Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
Tet: It Is Good to Be Afflicted
65 You have done good for your servant, O Lord,
according to your words.
66 Teach me good judgment and knowledge,
for I believe in your commandments.
67 Before I was afflicted I strayed,
but now I keep your saying.
68 You are good, and you do good.
Teach me your statutes.
69 The arrogant have smeared me with lies.
I guard your precepts with all my heart.
70 Their calloused hearts[a] feel nothing,
but I delight in your law.
71 It was good for me that I was afflicted,
so that I might learn your statutes.
72 Better for me is the law from your mouth
than thousands of pieces of silver and gold.
The Day of Atonement
16 The Lord spoke to Moses after the death of Aaron’s two sons, who had died when they approached the presence of the Lord. 2 The Lord said to Moses, “Tell your brother Aaron that he must not enter into the Holy Place at any time he chooses by going inside the veil which is in front of the atonement seat[a] that is on the ark. This is so that he will not die, for I appear in the cloud over the atonement seat.”
3 This is how Aaron shall enter the Holy Place: with a bull from the herd for a sin offering and a ram for a whole burnt offering. 4 He is to wear a sacred linen tunic, with linen underwear covering his flesh, with the linen sash as his belt, and with his head wrapped with the linen turban.[b] These are the sacred garments. He must wash his body with water and then put the garments on. 5 From the congregation of the people of Israel he shall also receive two male goats for a sin offering and one ram for a whole burnt offering.
20 When he has finished making atonement to cleanse the sanctuary, the Tent of Meeting, and the altar, he shall present the live goat. 21 Then Aaron shall lay his two hands on the head of the live goat and confess over it all the guilt of the people of Israel and all their rebellions and all their sins. He is to put them on the head of the goat and send it away into the wilderness in the custody of an appointed man. 22 So the goat will carry all their guilt on itself to a remote, desolate place, and the man will send the goat away into the wilderness.
23 Then Aaron shall enter the Tent of Meeting, take off the special linen garments that he had put on to enter into the sanctuary, and leave them there. 24 He shall bathe his body in water in a holy place and put on his regular garments. Then he shall go out and offer the burnt offering for himself and the burnt offering for the people to make atonement for himself and for the people. 25 He shall turn the fat from the sin offering into smoke on the altar.
26 The man who releases the goat designated as the scapegoat shall wash his clothes and bathe his body in water. After that he may re-enter the camp. 27 The bull for the sin offering and the goat for the sin offering, whose blood has been brought in to make atonement in the sanctuary, shall be brought outside the camp. Their hide and flesh and manure are to be burned in fire. 28 The man who burns them is to wash his clothes and bathe his body in water. After that he may re-enter the camp.
The Withered Fig Tree
18 As he returned to the city early in the morning, he was hungry. 19 Seeing a fig tree by the road, he went up to it but found nothing on it except leaves. He said to it, “May there never be fruit from you again!”
Immediately the fig tree withered away. 20 When the disciples saw it, they were amazed and asked, “How did the fig tree wither so quickly?”
21 Jesus answered them, “Amen I tell you: If you have faith, and do not doubt, you will not only do what was done to the fig tree, but even if you told this mountain, ‘Be lifted up and thrown into the sea,’ it would be done. 22 Whatever you ask for in prayer, as you believe, you will receive.”
The Holy Bible, Evangelical Heritage Version®, EHV®, © 2019 Wartburg Project, Inc. All rights reserved.