Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

17 When Avram was 99 years old Adonai appeared to Avram and said to him, “I am El Shaddai [God Almighty]. Walk in my presence and be pure-hearted. ² I will make my covenant between me and you, and I will increase your numbers greatly.” ³ Avram fell on his face, and God continued speaking with him: ⁴ “As for me, this is my covenant with you: you will be the father of many nations. ⁵ Your name will no longer be Avram [exalted father], but your name will be Avraham [father of many], because I have made you the father of many nations. ⁶ I will cause you to be very fruitful. I will make nations of you, kings will descend from you.

(vii) ⁷ “I am establishing my covenant between me and you, along with your descendants after you, generation after generation, as an everlasting covenant, to be God for you and for your descendants after you.

¹⁵ God said to Avraham, “As for Sarai your wife, you are not to call her Sarai [mockery]; her name is to be Sarah [princess]. ¹⁶ I will bless her; moreover, I will give you a son by her. Truly I will bless her: she will be a mother of nations; kings of peoples will come from her.”

¹³ For the promise to Avraham and his seed^[a] that he would inherit the world did not come through legalism but through the righteousness that trust produces. ¹⁴ For if the heirs are produced by legalism, then trust is pointless and the promise worthless. ¹⁵ For what law brings is punishment. But where there is no law, there is also no violation.

¹⁶ The reason the promise is based on trusting is so that it may come as God’s free gift, a promise that can be relied on by all the seed, not only those who live within the framework of the Torah, but also those with the kind of trust Avraham had — Avraham avinu for all of us. ¹⁷ This accords with the Tanakh, where it says, “I have appointed you to be a father to many nations.”^[b] Avraham is our father in God’s sight because he trusted God as the one who gives life to the dead and calls nonexistent things into existence. ¹⁸ For he was past hope, yet in hope he trusted that he would indeed become a father to many nations, in keeping with what he had been told, “So many will your seed be.”^{[c] 19} His trust did not waver when he considered his own body — which was as good as dead, since he was about a hundred years old — or when he considered that Sarah’s womb was dead too. ²⁰ He did not by lack of trust decide against God’s promises. On the contrary, by trust he was given power as he gave glory to God, ²¹ for he was fully convinced that what God had promised he could also accomplish. ²² This is why it was credited to his account as righteousness.^[d]

²³ But the words, “it was credited to his account . . . ,” were not written for him only. ²⁴ They were written also for us, who will certainly have our account credited too, because we have trusted in him who raised Yeshua our Lord from the dead — ²⁵ Yeshua, who was delivered over to death because of our offences and raised to life in order to make us righteous.

³¹ He began teaching them that the Son of Man had to endure much suffering and be rejected by the elders, the head cohanim and the Torah-teachers; and that he had to be put to death; but that after three days, he had to rise again. ³² He spoke very plainly about it. Kefa took him aside and began rebuking him. ³³ But, turning around and looking at his talmidim, he rebuked Kefa. “Get behind me, Satan!” he said, “For your thinking is from a human perspective, not from God’s perspective!”

³⁴ Then Yeshua called the crowd and his talmidim to him and told them, “If anyone wants to come after me, let him say ‘No’ to himself, take up his execution-stake, and keep following me. ³⁵ For whoever wants to save his own life will destroy it, but whoever destroys his life for my sake and for the sake of the Good News will save it. ³⁶ Indeed, what will it benefit a person if he gains the whole world but forfeits his life? ³⁷ What could a person give in exchange for his life? ³⁸ For if someone is ashamed of me and of what I say in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man also will be ashamed of him when he comes in his Father’s glory with the holy angels.

² Six days later, Yeshua took Kefa, Ya‘akov and Yochanan and led them up a high mountain privately. As they watched, he began to change form, ³ and his clothes became dazzlingly white, whiter than anyone in the world could possibly bleach them. ⁴ Then they saw Eliyahu and Moshe speaking with Yeshua. ⁵ Kefa said to Yeshua, “It’s good that we’re here, Rabbi! Let’s put up three shelters — one for you, one for Moshe and one for Eliyahu.” ⁶ (He didn’t know what to say, they were so frightened.) ⁷ Then a cloud enveloped them; and a voice came out of the cloud, “This is my Son, whom I love. Listen to him!” ⁸ Suddenly, when they looked around, they no longer saw anyone with them except Yeshua.

⁹ As they came down the mountain, he warned them not to tell anyone what they had seen until after the Son of Man had risen from the dead.