Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
28 To You, O LORD, do I cry. O my strength, do not be deaf toward me; lest if You do not answer me, I be like those who go down into the pit.
2 Hear the voice of my petitions when I cry to You, when I hold up my hands toward Your Holy Oracle.
3 Do not draw me away with the wicked and with the workers of iniquity, who speak friendly to their neighbors when malice is in their hearts.
4 Reward them according to their deeds, and according to the wickedness of their inventions. Recompense them for the work of their hands. Render them their reward.
5 For they do not reward the works of the LORD, nor the operation of His hands. Break them down and do not build them up.
6 Praised be the LORD, for He has heard the voice of my petitions.
7 The LORD is my strength and my shield. My heart trusted in Him, and I was helped. Therefore, my heart shall rejoice; and with my song I will praise Him.
8 The LORD is their strength; and He is the strength of the deliverances of His anointed.
9 Save Your people and bless Your inheritance. Feed them, also, and exalt them forever. A Psalm of David.
16 Then Samson went to Gaza, and saw a harlot there, and went in to her.
2 And it was told to the Gazites, “Samson has come here.” And they went around and laid wait for him all night in the gate of the city, and were quiet all night, saying, “Wait until the early morning and we shall kill him.”
3 And Samson slept until midnight and arose at midnight and took the doors of the gates of the city and the two posts and lifted them away, with the bars, and put them upon his shoulders and carried them up to the top of the mountain that is before Hebron.
4 And after this, he loved a woman by the river of Sorek, whose name was Delilah,
5 to whom came the princes of the Philistines. And they said to her, “Entice him and see wherein his great strength lies, and by what means we may overcome him, so that we may bind him and punish him. And every one of us shall give you eleven hundred shekels of silver.”
6 And Delilah said to Samson, “Tell me, please, wherein your great strength lies, and with what you might be bound, to do you harm.”
7 Then Samson answered her, “If they bind me with seven green cords that were never dried, then I shall be weak and be as another man.”
8 And the princes of the Philistines brought her seven green cords that were not dry, and she bound him with them.
9 And she had men lying in wait with her in the chamber. Then she said to him, “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!” And he broke the cords, as a thread of yarn is broken when it feels fire. So, his strength was not known.
10 Afterward, Delilah said to Samson, “See, you have mocked me and told me lies. I ask you now, please tell me with what you might be bound.
11 Then he answered her, “If they bind me with new ropes that never were used, then shall I be weak and be as another man.”
12 Delilah, therefore, took new ropes and bound him with them, and said to him, “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!” And men lay in wait in the chamber, and he broke them from his arms, as a thread.
13 Afterward Delilah said to Samson, “Up to now you have beguiled me, and told me lies. Tell me how you might be bound.” And he said to her, “If you weave the seven locks of my head with the threads of the woof.
14 And she fastened it with a pin and said to him, “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!” And he awoke out of his sleep and went away with the pin of the web and the woof.
15 Again, she said to him, “How can you say, ‘I love you,’ when your heart is not with me? You have mocked me these three times and have not told me wherein your great strength lies.”
16 And because she pressed him with her words continually, and pestered him, his soul was pained to the death.
17 Therefore, he told her all his heart and said to her, “There has never come a razor upon my head; for I am a Nazirite to God from my mother’s womb. Therefore, if I am shaved, my strength will go from me and I shall be weak and be like all men.”
18 And when Delilah saw that he had told her all his heart, she sent, and called for the princes of the Philistines, saying, “Come up once again; for he has shown me all his heart.” Then the princes of the Philistines came up to her and brought the money in their hands.
19 And she made him sleep upon her knees. And she called a man and made him shave off the seven locks of his head. And she began to subdue him; for his strength had gone from him.
20 Then she said, “The Philistines are upon you, Samson!” And he awoke out of his sleep, and thought, “I will go out now, as at other times, and shake myself.” But he did not know that the LORD had departed from him.
21 Therefore, the Philistines took him and put out his eyes and brought him down to Gaza and bound him with chains. And he was a grinder in the prison house.
22 And the hair of his head began to grow again after it was shaved.
15 Indeed, some preach Christ out of envy and strife, but some also out of goodwill.
16 Indeed, the former preaches Christ out of rivalry (and not purely, supposing to add more affliction to my bonds),
17 but the latter out of love, knowing that I am appointed for the defense of the Gospel.
18 What then? Christ is still preached in all manner of ways, whether under a pretense or sincerely. And I rejoice in that! Indeed, and I will rejoice!
19 For I know that this shall cause my deliverance (through your prayer and by the help of the Spirit of Jesus Christ)
20 as I fervently expect and hope that in nothing shall I be ashamed. But that with all confidence (as always) so now Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether it be by life or by death.
21 For, to me, Christ is life and death is gain.
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