Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

Psalm 17

A Prayer of David.

¹ Hear the right (my righteous cause), O Lord; listen to my shrill, piercing cry! Give ear to my prayer, that comes from unfeigned and guileless lips.

² Let my sentence of vindication come from You! May Your eyes behold the things that are just and upright.

³ You have proved my heart; You have visited me in the night; You have tried me and find nothing [no evil purpose in me]; I have purposed that my mouth shall not transgress.

⁴ Concerning the works of men, by the word of Your lips I have avoided the ways of the violent (the paths of the destroyer).

⁵ My steps have held closely to Your paths [to the tracks of the One Who has gone on before]; my feet have not slipped.

⁶ I have called upon You, O God, for You will hear me; incline Your ear to me and hear my speech.

⁷ Show Your marvelous loving-kindness, O You Who save by Your right hand those who trust and take refuge in You from those who rise up against them.

⁸ Keep and guard me as the pupil of Your eye; hide me in the shadow of Your wings

⁹ From the wicked who despoil and oppress me, my deadly adversaries who surround me.

¹⁰ They are enclosed in their own prosperity and have shut up their hearts to pity; with their mouths they make exorbitant claims and proudly and arrogantly speak.

¹¹ They track us down in each step we take; now they surround us; they set their eyes to cast us to the ground,

¹² Like a lion greedy and eager to tear his prey, and as a young lion lurking in hidden places.

¹³ Arise, O Lord! Confront and forestall them, cast them down! Deliver my life from the wicked by Your sword,

¹⁴ From men by Your hand, O Lord, from men of this world [these poor moths of the night] whose portion in life is idle and vain. Their bellies are filled with Your hidden treasure [what You have stored up]; their children are satiated, and they leave the rest [of their] wealth to their babes.

¹⁵ As for me, I will continue beholding Your face in righteousness (rightness, justice, and right standing with You); I shall be fully satisfied, when I awake [to find myself] beholding Your form [and having sweet communion with You].

⁵ Thus says the Lord: Cursed [with great evil] is the strong man who trusts in and relies on frail man, making weak [human] flesh his arm, and whose mind and heart turn aside from the Lord.

⁶ For he shall be like a shrub or a person naked and destitute in the desert; and he shall not see any good come, but shall dwell in the parched places in the wilderness, in an uninhabited salt land.

⁷ [Most] blessed is the man who believes in, trusts in, and relies on the Lord, and whose hope and confidence the Lord is.

⁸ For he shall be like a tree planted by the waters that spreads out its roots by the river; and it shall not see and fear when heat comes; but its leaf shall be green. It shall not be anxious and full of care in the year of drought, nor shall it cease yielding fruit.

⁹ The heart is deceitful above all things, and it is exceedingly perverse and corrupt and severely, mortally sick! Who can know it [perceive, understand, be acquainted with his own heart and mind]?^(A)

¹⁰ I the Lord search the mind, I try the heart, even to give to every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his doings.

¹¹ Like the partridge that gathers a brood which she did not hatch and sits on eggs which she has not laid, so is he who gets riches by unjust means and not by right. He will leave them, or they will leave him, in the midst of his days, and at his end he will be a fool.

¹² A glorious throne, set on high from the beginning, is the place of our sanctuary (the temple).

¹³ O Lord, the Hope of Israel, all who forsake You shall be put to shame. They who depart from You and me [Your prophet] shall [disappear like] writing upon the ground, because they have forsaken the Lord, the Fountain of living waters.

¹⁴ Heal me, O Lord, and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved, for You are my praise.

¹⁵ Behold, they say to me, Where is the word of the Lord [predicting the disaster that you said would befall us]? Let it come now!

¹⁶ But as for me, I have not sought to escape from being a shepherd after You, nor have I desired the woeful day [of judgment]; You know that. Whatever I said was spoken in Your presence and was from You.

¹⁷ Be not a terror to me; You are my refuge and my hope in the day of evil.

¹⁸ Let those be put to shame who persecute me, but let me not be put to shame; let them be dismayed, but let me not be dismayed. Bring on them the day of evil, and destroy them with double destruction.

²² Then a blind and dumb man under the power of a demon was brought to Jesus, and He cured him, so that the blind and dumb man both spoke and saw.

²³ And all the [crowds of] people were stunned with bewildered wonder and said, This cannot be the Son of David, can it?

²⁴ But the Pharisees, hearing it, said, This ^[a]Man drives out demons only by and with the help of Beelzebub, the prince of demons.

²⁵ And knowing their thoughts, He said to them, Any kingdom that is divided against itself is being brought to desolation and laid waste, and no city or house divided against itself will last or continue to stand.

²⁶ And if Satan drives out Satan, he has become divided against himself and disunified; how then will his kingdom last or continue to stand?

²⁷ And if I drive out the demons by [help of] Beelzebub, by whose [help] do your sons drive them out? ^[b]For this reason they shall be your judges.

²⁸ But if it is by the Spirit of God that I drive out the demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you [^[c]before you expected it].

²⁹ Or how can a person go into a strong man’s house and carry off his goods (the entire equipment of his house) without first binding the strong man? Then indeed he may plunder his house.

³⁰ He who is not with Me [definitely ^[d]on My side] is against Me, and he who does not [definitely] gather with Me and for ^[e]My side scatters.

³¹ Therefore I tell you, every sin and blasphemy (every evil, abusive, ^[f]injurious speaking, or indignity against sacred things) can be forgiven men, but blasphemy against the [Holy] Spirit shall not and ^[g]cannot be forgiven.

³² And whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but whoever speaks against the Spirit, the Holy One, will not be forgiven, either in this world and age or in the world and age to come.