name of the Lord his God. Then he would move his hand over the bad place in my skin. After that my skin would be clean again. That is what I thought he would do. ¹² The Abana and Pharpar rivers in Damascus are better than any of the rivers in Israel. Surely, I could wash in those rivers and become clean!’ So Naaman turned around and he went away. He was very angry.

¹³ But Naaman's servants went to him. One of them said, ‘My master, the prophet might have asked you to do something very difficult. Then you surely would have done it! Now he says to you, “Wash yourself! Then you will be clean.” That is much easier for you to do.’

¹⁴ So Naaman went down to the Jordan River. He washed himself in it seven times, as the man of God had told him to do. Naaman's skin became well again. It became as clean as a young child's skin.

Paul and Barnabas go to Jerusalem

15 Some men arrived in Antioch from Judea.^[a] They began to teach the believers there who were not Jews. They said to them, ‘God cannot save you unless someone circumcises you. This is in the Law that God gave to Moses.’

² Paul and Barnabas did not agree with these men. They argued strongly against them. As a result, the believers in Antioch decided what to do. They chose Paul, Barnabas and some of the other believers to go to Jerusalem. They should go to meet with the apostles and the other leaders of the believers. The leaders should decide who was right in this quarrel. ³ The group of believers at Antioch sent Paul, Barnabas and the other men on their way. They travelled through Phoenicia and Samaria. They spoke to the believers in those places. They told them, ‘Gentiles are also turning to God and they are believing in Jesus.’ The believers were all very happy to hear this news. ⁴ When Paul, Barnabas and the other men arrived in Jerusalem, they met with the believers there. The apostles, the other leaders and the whole group of believers were happy to see them. Paul and Barnabas told them about everything that God had helped them to do.

⁵ Some Jewish believers were there who also belonged to the Pharisees' group. They stood up and they said, ‘We must circumcise Gentiles when they become believers. We must tell them to obey all the Law that God gave to Moses.’

⁶ So the apostles and the other leaders of the believers met to talk about this problem. ⁷ After they had all talked about this problem for a long time, Peter stood up to speak.^[b] He said, ‘My friends, you know that, a long time ago, God chose me from among all you leaders. He wanted me to teach Gentiles the good news about Jesus. God wanted them to hear his message and to believe in Jesus. ⁸ God knows what people truly believe. He showed clearly that he accepts Gentile believers as his people. He gave his Holy Spirit to them in the same way that he did for us. ⁹ He made no difference between them and us. When they believed in Jesus, he saved them. He made them clean inside.

¹⁰ So do not say that God has done a wrong thing. God has shown us that he accepts Gentiles when they believe in Jesus. If you make the Gentile believers obey the Law of Moses, that is like a heavy weight on their necks. Even we Jews and our ancestors could not carry that heavy weight. ¹¹ God saves us who are Jews when we believe in Jesus. It is not because we obey the Law of Moses. It is because the Lord Jesus is kind to us. God saves Gentiles in the same way, when they believe in Jesus.’

¹² After Peter said this everybody in the group was quiet. Then Barnabas and Paul spoke to them. They said, ‘God helped us to do great miracles among the Gentiles. These showed that God was with us.’

¹³ When they had finished their report, James spoke to the group. He said, ‘Listen to me, my friends. ¹⁴ Simon Peter has just described to us what happened first with the Gentile believers. He explained how God chose some of them to belong to him as his own people.

¹⁵ The message of God's prophets agrees completely with this. They wrote long ago:

¹⁶ The Lord God said,

¹⁹ James then said, ‘So this is what I have decided about this problem. Many Gentiles are now turning to God as believers. We should not make it difficult for them. ²⁰ Instead of that, we should write a letter to tell them how to live as believers. We should say to them, “Do not eat any food which people have given to their idols. That food has become unclean. Do not have sex with anyone that you are not married to. If people have strangled an animal to kill it, do not eat its meat. Do not eat anything that still has blood in it.”^{[e] 21} These rules are important, because people have known the Law of Moses for a very long time. On every Jewish day of rest, someone teaches us about the Law in our Jewish meeting places in every city.’