Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
Psalm 16
Confidence in the Lord
A Davidic Miktam.(A)
1 Protect me, God, for I take refuge in You.(B)
2 I[a] said to Yahweh, “You are my Lord;
I have nothing good besides You.”[b](C)
3 As for the holy people who are in the land,(D)
they are the noble ones.
All my delight is in them.
4 The sorrows of those who take another god
for themselves will multiply;
I will not pour out their drink offerings of blood,
and I will not speak their names with my lips.(E)
5 Lord, You are my portion[c]
and my cup of blessing;
You hold my future.(F)
6 The boundary lines have fallen for me
in pleasant places;
indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance.(G)
15 Then[a] Jeshurun[b](A) became fat and rebelled—
you became fat, bloated, and gorged.
He abandoned the God who made him
and scorned the Rock of his salvation.
16 They provoked His jealousy with foreign gods;
they enraged Him with detestable practices.(B)
17 They sacrificed to demons, not God,
to gods they had not known,
new gods that had just arrived,
which your fathers did not fear.(C)
18 You ignored the Rock who gave you birth;
you forgot the God who gave birth to you.
19 When the Lord saw this, He despised them,
provoked to anger by His sons and daughters.
20 He said: “I will hide My face from them;
I will see what will become of them,
for they are a perverse generation—
unfaithful children.
21 They have provoked My jealousy
with their so-called gods;[c]
they have enraged Me with their worthless idols.
So I will provoke their jealousy
with an inferior people;[d]
I will enrage them with a foolish nation.(D)
22 For fire has been kindled because of My anger
and burns to the depths of Sheol;
it devours the land and its produce,
and scorches the foundations of the mountains.
23 “I will pile disasters on them;
I will use up My arrows against them.
24 They will be weak from hunger,
ravaged by pestilence and bitter plague;
I will unleash on them wild beasts with fangs,
as well as venomous snakes that slither in the dust.
25 Outside, the sword will take their children,
and inside, there will be terror;
the young man and the young woman will be killed,
the infant and the gray-haired man.(E)
26 “I would have said: I will cut them to pieces[e]
and blot out the memory of them from mankind,
27 if I had not feared insult from the enemy,
or feared that these foes might misunderstand
and say: ‘Our own hand has prevailed;
it wasn’t the Lord who did all this.’”
39 See now that I alone am He;
there is no God but Me.(A)
I bring death and I give life;
I wound and I heal.
No one can rescue anyone from My hand.(B)
40 I raise My hand to heaven and declare:
As surely as I live forever,
41 when I sharpen My flashing sword,
and My hand takes hold of judgment,
I will take vengeance on My adversaries
and repay those who hate Me.
42 I will make My arrows drunk with blood
while My sword devours flesh—
the blood of the slain and the captives,
the heads of the enemy leaders.”[a]
His Death and Resurrection Predicted
21 But He strictly warned and instructed them to tell this to no one,(A) 22 saying,(B) “The Son of Man(C) must suffer many things(D) and be rejected(E) by the elders, chief priests, and scribes,(F) be killed, and be raised the third day.”(G)
Take Up Your Cross
23 Then He said to them all, “If anyone wants to come with[a] Me, he must deny himself,(H) take up his cross daily,[b] and follow Me.(I) 24 For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life because of Me will save it.(J) 25 What is a man benefited if he gains the whole world, yet loses or forfeits himself?(K) 26 For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words,(L) the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when He comes in His glory(M) and that of the Father and the holy angels.(N) 27 I tell you the truth: There are some standing here who will not taste death(O) until they see the kingdom of God.”(P)
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