Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

5 ^1-2 O Lord, hear me praying; listen to my plea, O God my King, for I will never pray to anyone but you. ³ Each morning I will look to you in heaven and lay my requests before you, praying earnestly.

⁴ I know you get no pleasure from wickedness and cannot tolerate the slightest sin. ⁵ Therefore, proud sinners will not survive your searching gaze, for how you hate their evil deeds. ⁶ You will destroy them for their lies; how you abhor all murder and deception.

⁷ But as for me, I will come into your Temple protected by your mercy and your love; I will worship you with deepest awe.

⁸ Lord, lead me as you promised me you would; otherwise my enemies will conquer me. Tell me clearly what to do, which way to turn. ⁹ For they cannot speak one truthful word. Their hearts are filled to the brim with wickedness. Their suggestions are full of the stench of sin and death. Their tongues are filled with flatteries to gain their wicked ends. ¹⁰ O God, hold them responsible. Catch them in their own traps; let them fall beneath the weight of their own transgressions, for they rebel against you.

¹¹ But make everyone rejoice who puts his trust in you. Keep them shouting for joy because you are defending them. Fill all who love you with your happiness. ¹² For you bless the godly man, O Lord; you protect him with your shield of love.

10 Ask the Lord for rain in the springtime, and he will answer with lightning and showers. Every field will become a lush pasture. ² How foolish to ask the idols for anything like that! Fortune-tellers’ predictions are all a bunch of silly lies; what comfort is there in promises that don’t come true? Judah and Israel have been led astray and wander like lost sheep; everyone attacks them, for they have no shepherd to protect them.

³ “My anger burns against your ‘shepherds’—your leaders—and I will punish them—these goats. For the Lord Almighty has arrived to help his flock of Judah. I will make them strong and glorious like a proud steed in battle. ⁴ From them will come the Cornerstone, the Peg on which all hope hangs, the Bow that wins the battle, the Ruler over all the earth.^{[a] 5} They will be mighty warriors for God, grinding their enemies’ faces into the dust beneath their feet. The Lord is with them as they fight; their enemy is doomed.

⁶ “I will strengthen Judah, yes, and Israel too; I will reestablish them because I love them. It will be as though I had never cast them all away, for I, the Lord their God, will hear their cries. ⁷ They shall be like mighty warriors. They shall be happy as with wine. Their children, too, shall see the mercies of the Lord and be glad. Their hearts shall rejoice in the Lord. ⁸ When I whistle to them, they’ll come running, for I have bought them back again. From the few that are left, their population will grow again to former size. ⁹ Though I have scattered them like seeds among the nations, still they will remember me and return again to God; with all their children, they will come home again to Israel. ¹⁰ I will bring them back from Egypt and Assyria and resettle them in Israel—in Gilead and Lebanon; there will scarcely be room for all of them! ¹¹ They shall pass safely through the sea of distress,^[b] for the waves will be held back. The Nile will become dry—the rule of Assyria and Egypt over my people will end.”

¹² The Lord says, “I will make my people strong with power from me! They will go wherever they wish, and wherever they go they will be under my personal care.”

⁶ But if any of you causes one of these little ones who trusts in me to lose his faith,^[a] it would be better for you to have a rock tied to your neck and be thrown into the sea.

⁷ “Woe upon the world for all its evils.^[b] Temptation to do wrong is inevitable, but woe to the man who does the tempting. ⁸ So if your hand or foot causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. Better to enter heaven crippled than to be in hell with both of your hands and feet. ⁹ And if your eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. Better to enter heaven with one eye than to be in hell with two.