Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
An instruction[a]. By Ethan, the Ezrahite
God’s Covenant with David
89 I will sing forever about the gracious love of the Lord;
from generation to generation
I will declare your faithfulness with my mouth.
2 I will declare that your gracious love was established forever;
in the heavens itself, you have established your faithfulness.
3 I have made a covenant with my chosen one;
I have made a promise to David, my servant.
4 “I will establish your dynasty forever,
and I will lift up one who will build[b] your throne
from generation to generation.”
God’s Describes His Anointed
19 You spoke to your faithful[a] ones through a vision:[b]
“I will set a helper over[c] a warrior.
I will raise up a chosen one from the people.
20 I have found my servant David;
I have anointed him with my sacred oil,
21 with whom my power[d] will be firmly established;
for my arm will strengthen him.
22 No enemy will deceive him;
no wicked person[e] will afflict him.
23 I will crush his enemies before him
and strike those who hate him.
24 My faithfulness and gracious love will be with him,
and in my name his power[f] will be exalted.
25 I will place his hand[g] over the sea,
and his right hand[h] over the rivers.
26 He will announce to me
‘You are my father,
my God, and the rock of my salvation.’
2 There was one man from Zorah, from the family of the descendants of Dan, whose name was Manoah. Since his wife was infertile, she hadn’t borne children.[a] 3 One day the angel of the Lord presented himself to the woman. “Hello!” he greeted[b] her. “Though you are infertile at this time and haven’t borne a child, you’re about to conceive and give birth to a son. 4 So be sure that you don’t drink wine or anything intoxicating, and don’t eat anything unclean 5 because—surprise!—you’re going to conceive and give birth to a son! Don’t put a razor to his head, because the young man will be a Nazirite, dedicated[c] to God from inside the womb. He will begin to deliver Israel from domination by the Philistines.”
6 Then the woman went to tell her husband. She said, “A man of God appeared[d] to me. He looked like what an angel of God would look like—very frightening.[e] I didn’t ask him where he had come from and he didn’t tell me his name. 7 He told me, ‘Surprise!—you’re going to conceive and give birth to a son!’ and as for you, ‘Be sure that you don’t drink wine or anything intoxicating, and don’t eat anything unclean,’ ‘because the young man will be a Nazirite dedicated to God from inside the womb’ until the day he dies.”
8 So Manoah prayed to the Lord, “Please, Lord, have the man of God whom you sent before[f] come again so he can instruct us what to do on behalf of the child who is to be born.”
9 God listened to Manoah’s request,[g] and the angel of God came again to the woman as she was sitting out in the pasture. But her husband Manoah wasn’t with her, 10 so the woman ran quickly to tell her husband, “Look! The man who came the other[h] day appeared to me!”
11 So Manoah got up quickly and followed his wife, and when he came to the man he told him, “Are you the man who spoke to my[i] wife?”
He replied, “I am.”
12 Manoah asked, “Now, when what you’ve said occurs, what is to be the young man’s way of life and work?”
13 The angel of the Lord replied to Manoah, “Just have your wife[j] be careful to carry out everything that I told her. 14 She must not consume anything extracted from grape vines, including wine or anything intoxicating, and she must not eat anything unclean, doing everything that I commissioned her to do.”
15 Manoah responded to the angel of the Lord, “Please, let us detain you while we prepare a young goat for you.”
16 The angel of the Lord answered Manoah, “If you detain me, I won’t be eating your food, but if you prepare a burnt offering, you’ll be making a sacrifice to the Lord.” The angel of the Lord[k] said this[l] because Manoah didn’t know that he was the angel of the Lord.
17 Manoah asked the angel of the Lord, “What’s your name, because when what you’ve said happens, we’ll glorify[m] you?”
18 The angel of the Lord answered him, “Why are you asking this about my name? It’s ‘Wonderful.’”[n]
19 So Manoah prepared a young goat and a grain offering and offered it on a boulder to the Lord, who kept on performing miracles while Manoah and his wife watched continually. 20 When the burnt offering was engulfed in flames that sprang up from the altar toward heaven, the angel of the Lord ascended in the flame that came from the altar. When Manoah and his wife observed this, they collapsed on their faces to the ground. 21 The angel of the Lord did not appear again to Manoah or to his wife, and then Manoah knew confidently that the visitor[o] had been the angel of the Lord.
22 Then Manoah told his wife, “We’re going to die for sure, because we’ve seen God!”
23 But his wife replied to him, “If the Lord had intended to kill us, he wouldn’t have accepted a burnt offering and a grain offering from us,[p] he wouldn’t have shown us all these things, and he wouldn’t have permitted us to hear things[q] like this, now would he?”[r]
24 Later on, the woman gave birth to a son and named him Samson.[s] The child grew strong and the Lord blessed him.
Division among the People
40 When they heard these words, some in the crowd were saying, “This really is the Prophet,” 41 while others were saying, “This is the Messiah!”[a]
But some were saying, “The Messiah[b] doesn’t come from Galilee, does he? 42 Doesn’t the Scripture say that the Messiah[c] is from David’s family and from Bethlehem, the village where David lived?” 43 So there was a division in the crowd because of him. 44 Some of them were wanting to seize him, but no one laid hands on him.
The Unbelief of the Authorities
45 Then the officers returned to the high priests and Pharisees, who asked them, “Why didn’t you bring him?”
46 The officers answered, “No man ever spoke like that!”
47 Then the Pharisees replied to them, “You haven’t been deceived, too, have you? 48 None of the authorities or Pharisees has believed in him, have they? 49 But this mob that does not know the Law—they’re under a curse!”
50 One of their own, Nicodemus (the man who had previously met with Jesus),[d] asked them, 51 “Surely our Law does not condemn[e] a person without first hearing from him and finding out what he is doing, does it?”
52 They answered him, “You aren’t from Galilee, too, are you? Search and see that no prophet comes from Galilee.”
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