Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
(A psalm of praise.)
The Lord Is God
1 Shout praises to the Lord,
everyone on this earth.
2 Be joyful and sing
as you come in
to worship the Lord!
3 You know the Lord is God!
He created us,
and we belong to him;
we are his people,
the sheep in his pasture.
4 Be thankful and praise the Lord
as you enter his temple.
5 (A) The Lord is good!
His love and faithfulness
will last forever.
The Lord Commands Moses and Aaron To Speak to the King
28 When the Lord spoke to Moses in the land of Egypt, 29 he said, “I am the Lord. Tell the king[a] of Egypt everything I say to you.”
30 But Moses answered, “You know I am a very poor speaker, and the king will never listen to me.”
7 The Lord said:
I am going to let your brother Aaron speak for you. He will tell your message to the king, just as a prophet speaks my message to the people. 2 Tell Aaron everything I say to you, and he will order the king to let my people leave his country. 3-4 (A) But I will make the king so stubborn that he won't listen to you. He won't listen even when I do many terrible things to him and his nation. Then I will bring a final punishment on Egypt, and the king will let Israel's families and tribes go. 5 When this happens, the Egyptians will know that I am the Lord.
6 Moses and Aaron obeyed the Lord 7 and spoke to the king. At the time, Moses was 80 years old, and Aaron was 83.
A Stick Turns into a Snake
8-9 The Lord said, “Moses, when the king[b] asks you and Aaron to perform a miracle, command Aaron to throw his walking stick down in front of the king, and it will turn into a snake.”
10 Moses and Aaron went to the king and his officials and did exactly as the Lord had commanded—Aaron threw the stick down, and it turned into a snake. 11 Then the king called in the wise men and the magicians, who used their secret powers to do the same thing— 12 they threw down sticks that turned into snakes. But Aaron's snake swallowed theirs. 13 The king behaved just as the Lord had said and stubbornly refused to listen.
The Teaching of the Ancestors
(Matthew 15.1-9)
7 Some Pharisees and several teachers of the Law of Moses from Jerusalem came and gathered around Jesus. 2 They noticed that some of his disciples ate without first washing their hands.[a]
3 The Pharisees and many others obey the teachings of their ancestors. They always wash their hands in the proper way[b] before eating. 4 None of them will eat anything they buy in the market until it is washed. They also follow a lot of other teachings, such as washing cups, pitchers, and bowls.[c]
5 The Pharisees and teachers asked Jesus, “Why don't your disciples obey what our ancestors taught us to do? Why do they eat without washing their hands?”
6 (A) Jesus replied:
You are nothing but show-offs! The prophet Isaiah was right when he wrote that God had said,
“All of you praise me
with your words,
but you never really
think about me.
7 It is useless for you
to worship me,
when you teach rules
made up by humans.”
8 You disobey God's commands in order to obey what humans have taught. 9 You are good at rejecting God's commands so that you can follow your own teachings! 10 (B) Didn't Moses command you to respect your father and mother? Didn't he tell you to put to death all who curse their parents? 11 But you let people get by without helping their parents when they should. You let them say that what they own has been offered to God.[d] 12 You won't let those people help their parents. 13 And you ignore God's commands in order to follow your own teaching. You do a lot of other things just as bad.
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