Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

Psalm 113

Praise to the Merciful God

Jerusalem as God’s Furnace

¹⁷ The word of the Lord came to me: ¹⁸ “Son of man, the house of Israel has become merely dross to me.^(A) All of them are copper, tin, iron, and lead inside the furnace;^(B) they are just dross from silver. ¹⁹ Therefore, this is what the Lord God says: Because all of you have become dross, I am about to gather you into Jerusalem. ²⁰ Just as one gathers silver, copper, iron, lead, and tin into the furnace to blow fire^(C) on them and melt them, so I will gather you in my anger and wrath, put you inside, and melt you. ²¹ Yes, I will gather you together and blow on you with the fire of my fury, and you will be melted within the city. ²² As silver is melted inside a furnace, so you will be melted inside the city. Then you will know that I, the Lord, have poured out my wrath on you.”^(D)

Indictment of a Sinful Land

²³ The word of the Lord came to me: ²⁴ “Son of man, say to her, ‘You are a land that has not been cleansed,^(E) that has not received rain in the day of indignation.’ ²⁵ The conspiracy of her prophets^(F) within her is^[a] like a roaring lion tearing its prey: they devour people, seize wealth and valuables, and multiply the widows within her. ²⁶ Her priests do violence to my instruction and profane my holy things.^(G) They make no distinction between the holy and the common, and they do not explain the difference between the clean and the unclean.^(H) They close their eyes to my Sabbaths, and I am profaned among them.

²⁷ “Her officials within her are like wolves tearing their prey, shedding blood, and destroying lives in order to make profit dishonestly. ²⁸ Her prophets plaster for them with whitewash by seeing false visions and lying divinations,^(I) saying, ‘This is what the Lord God says,’ when the Lord has not spoken. ²⁹ The people of the land have practiced extortion and committed robbery.^(J) They have oppressed the poor and needy and unlawfully exploited the resident alien. ³⁰ I searched for a man among them who would repair the wall^(K) and stand in the gap before me on behalf of the land so that I might not destroy it,^(L) but I found no one. ³¹ So I have poured out my indignation on them and consumed them with the fire of my fury. I have brought their conduct down on their own heads.”^(M) This is the declaration of the Lord God.

The Believer’s Triumph

³¹ What, then, are we to say about these things?^(A) If God is for us, who is against us?^{(B) 32} He did not even spare his own Son^(C) but gave him up for us all.^(D) How will he not also with him grant us everything? ³³ Who can bring an accusation against God’s elect?^(E) God is the one who justifies.^{(F) 34} Who is the one who condemns?^(G) Christ Jesus is the one who died,^(H) but even more, has been raised;^(I) he also is at the right hand of God^(J) and intercedes for us.^{(K) 35} Who can separate us from the love of Christ? Can affliction^(L) or distress or persecution^(M) or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? ³⁶ As it is written:

³⁷ No, in all these things we are more than conquerors^(P) through him who loved us.^{(Q) 38} For I am persuaded that neither death nor life,^(R) nor angels nor rulers,^(S) nor things present nor things to come,^(T) nor powers, ³⁹ nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from the love of God^(U) that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.^(V)