Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
Book 1
Psalms 1—41
Two Ways to Live
1 Happy is the person who doesn’t listen to the wicked.
He doesn’t go where sinners go.
He doesn’t do what bad people do.
2 He loves the Lord’s teachings.
He thinks about those teachings day and night.
3 He is strong, like a tree planted by a river.
It produces fruit in season.
Its leaves don’t die.
Everything he does will succeed.
4 But wicked people are not like that.
They are like useless chaff
that the wind blows away.
5 So the wicked will not escape God’s punishment.
Sinners will not worship God with good people.
6 This is because the Lord protects good people.
But the wicked will be destroyed.
20 Jerusalem, look up and see.
Someone comes from the north.
Where is the flock God gave to you to care for?
It is the flock you bragged about.
21 What will you say when they appoint as your heads
those you had thought were your friends?
Won’t you have much pain and trouble?
Your pain will be like that of a woman having a baby.
22 You might ask yourself,
“Why has this happened to me?”
It happened because of your many sins.
Because of your sins, your skirt was torn off
and your body has been treated badly.
23 A black man from Cush cannot change the color of his skin.
A leopard cannot change his spots.
In the same way, Jerusalem, you cannot change and do good.
You always do evil.
24 “I will scatter you like chaff that is blown away by the desert wind.
25 This is what will happen to you.
This is your part in my plans,” says the Lord.
“This will happen because you forgot me.
You have trusted in false gods.
26 Jerusalem, I will pull your skirts up over your face.
Everyone will see you, and you will be ashamed.
27 I have seen the terrible things you have done.
I know your acts of adultery and your snorting.
I have seen you acting like a prostitute.
I have seen your hated acts
on the hills and in the fields.
How terrible it will be for you, Jerusalem.
How long will you continue being unclean?”
17 You pray to God and call him Father. And this Father judges each man’s work equally. So while you are here on earth, you should live with respect for God. 18 You know that in the past you were living in a worthless way. You got that way of living from the people who lived before you. But you were saved from that useless life. You were bought, but not with something that ruins like gold or silver. 19 You were bought with the precious blood of the death of Christ, who was like a pure and perfect lamb. 20 Christ was chosen before the world was made. But he was shown to the world in these last times for you. 21 You believe in God through Christ. God raised Christ from death and gave him glory. So your faith and your hope are in God.
22 Now you have made yourselves pure by obeying the truth. Now you can have true love for your brothers. So love each other deeply with all your heart. 23 You have been born again. This new life did not come from something that dies, but from something that cannot die. You were born again through God’s living message that continues forever. 24 The Scripture says,
“All people are like the grass.
And all their strength is like the flowers of the field.
The grass dies and the flowers fall.
25 But the word of the Lord will live forever.” Isaiah 40:6-8
And this is the word that was preached to you.
Jesus Is the Living Stone
2 So then, get rid of all evil and all lying. Do not be a hypocrite. Do not be jealous or speak evil of others. Put all these things out of your life.
The Holy Bible, International Children’s Bible® Copyright© 1986, 1988, 1999, 2015 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission.