Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

⁸⁹ Forever, O Lord, Your word is settled in heaven [stands firm as the heavens].^(A)

⁹⁰ Your faithfulness is from generation to generation; You have established the earth, and it stands fast.

⁹¹ All [the whole universe] are Your servants; therefore they continue this day according to Your ordinances.^(B)

⁹² Unless Your law had been my delight, I would have perished in my affliction.

⁹³ I will never forget Your precepts, [how can I?] for it is by them You have quickened me (granted me life).

⁹⁴ I am Yours, therefore save me [Your own]; for I have sought (inquired of and for) Your precepts and required them [as my urgent need].^(C)

⁹⁵ The wicked wait for me to destroy me, but I will consider Your testimonies.

⁹⁶ I have seen that everything [human] has its limits and end [no matter how extensive, noble, and excellent]; but Your commandment is exceedingly broad and extends without limits [into eternity].^(D)

¹¹ When Micaiah son of Gemariah, the son of Shaphan, had heard out of the book all the words of the Lord,

¹² He went down to the king’s house into the scribe’s chamber, and behold, all the princes were sitting there: Elishama the scribe, Delaiah son of Shemaiah, Elnathan son of Achbor, Gemariah son of Shaphan, Zedekiah son of Hananiah, and all the [other] princes.

¹³ Then Micaiah declared to them all the words that he had heard when Baruch read the book in the hearing of the people.

¹⁴ Therefore all the princes sent Jehudi son of Nethaniah, the son of Shelemiah, the son of Cushi, to Baruch, saying, Take in your hand the scroll from which you have read in the hearing of the people and come [to us]. So Baruch son of Neriah took the scroll in his hand and came to them.

¹⁵ And they said to him, Sit down now and read it in our hearing. So Baruch read it in their hearing.

¹⁶ Now when they had heard all the words, they turned one to another in fear and said to Baruch, We must surely tell the king of all these words.

¹⁷ And they asked Baruch, Tell us now, how did you write all these words? At [Jeremiah’s] dictation?

¹⁸ Then Baruch answered them, He dictated all these words to me, and I wrote them with ink in the book.

¹⁹ Then the princes said to Baruch, Go and hide, you and Jeremiah, and let no one know where you are.

²⁰ Then they went into the court to the king, but they [first] put the scroll in the chamber of Elishama the scribe; then they reported all the words to the king.

²¹ So the king sent Jehudi to get the scroll, and he took it out of the chamber of Elishama the scribe. And Jehudi read it in the hearing of the king and of all the princes who stood beside the king.

²² Now it was the ninth month, and the king was sitting in the winter house, and a fire was burning there before him in the brazier.

²³ And [each time] when Jehudi had read three or four columns [of the scroll], he [King Jehoiakim] would cut them off with a penknife and cast them into the fire that was in the brazier, until the entire scroll was consumed in the fire that was in the brazier.

²⁴ Yet they were not afraid, nor did they rend their garments—neither the king, nor any of his servants who heard all these words.

²⁵ Even though Elnathan and Delaiah and Gemariah tried to persuade the king not to burn the scroll, he would not listen to them.

²⁶ And the king commanded Jerahmeel the king’s son and Seraiah son of Azriel and Shelemiah son of Abdeel to seize Baruch the scribe and Jeremiah the prophet, but the Lord hid them.

² Do open your hearts to us again [enlarge them to take us in]. We have wronged no one, we have betrayed or corrupted no one, we have cheated or taken advantage of no one.

³ I do not say this to reproach or condemn [you], for I have said before that you are [nested] in our hearts, [and you will remain there] together [with us], whether we die or live.

⁴ I have great boldness and free and fearless confidence and cheerful courage toward you; my pride in you is great. I am filled [brimful] with the comfort [of it]; with all our tribulation and in spite of it, [I am filled with comfort] I am overflowing with joy.

⁵ For even when we arrived in Macedonia, our bodies had no ease or rest, but we were oppressed in every way and afflicted at every turn—fighting and contentions without, dread and fears within [us].

⁶ But God, Who comforts and encourages and refreshes and cheers the depressed and the sinking, comforted and encouraged and refreshed and cheered us by the arrival of Titus.

⁷ [Yes] and not only by his coming but also by [his account of] the comfort with which he was encouraged and refreshed and cheered as to you, while he told us of your yearning affection, of how sorry you were [for me] and how eagerly you took my part, so that I rejoiced still more.

⁸ For even though I did grieve you with my letter, I do not regret [it now], though I did regret it; for I see that that letter did pain you, though only for a little while;

⁹ Yet I am glad now, not because you were pained, but because you were pained into repentance [and so turned back to God]; for you felt a grief such as God meant you to feel, so that in nothing you might suffer loss through us or harm for what we did.

¹⁰ For godly grief and the pain God is permitted to direct, produce a repentance that leads and contributes to salvation and deliverance from evil, and it never brings regret; but worldly grief (the hopeless sorrow that is characteristic of the pagan world) is deadly [breeding and ending in death].

¹¹ For [you can look back now and] observe what this same godly sorrow has done for you and has produced in you: what eagerness and earnest care to explain and clear yourselves [of all ^[a]complicity in the condoning of incest], what indignation [at the sin], what alarm, what yearning, what zeal [to do justice to all concerned], what readiness to mete out punishment [^[b]to the offender]! At every point you have proved yourselves cleared and guiltless in the matter.^(A)

¹² So although I did write to you [as I did], it was not for the sake and because of the one who did [the] wrong, nor on account of the one who suffered [the] wrong, but in order that you might realize before God [that your readiness to accept our authority revealed] how zealously you do care for us.