Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

8 Does not skillful and godly Wisdom cry out, and understanding raise her voice [in contrast to the loose woman]?

² On the top of the heights beside the way, where the paths meet, stands Wisdom [skillful and godly];

³ At the gates at the entrance of the town, at the coming in at the doors, she cries out:

⁴ To you, O men, I call, and my voice is directed to the sons of men.

²² The Lord formed and brought me [Wisdom] forth at the beginning of His way, before His acts of old.

²³ I [Wisdom] was inaugurated and ordained from everlasting, from the beginning, before ever the earth existed.^(A)

²⁴ When there were no deeps, I was brought forth, when there were no fountains laden with water.

²⁵ Before the mountains were settled, before the hills, I was brought forth,^(B)

²⁶ While as yet He had not made the land or the fields or the first of the dust of the earth.

²⁷ When He prepared the heavens, I [Wisdom] was there; when He drew a circle upon the face of the deep and stretched out the firmament over it,

²⁸ When He made firm the skies above, when He established the fountains of the deep,

²⁹ When He gave to the sea its limit and His decree that the waters should not transgress [across the boundaries set by] His command, when He appointed the foundations of the earth—^(C)

³⁰ Then I [Wisdom] was ^[a]beside Him as a master and director of the work; and I was daily His delight, rejoicing before Him always,^(D)

³¹ Rejoicing in His inhabited earth and delighting in the sons of men.^(E)

Psalm 8

To the Chief Musician; set to a Philistine lute, or [possibly] to a particular Hittite tune. A Psalm of David.

¹ O Lord, our Lord, how excellent (majestic and glorious) is Your name in all the earth! You have set Your glory on [or above] the heavens.

² Out of the mouths of babes and unweaned infants You have established strength because of Your foes, that You might silence the enemy and the avenger.^(A)

³ When I view and consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars, which You have ordained and established,

⁴ What is man that You are mindful of him, and the son of [earthborn] man that You care for him?

⁵ Yet You have made him but a little lower than God [or heavenly beings], and You have crowned him with glory and honor.

⁶ You made him to have dominion over the works of Your hands; You have put all things under his feet:^(B)

⁷ All sheep and oxen, yes, and the beasts of the field,

⁸ The birds of the air, and the fish of the sea, and whatever passes along the paths of the seas.

⁹ O Lord, our Lord, how excellent (majestic and glorious) is Your name in all the earth!

5 Therefore, since we are justified (^[a]acquitted, declared righteous, and given a right standing with God) through faith, let us [grasp the fact that we] have [the peace of reconciliation to hold and to ^[b]enjoy] peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed One).

² Through Him also we have [our] access (entrance, introduction) by faith into this grace (state of God’s favor) in which we [firmly and safely] stand. And let us rejoice and exult in our hope of experiencing and enjoying the glory of God.

³ Moreover [let us also be full of joy now!] let us exult and triumph in our troubles and rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that pressure and affliction and hardship produce patient and unswerving endurance.

⁴ And endurance (fortitude) develops maturity of ^[c]character (approved faith and ^[d]tried integrity). And character [of this sort] produces [the habit of] ^[e]joyful and confident hope of eternal salvation.

⁵ Such hope never disappoints or deludes or shames us, for God’s love has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit Who has been given to us.

¹² I have still many things to say to you, but you are not able to bear them or to take them upon you or to grasp them now.

¹³ But when He, the Spirit of Truth (the Truth-giving Spirit) comes, He will guide you into all the Truth (the whole, full Truth). For He will not speak His own message [on His own authority]; but He will tell whatever He hears [from the Father; He will give the message that has been given to Him], and He will announce and declare to you the things that are to come [that will happen in the future].

¹⁴ He will honor and glorify Me, because He will take of (receive, draw upon) what is Mine and will reveal (declare, disclose, transmit) it to you.

¹⁵ Everything that the Father has is Mine. That is what I meant when I said that He [the Spirit] will take the things that are Mine and will reveal (declare, disclose, transmit) it to you.