Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
A song of David.
103 My soul, praise the Lord!
Every part of me, praise his holy name!
2 My soul, praise the Lord
and never forget how kind he is!
3 He forgives all our sins
and heals all our sicknesses.
4 He saves us from the grave,
and he gives us love and compassion.
5 He gives us plenty of good things.
He makes us young again,
like an eagle that grows new feathers.
6 The Lord does what is fair.
He brings justice to all who have been hurt by others.
7 He taught his laws to Moses.
He let Israel see the powerful things he can do.
8 The Lord is kind and merciful.
He is patient and full of love.
9 He does not always criticize.
He does not stay angry with us forever.
10 We sinned against him,
but he didn’t give us the punishment we deserved.
11 His love for his followers is
as high above us as heaven is above the earth.
12 And he has taken our sins
as far away from us as the east is from the west.
13 The Lord is as kind to his followers
as a father is to his children.
The Famine Begins
53 For seven years people had all the food they needed, but those years ended. 54 Then the seven years of hunger began, just as Joseph had said. No food grew anywhere in any of the countries in that area. But in Egypt people had plenty to eat because Joseph had stored the grain. 55 The famine began, and the people cried to Pharaoh for food. Pharaoh said to the Egyptian people, “Go ask Joseph what to do.”
56 There was famine everywhere, so Joseph gave the people grain from the warehouses. He sold the stored grain to the people of Egypt. The famine was bad in Egypt, 57 but the famine was bad everywhere. So people from the countries around Egypt had to come to Joseph in Egypt to buy grain.
The Dreams Come True
42 During the famine in Canaan, Jacob learned that there was grain in Egypt. So he said to his sons, “Why are you sitting here doing nothing? 2 I have heard that there is grain for sale in Egypt. Go there and buy grain for us so that we will live and not die!”
3 So ten of Joseph’s brothers went to Egypt to buy grain. 4 Jacob did not send Benjamin. (Benjamin was Joseph’s only full brother.[a]) Jacob was afraid that something bad might happen to Benjamin.
5 The famine was very bad in Canaan, so there were many people from Canaan who went to Egypt to buy grain. Among them were the sons of Israel.
6 Joseph was the governor of Egypt at the time. He was the one who checked the sale of grain to people who came to Egypt to buy it. Joseph’s brothers came to him and bowed before him. 7 Joseph saw his brothers and recognized them, but he acted like he didn’t know them. He was rude when he spoke to them. He said, “Where do you come from?”
The brothers answered, “We have come from the land of Canaan to buy food.”
8 Joseph recognized his brothers, but they did not know who he was. 9 Then Joseph remembered the dreams that he had dreamed about his brothers.
Joseph said to his brothers, “You have not come to buy food! You are spies. You came to learn where we are weak.”
10 But the brothers said to him, “No, sir, we come as your servants. We have come only to buy food. 11 We are all brothers—we all have the same father. We are honest men. We have come only to buy food.”
12 Then Joseph said to them, “No, you have come to spy on us!”
13 And the brothers said, “No, sir, we come as servants from Canaan. We are all brothers, sons of the same father. There were twelve brothers in our family. Our youngest brother is still at home with our father, and the other brother died a long time ago.”
14 But Joseph said to them, “No! I can see that I am right. You are spies. 15 But I will let you prove that you are telling the truth. In the name of Pharaoh, I swear that I will not let you go until your youngest brother comes here. 16 One of you must go back to get your youngest brother while the rest of you stay here in prison. Then we can prove whether you are telling the truth or not. If you are not telling the truth, then by Pharaoh, I swear that you are spies!” 17 Then Joseph put them all in prison for three days.
9 “These ancestors of ours became jealous of their brother Joseph and sold him to be a slave in Egypt. But God was with him 10 and saved him from all his troubles. Pharaoh was the king of Egypt then. He liked Joseph and respected him because of the wisdom God gave him. Pharaoh gave Joseph the job of being a governor of Egypt. He even let him rule over all the people in Pharaoh’s house. 11 But all the land of Egypt and of Canaan became dry. It became so dry that food could not grow, and the people suffered very much. Our people could not find anything to eat.
12 “But Jacob heard that there was food in Egypt. So he sent our people there. This was their first trip to Egypt. 13 Then they went there a second time. This time Joseph told his brothers who he was. And Pharaoh learned about Joseph’s family. 14 Then Joseph sent some men to tell Jacob, his father, to come to Egypt. He also invited all his relatives, a total of 75 people. 15 So Jacob went down to Egypt. He and our other ancestors lived there until they died. 16 Later, their bodies were moved to Shechem, where they were put in a tomb. It was the same tomb that Abraham had bought in Shechem from the sons of Hamor. He paid them with silver.
Copyright © 2006 by Bible League International