Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
A Prayer for Deliverance
126 When the Lord brought us back to Jerusalem,[a]
it was like a dream!
2 How we laughed, how we sang for joy!
Then the other nations said about us,
“The Lord did great things for them.”
3 Indeed he did great things for us;
how happy we were!
4 Lord, make us prosperous again,[b]
just as the rain brings water back to dry riverbeds.
5 Let those who wept as they planted their crops,
gather the harvest with joy!
6 Those who wept as they went out carrying the seed
will come back singing for joy,
as they bring in the harvest.
Jeremiah's Message about the Prophets
9 My heart is crushed,
and I am trembling.
Because of the Lord,
because of his holy words,
I am like a man who is drunk,
someone who has had too much wine.
10 The land is full of people unfaithful to the Lord;
they live wicked lives and misuse their power.
Because of the Lord's curse the land mourns
and the pastures are dry.
11 The Lord says,
“The prophets and the priests are godless;
I have caught them doing evil in the Temple itself.
12 The paths they follow will be slippery and dark;
I will make them stumble and fall.
I am going to bring disaster on them;
the time of their punishment is coming.
I, the Lord, have spoken.
13 I have seen the sin of Samaria's prophets:
they have spoken in the name of Baal
and have led my people astray.
14 (A)But I have seen the prophets in Jerusalem do even worse:
they commit adultery and tell lies;
they help people to do wrong,
so that no one stops doing what is evil.
To me they are all as bad
as the people of Sodom and Gomorrah.
15 “So then, this is what I, the Lord Almighty, say about the prophets of Jerusalem:
I will give them bitter plants to eat
and poison to drink,
because they have spread ungodliness throughout the land.”
The Priest Melchizedek
7 (A)This Melchizedek was king of Salem and a priest of the Most High God. As Abraham was coming back from the battle in which he defeated the four kings, Melchizedek met him and blessed him, 2 and Abraham gave him one tenth of all he had taken. (The first meaning of Melchizedek's name is “King of Righteousness”; and because he was king of Salem, his name also means “King of Peace.”) 3 There is no record of Melchizedek's father or mother or of any of his ancestors; no record of his birth or of his death. He is like the Son of God; he remains a priest forever.
4 You see, then, how great he was. Abraham, our famous ancestor, gave him one tenth of all he got in the battle. 5 (B)And those descendants of Levi who are priests are commanded by the Law to collect one tenth from the people of Israel, that is, from their own people, even though they are also descendants of Abraham. 6 Melchizedek was not descended from Levi, but he collected one tenth from Abraham and blessed him, the man who received God's promises. 7 There is no doubt that the one who blesses is greater than the one who is blessed. 8 In the case of the priests the tenth is collected by men who die; but as for Melchizedek the tenth was collected by one who lives, as the scripture says. 9 And, so to speak, when Abraham paid the tenth, Levi (whose descendants collect the tenth) also paid it. 10 For Levi had not yet been born, but was, so to speak, in the body of his ancestor Abraham when Melchizedek met him.
Good News Translation® (Today’s English Version, Second Edition) © 1992 American Bible Society. All rights reserved. For more information about GNT, visit www.bibles.com and www.gnt.bible.