Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

Prayer for Deliverance from the Treacherous.

A Song of ^[a]Ascents.

Cyrus’s Proclamation

1 ^(A)Now in the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, in order to fulfill the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah, the Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia, so that he ^(B)sent a proclamation throughout all his kingdom, and also put it in writing, saying:

² “Thus says Cyrus king of Persia, ‘The Lord, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth and ^(C)He has appointed me to build Him a house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah. ³ Whoever there is among you of all His people, may his God be with him! Let him go up to Jerusalem which is in Judah and rebuild the house of the Lord, the God of Israel; ^(D)He is the God who is in Jerusalem. ⁴ Every survivor, at whatever place he may ^[a]live, let the men of ^[b]that place support him with silver and gold, with goods and cattle, together with a freewill offering for the house of God which is in Jerusalem.’”

Holy Vessels Restored

⁵ Then the heads of fathers’ households of Judah and Benjamin and the priests and the Levites arose, ^(E)even everyone whose spirit God had stirred to go up and rebuild the house of the Lord which is in Jerusalem. ⁶ All those about them ^[c](F)encouraged them with articles of silver, with gold, with goods, with cattle and with valuables, aside from all that was given as a freewill offering. ^7 (G)Also King Cyrus brought out the articles of the house of the Lord, ^(H)which Nebuchadnezzar had carried away from Jerusalem and put in the house of his gods; ⁸ and Cyrus, king of Persia, had them brought out by the hand of Mithredath the treasurer, and he counted them out to ^(I)Sheshbazzar, the prince of Judah. ⁹ Now this was their number: 30 ^(J)gold dishes, 1,000 silver dishes, 29 ^[d]duplicates; ¹⁰ 30 gold bowls, 410 silver bowls of a second kind and 1,000 other articles. ¹¹ All the articles of gold and silver numbered 5,400. Sheshbazzar brought them all up with the exiles who went up from Babylon to Jerusalem.

Paul’s Integrity

¹² For our ^[a]proud confidence is this: the testimony of ^(A)our conscience, that in holiness and ^(B)godly sincerity, ^(C)not in fleshly wisdom but in the grace of God, we have conducted ourselves in the world, and especially toward you. ¹³ For we write nothing else to you than what you read and understand, and I hope you will understand ^(D)until the end; ¹⁴ just as you also partially did understand us, that we are your reason to be proud as you also are ours, in ^(E)the day of our Lord Jesus.

¹⁵ In this confidence I intended at first to ^(F)come to you, so that you might ^[b]twice receive a ^[c](G)blessing; ^16 [d]that is, to ^(H)pass ^[e]your way into ^(I)Macedonia, and again from Macedonia to come to you, and by you to be ^(J)helped on my journey to Judea. ¹⁷ Therefore, I was not vacillating when I intended to do this, was I? Or what I purpose, do I purpose ^(K)according to the flesh, so that with me there will be yes, yes and no, no at the same time? ¹⁸ But as ^(L)God is faithful, ^(M)our word to you is not yes and no. ¹⁹ For ^(N)the Son of God, Christ Jesus, who was preached among you by us—by me and ^(O)Silvanus and ^(P)Timothy—was not yes and no, but is yes ^(Q)in Him.