Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
106 Hallelujah!
Give thanks to the Lord because he is good,
because his mercy endures forever.
2 Who can speak about all the mighty things the Lord has done?
Who can announce all the things for which he is worthy of praise?
3 Blessed are those who defend justice
and do what is right at all times.
4 Remember me, O Lord, when you show favor to your people.
Come to help me with your salvation
5 so that I may see the prosperity of your chosen ones,
find joy in our people’s happiness,
and brag with the people who belong to you.
6 We have sinned, and so did our ancestors.
We have done wrong.
We are guilty.
13 They quickly forgot what he did.
They did not wait for his advice.
14 They had an unreasonable desire ⌞for food⌟ in the wilderness.
In the desert they tested God.
15 He gave them what they asked for.
He ⌞also⌟ gave them a degenerative disease.
16 In the camp certain men became envious of Moses.
They also became envious of Aaron, the Lord’s holy one.
17 The ground split open and swallowed Dathan.
It buried Abiram’s followers.
18 A fire broke out among their followers.
Flames burned up wicked people.
19 At Mount Horeb they made ⌞a statue of⌟ a calf.
They worshiped an idol made of metal.
20 They traded their glorious God [a]
for the statue of a bull that eats grass.
21 They forgot God, their savior,
the one who did spectacular things in Egypt,
22 miracles in the land of Ham,
and terrifying things at the Red Sea.
23 God said he was going to destroy them,
but Moses, his chosen one, stood in his way
to prevent him from exterminating them.
47 Rescue us, O Lord our God, and gather us from the nations
so that we may give thanks to your holy name
and make your praise our glory.
48 Thanks be to the Lord God of Israel
from everlasting to everlasting.
Let all the people say amen.
Hallelujah!
21 The Lord was angry with me because of you. So the Lord your God took an oath that I wouldn’t cross the Jordan River and enter the good land he is giving you as your property. 22 I’m going to die in this land and not cross the Jordan River, but you’re going to go across and take possession of that good land. 23 Be careful that you don’t forget the promise [a] that the Lord your God made to you. Don’t make your own carved idols or statues that represent anything the Lord your God has forbidden. 24 The Lord your God is a raging fire, a God who does not tolerate rivals.
25 Even when you have children and grandchildren and have grown old in that land, don’t become corrupt and make carved idols or statues that represent anything. I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you today: [b] If you do this thing that the Lord your God considers evil, making him furious, 26 you will quickly disappear from the land you’re going to possess on the other side of the Jordan River. You won’t live very long there. You’ll be completely wiped out. 27 The Lord will scatter you among the people of the world, and only a few of you will be left among the nations where the Lord will force you to live. 28 There you will worship wooden and stone gods made by human hands. These gods can’t see, hear, eat, or smell.
29 But if you look for the Lord your God when you are among those nations, you will find him whenever you search for him with all your heart and with all your soul. 30 When you’re in distress and all these things happen to you, then you will finally come back to the Lord your God and obey him. 31 The Lord your God is a merciful God. He will not abandon you, destroy you, or forget the promise to your ancestors that he swore he would keep.
32 Search the distant past, long before your time. Start from the very day God created people on earth. Search from one end of heaven to the other. Has anything as great as this ever happened before, or has anything like it ever been heard of? 33 Have any ⌞other⌟ people ever heard God speak from a fire and lived? You did! 34 Or has any god ever tried to come and take one nation away from another for himself? The Lord your God used his mighty hand and powerful arm to do this for you in Egypt. He did this using plagues, miraculous signs, amazing things, and war. He did his great and awe-inspiring deeds in front of you.
35 You were shown these things so that you would know that the Lord is God. There is no other god. 36 He let you hear his voice from heaven so that he could instruct you. He showed you his great fire on earth, and you heard him speak from the column of fire. 37 Because he loved your ancestors and chose their descendants, he was with you as he brought you out of Egypt by his great power. 38 He forced nations greater and stronger than you out of your way to bring you into their land and give it to you. This land is your own possession today.
39 Remember today, and never forget that the Lord is God in heaven above and here on earth. There is no other god. 40 Obey his laws and commands which I’m giving you today. Then things will go well for you and your descendants. You will live for a long time in the land. The Lord your God is giving you the land for as long as you live.
9 He added, “You have no trouble rejecting the commandments of God in order to keep your own traditions! 10 For example, Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’ and ‘Whoever curses father or mother must be put to death.’ 11 But you say, ‘If a person tells his father or mother that whatever he might have used to help them is corban (that is, an offering to God), 12 he no longer has to do anything for his father or mother.’ 13 Because of your traditions you have destroyed the authority of God’s word. And you do many other things like that.”
14 Then he called the crowd again and said to them, “Listen to me, all of you, and try to understand! 15 Nothing that goes into a person from the outside can make him unclean. It’s what comes out of a person that makes him unclean. 16 Let the person who has ears listen!” [a]
17 When he had left the people and gone home, his disciples asked him about this illustration.
18 Jesus said to them, “Don’t you understand? Don’t you know that whatever goes into a person from the outside can’t make him unclean? 19 It doesn’t go into his thoughts but into his stomach and then into a toilet.” (By saying this, Jesus declared all foods acceptable.) 20 He continued, “It’s what comes out of a person that makes him unclean. 21 Evil thoughts, sexual sins, stealing, murder, 22 adultery, greed, wickedness, cheating, shameless lust, envy, cursing, arrogance, and foolishness come from within a person. 23 All these evils come from within and make a person unclean.”
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