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December 9, 2022

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Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

Daily Bible readings that follow the church liturgical year, with thematically matched Old and New Testament readings.

Duration: 1245 days

Psalm 146:5-10

⁵How blessed is the one whose helper is the God of Jacob,
whose hope is in the Lord his God,
⁶the one who made heaven and earth,
the sea, and all that is in them,
who remains forever faithful,^[a]
⁷vindicates the oppressed,^[b]
and gives food to the hungry.
The Lord releases the imprisoned.
⁸The Lord gives sight to the blind.
The Lord lifts up all who are bent over.^[c]
The Lord loves the godly.
⁹The Lord protects the resident foreigner.
He lifts up the fatherless and the widow,^[d]
but he opposes the wicked.^[e]
¹⁰The Lord rules forever,
your God, O Zion, throughout the generations to come.^[f]
Praise the Lord!

Ruth 4:13-17

A Grandson is Born to Naomi

¹³So Boaz married Ruth and slept with her.^[a] The Lord enabled her to conceive^[b] and she gave birth to a son. ¹⁴The village women said to Naomi, “May the Lord be praised because he has not left you without a guardian^[c] today! May he^[d] become famous in Israel!^[e] ¹⁵He will encourage you and provide for you when you are old,^[f] for your daughter-in-law, who loves you, has given him birth. She^[g] is better to you than seven sons!” ¹⁶Naomi took the child and placed him on her lap;^[h] she became his caregiver.^[i] ¹⁷The neighbor women gave him a name, saying, “A son has been born to Naomi.” They named him Obed.^[j] Now he became the father of Jesse—David’s father.

2 Peter 3:11-18

¹¹Since all these things are to melt away^[a] in this manner,^[b] what sort of people must you^[c] be, conducting your lives in holiness and godliness,^[d] ¹²while waiting for and hastening^[e] the coming of the day of God?^[f] Because of this day,^[g] the heavens will be burned up and^[h] dissolve, and the celestial bodies^[i] will melt away in a blaze!^[j] ¹³But, according to his promise, we are waiting for^[k] new heavens and a new earth, in which^[l] righteousness truly resides.^[m]

Exhortation to the Faithful

¹⁴Therefore, dear friends, since you are waiting for^[n] these things, strive to be found^[o] at peace, without spot or blemish, when you come into his presence.^[p] ¹⁵And regard the patience of our Lord as salvation,^[q] just as also our dear brother Paul^[r] wrote to you,^[s] according to the wisdom given to him, ¹⁶speaking of these things in all his letters.^[t] Some things in these letters^[u] are hard to understand, things^[v] the ignorant and unstable twist^[w] to their own destruction, as they also do to the rest of the scriptures.^[x] ¹⁷Therefore, dear friends, since you have been forewarned,^[y] be on your guard that you do not get led astray by the error of these unprincipled men^[z] and fall from your firm grasp on the truth.^[aa] ¹⁸But grow in the grace and knowledge^[ab] of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the honor both now and on^[ac] that eternal day.^[ad]

