Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

Psalm 16

A Poem of David; [probably] intended to record memorable thoughts.

¹ Keep and protect me, O God, for in You I have found refuge, and in You do I put my trust and hide myself.

² I say to the Lord, You are my Lord; I have no good beside or beyond You.

³ As for the godly (the saints) who are in the land, they are the excellent, the noble, and the glorious, in whom is all my delight.

⁴ Their sorrows shall be multiplied who choose another god; their drink offerings of blood will I not offer or take their names upon my lips.

⁵ The Lord is my chosen and assigned portion, my cup; You hold and maintain my lot.

⁶ The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; yes, I have a good heritage.

⁷ I will bless the Lord, Who has given me counsel; yes, my heart instructs me in the night seasons.

⁸ I have set the Lord continually before me; because He is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.

⁹ Therefore my heart is glad and my glory [my inner self] rejoices; my body too shall rest and confidently dwell in safety,

¹⁰ For You will not abandon me to Sheol (the place of the dead), neither will You suffer Your holy one [Holy One] to see corruption.^(A)

¹¹ You will show me the path of life; in Your presence is fullness of joy, at Your right hand there are pleasures forevermore.^(B)

²² Then Aaron lifted his hands toward the people and blessed them, and came down [from the altar] after offering the sin offering, the burnt offering, and the peace offerings.

²³ Moses and Aaron went into the Tent of Meeting, and when they came out they blessed the people, and the glory of the Lord [the Shekinah cloud] appeared to all the people [as promised].^(A)

²⁴ Then there came a fire out from before the Lord and consumed the burnt offering and the fat on the altar; and when all the people saw it, they shouted and fell on their faces.

10 And Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, each took his censer and put fire in it, and put incense on it, and offered strange and unholy fire before the Lord, as He had not commanded them.

² And there came forth fire from before the Lord and killed them, and they died before the Lord.

³ Then Moses said to Aaron, This is what the Lord meant when He said, I ^[a][and My will, not their own] will be acknowledged as hallowed by those who come near Me, and before all the people I will be honored. And Aaron said nothing.

⁴ Moses called Mishael and Elzaphan, sons of Uzziel uncle of Aaron, and said to them, Come near, carry your brethren from before the sanctuary out of the camp.

⁵ So they drew near and carried them in their undertunics [stripped of their priestly vestments] out of the camp, as Moses had said.

⁶ And Moses said to Aaron and Eleazar and Ithamar, his sons [the father and brothers of the two priests whom God had slain for offering false fire], Do not uncover your heads or let your hair go loose or tear your clothes, lest you die [also] and lest God’s wrath should come upon all the congregation; but let your brethren, the whole house of Israel, bewail the burning which the Lord has kindled.

⁷ And you shall not go out from the door of the Tent of Meeting, lest you die, for the Lord’s anointing oil is upon you. And they did according to Moses’ word.

⁸ And the Lord said to Aaron,

⁹ Do not drink wine or strong drink, you or your sons, when you go into the Tent of Meeting, lest you die; it shall be a statute forever in all your generations.

¹⁰ You shall make a distinction and recognize a difference between the holy and the common or unholy, and between the unclean and the clean;

¹¹ And you are to teach the Israelites all the statutes which the Lord has spoken to them by Moses.

⁵ Examine and test and evaluate your own selves to see whether you are holding to your faith and showing the proper fruits of it. Test and prove yourselves [^[a]not Christ]. Do you not yourselves realize and know [thoroughly by an ever-increasing experience] that Jesus Christ is in you—unless you are [counterfeits] disapproved on trial and rejected?

⁶ But I hope you will recognize and know that we are not disapproved on trial and rejected.

⁷ But I pray to God that you may do nothing wrong, not in order that we [^[b]our teaching] may appear to be approved, but that you may continue doing right, [though] we may seem to have failed and be unapproved.

⁸ For we can do nothing against the Truth [^[c]not serve any party or personal interest], but only for the Truth [^[d]which is the Gospel].

⁹ For we are glad when we are weak (^[e]unapproved) and you are really strong. And this we also pray for: your all-round strengthening and perfecting of soul.

¹⁰ So I write these things while I am absent from you, that when I come to you, I may not have to deal sharply in my use of the authority which the Lord has given me [to be employed, however] for building [you] up and not for tearing [you] down.