Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
6 The year King Uzziah died I saw the Lord! He was sitting on a lofty throne, and the Temple was filled with his glory. 2 Hovering about him were mighty, six-winged angels of fire. With two of their wings they covered their faces, with two others they covered their feet, and with two they flew. 3 In a great antiphonal chorus they sang, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty; the whole earth is filled with his glory.” 4 Such singing it was! It shook the Temple to its foundations, and suddenly the entire sanctuary was filled with smoke.
5 Then I said, “My doom is sealed, for I am a foul-mouthed sinner, a member of a sinful, foul-mouthed race; and I have looked upon the King, the Lord of heaven’s armies.”
6 Then one of the mighty angels flew over to the altar and with a pair of tongs picked out a burning coal. 7 He touched my lips with it and said, “Now you are pronounced ‘not guilty’ because this coal has touched your lips. Your sins are all forgiven.”
8 Then I heard the Lord asking, “Whom shall I send as a messenger to my people? Who will go?”
And I said, “Lord, I’ll go! Send me.”
9 And he said, “Yes, go. But tell my people this: ‘Though you hear my words repeatedly, you won’t understand them. Though you watch and watch as I perform my miracles, still you won’t know what they mean.’ 10 Dull their understanding, close their ears, and shut their eyes. I don’t want them to see or to hear or to understand, or to turn to me to heal them.”[a]
11 Then I said, “Lord, how long will it be before they are ready to listen?”
And he replied, “Not until their cities are destroyed—without a person left—and the whole country is an utter wasteland, 12 and they are all taken away as slaves to other countries far away, and all the land of Israel lies deserted! 13 Yet a tenth—a remnant—will survive; and though Israel is invaded again and again and destroyed, yet Israel will be like a tree cut down, whose stump still lives to grow again.”
138 Lord, with all my heart I thank you. I will sing your praises before the armies of angels.[a] 2 I face your Temple as I worship, giving thanks to you for all your loving-kindness and your faithfulness, for your promises are backed by all the honor of your name.[b] 3 When I pray, you answer me and encourage me by giving me the strength I need.
4 Every king in all the earth shall give you thanks, O Lord, for all of them shall hear your voice. 5 Yes, they shall sing about Jehovah’s glorious ways, for his glory is very great. 6 Yet though he is so great, he respects the humble, but proud men must keep their distance. 7 Though I am surrounded by troubles, you will bring me safely through them. You will clench your fist against my angry enemies! Your power will save me. 8 The Lord will work out his plans for my life—for your loving-kindness, Lord, continues forever. Don’t abandon me—for you made me.
15 Now let me remind you, brothers, of what the Gospel really is, for it has not changed—it is the same Good News I preached to you before. You welcomed it then and still do now, for your faith is squarely built upon this wonderful message; 2 and it is this Good News that saves you if you still firmly believe it, unless of course you never really believed it in the first place.
3 I passed on to you right from the first what had been told to me, that Christ died for our sins just as the Scriptures said he would, 4 and that he was buried, and that three days afterwards he arose from the grave just as the prophets foretold. 5 He was seen by Peter and later by the rest of “the Twelve.”[a] 6 After that he was seen by more than five hundred Christian brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have died by now. 7 Then James saw him, and later all the apostles. 8 Last of all I saw him too, long after the others, as though I had been born almost too late for this. 9 For I am the least worthy of all the apostles, and I shouldn’t even be called an apostle at all after the way I treated the church of God.
10 But whatever I am now it is all because God poured out such kindness and grace upon me—and not without results: for I have worked harder than all the other apostles, yet actually I wasn’t doing it, but God working in me, to bless me. 11 It makes no difference who worked the hardest, I or they; the important thing is that we preached the Gospel to you and you believed it.
5 One day as he was preaching on the shore of Lake Gennesaret, great crowds pressed in on him to listen to the Word of God. 2 He noticed two empty boats standing at the water’s edge while the fishermen washed their nets. 3 Stepping into one of the boats, Jesus asked Simon, its owner, to push out a little into the water, so that he could sit in the boat and speak to the crowds from there.
4 When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Now go out where it is deeper and let down your nets and you will catch a lot of fish!”
5 “Sir,” Simon replied, “we worked hard all last night and didn’t catch a thing. But if you say so, we’ll try again.”
6 And this time their nets were so full that they began to tear! 7 A shout for help brought their partners in the other boat, and soon both boats were filled with fish and on the verge of sinking.
8 When Simon Peter realized what had happened, he fell to his knees before Jesus and said, “Oh, sir, please leave us—I’m too much of a sinner for you to have around.” 9 For he was awestruck by the size of their catch, as were the others with him, 10 and his partners too—James and John, the sons of Zebedee. Jesus replied, “Don’t be afraid! From now on you’ll be fishing for the souls of men!”
11 And as soon as they landed, they left everything and went with him.
The Living Bible copyright © 1971 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.