Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

89 A prayer of Moses the man of God. Lord, thou hast been our refuge from generation to generation.

² Before the mountains were made, or the earth and the world was formed; from eternity and to eternity thou art God.

³ Turn not man away to be brought low: and thou hast said: Be converted, O ye sons of men.

⁴ For a thousand years in thy sight are as yesterday, which is past. And as a watch in the night,

⁵ Things that are counted nothing, shall their years be.

⁶ In the morning man shall grow up like grass; in the morning he shall flourish and pass away: in the evening he shall fall, grow dry, and wither.

⁷ For in thy wrath we have fainted away: and are troubled in thy indignation.

⁸ Thou hast set our iniquities before thy eyes: our life in the light of thy countenance.

⁹ For all our days are spent; and in thy wrath we have fainted away. Our years shall be considered as a spider:

¹⁰ The days of our years in them are threescore and ten years. But if in the strong they be fourscore years: and what is more of them is labour and sorrow. For mildness is come upon us: and we shall be corrected.

¹¹ Who knoweth the power of thy anger, and for thy fear

¹² Can number thy wrath? So make thy right hand known: and men learned in heart, in wisdom.

¹³ Return, O Lord, how long? and be entreated in favour of thy servants.

¹⁴ We are filled in the morning with thy mercy: and we have rejoiced, and are delighted all our days.

¹⁵ We have rejoiced for the days in which thou hast humbled us: for the years in which we have seen evils.

¹⁶ Look upon thy servants and upon their works: and direct their children.

¹⁷ And let the brightness of the Lord our God be upon us: and direct thou the works of our hands over us; yea, the work of our hands do thou direct.

33 Manasses was twelve years old when he began to reign, and he reigned fifty-five years in Jerusalem.

² And he did evil before the Lord, according to all the abominations of the nations, which the Lord cast out before the children of Israel:

³ And he turned, and built again the high places which Ezechias his father had destroyed: and he built altars to Baalim, and made groves, and he adored all the host of heaven, and worshipped them.

⁴ He built also altars in the house of the Lord, whereof the Lord had said: In Jerusalem shall my name be for ever.

⁵ And he built them for all the host of heaven in the two courts of the house of the Lord.

⁶ And he made his sons to pass through the fire in the valley of Benennom: he observed dreams, followed divinations, gave himself up to magic arts, had with him magicians, and enchanters: and he wrought many evils before the Lord, to provoke him to anger.

⁷ He set also a graven, and a molten statue in the house of God, of which God had said to David, and to Solomon his son: In this house, and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, will I put my name for ever.

⁸ And I will not make the foot of Israel to be removed out of the land which I have delivered to their fathers: yet so if they will take heed to do what I hare commanded them, and all the law, and the ceremonies, and judgments by the hand of Moses.

⁹ So Manasses seduced Juda, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, to do evil beyond all the nations, which the Lord had destroyed before the face of the children of Israel.

¹⁰ And the Lord spoke to him, and to his people, and they would not hearken.

¹¹ Therefore he brought upon them the captains of the army of the king of the Assyrians: and they took Manasses, and carried him bound with chains and fetters to Babylon.

¹² And after that he was in distress he prayed to the Lord his God: and did penance exceedingly before the God of his fathers.

¹³ And he entreated him, and besought him earnestly: and he heard his prayer, and brought him again to Jerusalem into his kingdom, and Manasses knew that the Lord was God.

¹⁴ After this he built a wall without the city of David, on the west side of Gihon in the valley, from the entering in of the fish gate round about to Ophel, and raised it up to a great height: and he appointed captains of the army in all the fenced cities of Juda:

¹⁵ And he took away the strange gods, and the idol out of the house of the Lord: the altars also which he had made in the mount of the house of the Lord, and in Jerusalem, and he cast them all out of the city.

¹⁶ And he repaired the altar of the Lord, and sacrificed upon it victims, and peace offerings, and praise: and he commanded Juda to serve the Lord the God of Israel.

¹⁷ Nevertheless the people still sacrificed in the high places to the Lord their God.

11 Now faith is the substance of things to be hoped for, the evidence of things that appear not.

² For by this the ancients obtained a testimony.

³ By faith we understand that the world was framed by the word of God; that from invisible things visible things might be made.

⁴ By faith Abel offered to God a sacrifice exceeding that of Cain, by which he obtained a testimony that he was just, God giving testimony to his gifts; and by it he being dead yet speaketh.

⁵ By faith Henoch was translated, that he should not see death; and he was not found, because God had translated him: for before his translation he had testimony that he pleased God.

⁶ But without faith it is impossible to please God. For he that cometh to God, must believe that he is, and is a rewarder to them that seek him.

⁷ By faith Noe, having received an answer concerning those things which as yet were not seen, moved with fear, framed the ark for the saving of his house, by the which he condemned the world; and was instituted heir of the justice which is by faith.