Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
Psalm 72[a]
The Kingdom of the Messiah
1 Of Solomon.
O God, endow the king with your judgment,
the son of kings with your righteousness.
2 [b]He will govern your people fairly
and deal justly with your poor ones.
3 The mountains will yield peace for the people,
and the hills, righteousness.
4 He will defend the afflicted among the people,
save the children of the poor,
and overwhelm the oppressor.
5 He will reign as long as the sun,
as long as the moon, through all generations.
6 He will descend like rain on the meadow,
like showers that water the earth.
7 Justice will reign in his days,
and peace will abound
until the moon is no more.
8 His rule will extend from sea to sea,[c]
and from the river to the ends of the earth.
9 His foes[d] will bow down before him,
and his enemies will lick the dust.
10 The kings of Tarshish[e] and the Islands
will offer him tribute;
the kings of Sheba and Seba
will present him with gifts.
11 All kings will pay him homage,
and all nations will serve him.
12 For he will save the poor who cry out
and the needy who have no one to help them.
13 He will have pity on the lowly and the poor;
the lives of the needy he will save.
14 He will free them from oppression and violence,
for their blood is precious in his sight.
15 [f]Long may he live!
May the gold of Sheba be given to him.
May people pray for him unceasingly
and invoke blessings[g] on him all day long.
16 May grain abound throughout the land,
even growing abundantly on the mountain tops.
May its crops[h] be as plenteous as those of Lebanon,
and may its people flourish like the grass of the field.
17 May his name[i] be blessed forever;
may it endure as long as the sun.
May all peoples be blessed in him;
may all the nations proclaim his greatness.
18 [j]Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel,
who alone can perform such wondrous deeds.
19 May his glorious name be blessed forever,
and may the whole world be filled with his glory.
Amen. Amen.
20 The end of the psalms of David, son of Jesse.[k]
The Conquest of the Promised Land[a]
Chapter 1
Assurance of Divine Aid. 1 After the death of Moses, the servant of the Lord, the Lord spoke to Joshua, the son of Nun, the assistant of Moses, saying, 2 [b]“Moses my servant is dead. Rise, therefore, and cross over this Jordan, you and all of this people, to the land that I am giving to them, the people of Israel. 3 Every place that you set your feet down, I have given to you, as I promised to Moses. 4 Your territory will extend from the Desert of Lebanon as far as the great river, the River Euphrates, all of the land of the Hittites, and as far as the great sea on the west. 5 No one will be able to withstand you, all the days of your life. I will treat you just as I treated Moses, for I will never forsake nor abandon you. 6 So be strong and take courage, for you will lead these people to inherit the land that I promised to their forefathers to give them. 7 Only be strong and take courage. Be careful to observe the entire law that my servant Moses gave to you. Do not turn away from it to the right or to the left, so that you might prosper wherever you go. 8 Do not let this book of the law be absent from your mouth; meditate upon it day and night, so that you might carefully observe everything that is written in it. Then you will prosper and be successful. 9 I have given you a command. Be strong and brave, do not be afraid nor dismayed. I, the Lord, your God, will be with you wherever you go.”
32 The Faith of the Judges and Prophets. What more shall I say? Time is too short for me to speak of Gideon, Barak, Samson, and Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the Prophets,[a] 33 who by faith conquered kingdoms, administered justice, and obtained the promises. They closed the mouths of lions,[b] 34 quenched raging fires,[c] and escaped the edge of the sword. Their weakness was turned into strength as they became mighty in battle and put foreign armies to flight.
35 Women received their dead[d] back through resurrection. Others who were tortured refused to accept release in order to obtain a better resurrection. 36 Still others were mocked and scourged, even to the point of enduring chains and imprisonment.
37 They were stoned,[e] or sawed in two, or put to death by the sword. They went about in skins of sheep or goats—destitute, persecuted, and tormented. 38 The world was not worthy of them. They wandered about in desert areas and on mountains, and they lived in dens and caves of the earth.
39 Yet all these, even though they were commended for their faith, did not receive what was promised. 40 For God had made provision for us to have something better, and they were not to achieve perfection except with us.[f]
Let Us Run with Eyes Fixed on Jesus[g]
Chapter 12
You Have Not Yet Resisted to the Point of Bloodshed. 1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses,[h] let us throw off everything that weighs us down and the sins that so easily distract us and with perseverance run the race that lies ahead of us, 2 with our eyes fixed on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith. For the sake of the joy that lay before him, he endured the cross, ignoring its shame, and is now seated at the right hand of the throne of God.
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