Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

Love the Lord your God!

6 These are the commands, rules and laws that the Lord your God gave to me. He told me to teach them to you. You must obey them when you go across the Jordan River to live in that land. ² You must respect the Lord your God with fear. You must obey his rules and his commands that I am teaching you. You, your children and your grandchildren must obey them all through your lives. If you do that, you will enjoy a long life.

³ Listen, Israelites! Be careful to obey God's rules. If you do that, everything will be well for you. You will have many children. You will live in a land where there is plenty of food and drink, enough for everyone. The Lord, the God of your ancestors, promised that this will happen.

⁴ Listen, Israelites! The Lord alone is our God. There is no other true God. ⁵ Love the Lord your God with all your mind and with all your strength. Love him with all that you are. ⁶ Always think about these commands that I am giving you today. ⁷ Teach them to your children at all times. Talk about them when you sit together at home. Talk about them as you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. ⁸ Tie them as signs on your arms and on your heads, so that you remember them. ⁹ Write them on the wood beside the doors of your houses and on your gates.

The Word of God

ALEPH^[a]

God's new agreement

¹¹ But now Christ has come as our special priest. He brings us the good things that are now here. He has gone into God's own place in heaven. That is a greater and much better tent than the old tabernacle. No person made this tent. It does not belong to this world at all. ¹² Christ went into the Most Holy Place on our behalf. He did this once, for all time. He did not take with him the blood of goats or young cows when he went in there. Instead, he took the blood of his own death to offer to God. In that way, he made us free from sin for ever. ¹³ The old rules said that the priest must use the blood of goats or bulls to make people clean. Or he could burn a young cow and mix the ashes with water.^[a] He would then splash the blood or the ashes over the people who were unclean. Then those people became clean again in their bodies, and they could worship God.

¹⁴ But the blood of Christ's sacrifice will do much more than that! Christ offered himself to God, in the power of his Spirit, who lives for ever. That sacrifice was completely good. There was no wrong thing in Christ. He offered his own blood to make us completely clean inside ourselves. We no longer have to do things that lead to death. Instead, we can serve the God who lives for ever.

Jesus teaches people about the most important rule

²⁸ One of the teachers of God's Law came near to the group of people. He heard Jesus speaking with the leaders. The teacher knew that Jesus had answered them well. So then the teacher asked Jesus, ‘Which rule is the most important among God's Laws?’

²⁹ Jesus replied, ‘This rule is the most important rule: “Listen, Israel's people! The Lord alone is our God. There is no other Lord. ³⁰ Love the Lord, your God completely. Love him with all your mind and with all your strength. Love him in everything that you think and you do.”^{[a] 31} The second most important rule is this: “You should love other people as much as you love yourself.” No other rules are as important as these two.’

³² The teacher of God's Law said to Jesus, ‘Teacher, you have answered well. You are right to say that the Lord is the only God. And there is no other God except him. ³³ We must love him completely, with all our mind and with all our strength. We must also love other people as much as we love ourselves. This is more important than all the gifts or animals that we could offer to God.’

³⁴ Jesus heard that the man had answered well. So Jesus said to him, ‘You are almost ready for God to rule in your life.’ After that, everybody was afraid to ask Jesus any more questions.