Footnotes

2 Peter 3:11 tn Grk “all these things thus being dissolved.”
2 Peter 3:11 tn Or “thus.”
2 Peter 3:11 tc ‡ Most mss have a pronoun with the infinitive—either ὑμᾶς (humas, “you”; found in A C P Ψ 048^vid 33 1739 M, the corrector of P⁷², the second corrector of א, and many other witnesses), ἡμᾶς (hēmas, “we”; read by א* 5 630 2464), or ἑαυτούς (heautous, “[you your]selves/[we our]selves,” read by 1243). But the shorter reading (with no pronoun) has the support of P^72*,74vid B 1175. Though slim, the evidence for the omission is nevertheless the earliest. Further, the addition of some pronoun, especially the second person pronoun, seems to be a clarifying variant. It would be difficult to explain the pronoun’s absence in some witnesses if the pronoun were original. That three different pronouns have shown up in the mss is testimony for the omission’s authenticity. Thus, on external and internal grounds, the omission is preferred. For English style requirements, however, some pronoun has to be added. NA²⁷ has ὑμᾶς in brackets, indicating doubt as to its authenticity, while NA²⁸ drops the brackets.tn Or “you.”
2 Peter 3:11 tn Grk “in holy conduct and godliness.”
2 Peter 3:12 tn Or possibly, “striving for,” but the meaning “hasten” for σπουδάζω (spoudazō) is normative in Jewish apocalyptic literature (in which the coming of the Messiah/the end is anticipated). Such a hastening is not an arm-twisting of the divine volition, but a response by believers that has been decreed by God.
2 Peter 3:12 sn The coming of the day of God. Peter elsewhere describes the coming or parousia as the coming of Christ (cf. 2 Pet 1:16; 3:4). The almost casual exchange between “God” and “Christ” in this little book, and elsewhere in the NT, argues strongly for the deity of Christ (see esp. 1:1).
2 Peter 3:12 tn Grk “on account of which” (a subordinate relative clause in Greek).
2 Peter 3:12 tn Grk “being burned up, will dissolve.”
2 Peter 3:12 tn See note in v. 10 on “celestial bodies.”
2 Peter 3:12 tn Grk “being burned up” (see v. 10).
2 Peter 3:13 tn Or possibly, “let us wait for.” The form in Greek (προσδόκωμεν, prosdokōmen) could be either indicative or subjunctive. The present participle in v. 14, however, is best taken causally (“since you are waiting for”), suggesting that the indicative is to be read here.
2 Peter 3:13 tn The relative pronoun is plural, indicating that the sphere in which righteousness dwells is both the new heavens and the new earth.
2 Peter 3:13 tn Grk “dwells.” The verb κατοικέω (katoikeō) is an intensive cognate of οἰκέω (oikeō), often with the connotation of “taking up residence,” “settling down,” being at home,” etc. Cf., e.g., Matt 2:23; Acts 17:26; 22:12; Eph 3:17; Col 1:19; 2:9. Hence, the addition of the adverb “truly” is implicit in the connotation of the verb in a context such as this.
2 Peter 3:14 tn Grk “dear friends, waiting for.” See note in v. 13 on “waiting for.”
2 Peter 3:14 sn The Greek verb used in the phrase strive to be found is the same as is found in v. 10, translated “laid bare.” In typical Petrine fashion, a conceptual link is made by the same linkage of terms. The point of these two verses thus becomes clear: When the heavens disappear and the earth and its inhabitants are stripped bare before the throne of God, they should strive to make sure that their lives are pure and that they have nothing to hide.
2 Peter 3:14 tn “When you come into” is not in Greek. However, the dative pronoun αὐτῷ (autō) does not indicate agency (“by him”), but presence or sphere. The idea is “strive to be found {before him/in his presence}.”
2 Peter 3:15 tn The language here is cryptic. It probably means “regard the patience of our Lord as an opportunity for salvation.” In the least, Peter is urging his audience to take a different view of the delay of the parousia than that of the false teachers.
2 Peter 3:15 sn Critics generally assume that 2 Peter is not authentic, partially because in vv. 15-16 Paul is said to have written scripture. It is assumed that a recognition of Paul’s writings as scripture could not have happened until early in the 2nd century. However, in the same breath that Paul is canonized, Peter also calls him “brother.” This is unparalleled in the 2nd century apocryphal works, as well as early patristic writings, in which the apostles are universally elevated above the author and readers; here, Peter simply says “he’s one of us.”
2 Peter 3:15 sn Paul wrote to you. That Paul had written to these people indicates that they are most likely Gentiles. Further, that Peter is now writing to them suggests that Paul had already died, for Peter was the apostle to the circumcised. Peter apparently decided to write his two letters to Paul’s churches shortly after Paul’s death, both to connect with them personally and theologically (Paul’s gospel is Peter’s gospel) and to warn them of the wolves in sheep’s clothing that would come in to destroy the flock. Thus, part of Peter’s purpose seems to be to anchor his readership on the written documents of the Christian community (both the Old Testament and Paul’s letters) as a safeguard against heretics.
2 Peter 3:16 tn Grk “as also in all his letters speaking in them of these things.”
2 Peter 3:16 tn Grk “in which are some things hard to understand.”
2 Peter 3:16 tn Grk “which.” The antecedent is the “things hard to understand,” not the entirety of Paul’s letters. A significant principle is seen here: The primary proof texts used for faith and practice ought to be the clear passages that are undisputed in their meaning. Heresy today is still largely built on obscure texts.
2 Peter 3:16 tn Or “distort,” “wrench,” “torture” (all are apt descriptions of what heretics do to scripture).
2 Peter 3:16 sn This one incidental line, the rest of the scriptures, links Paul’s writings with scripture. This is thus one of the earliest affirmations of any part of the NT as scripture. Peter’s words were prophetic and were intended as a preemptive strike against the heretics to come.
2 Peter 3:17 tn Grk “knowing beforehand.”
2 Peter 3:17 tn Or “lawless ones.” sn These unprincipled men. The same word is used in 2:7, suggesting further that the heretics in view in chapter 3 are the false teachers of chapter 2.
2 Peter 3:17 tn Grk “fall from your firmness.”
2 Peter 3:18 tn The term “knowledge” (γνῶσις, gnōsis) used here is not the same as is found in 2 Pet 1:2, 3, 8; 2:20. This term is found in 1:5 and 1:6.
2 Peter 3:18 tn Or “until.”
2 Peter 3:18 tc The vast bulk of mss adds ἀμήν (amēn, “amen”) at the end of this letter, as they do almost all the rest of the NT books (only Acts, James, and 3 John lack a majority of witnesses supporting a concluding ἀμήν). The omission in B 1241 1243 1739* 1881 2298 appears to be original, although the fact that some of the best and earliest Alexandrian witnesses (P⁷² א A C P Ψ 5 33 81 436 442 1611 1735 1739^c 1852 2344 2492 co), along with several other mss, the Byzantine text, and early versions (vg sy), add the particle renders such a judgment less than iron-clad. NA²⁷ places the word in brackets, indicating doubts as to its authenticity, while NA²⁸ omits the word.tn Grk “day of eternity.”

New English Translation (NET)

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Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

Footnotes

A Grandson is Born to Naomi

Footnotes

Exhortation to the Faithful

Footnotes