Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
23 You who fear the Lord, praise Him;
all you descendants of Jacob, glorify Him,
and stand in awe of Him, all you descendants of Israel.
24 For He has not despised nor abhorred
the affliction of the afflicted;
nor has He hid His face from him;
but when he cried to Him, He heard.
25 From You my praise will be in the great congregation;
I will pay my vows before those who fear Him.
26 The meek will eat and be satisfied;
those who seek Him will praise the Lord.
May your hearts live forever.
27 All the ends of the world
will remember and turn to the Lord,
and all the families of the nations
will worship before You.
28 For kingship belongs to the Lord,
and He rules among the nations.
29 All the prosperous ones of the earth will eat and worship;
all who go down to the dust will bow before Him,
even he who cannot keep his own soul alive.
30 Posterity will serve Him;
it will be told to generations about the Lord;
31 they will come and declare His righteousness
to a people yet to be born,
that He has acted.
The Birth of Ishmael
16 Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children, and she had a maidservant, an Egyptian, whose name was Hagar. 2 So Sarai said to Abram, “The Lord has prevented me from having children. Please go in to my maid; it may be that I will obtain children through her.”
Abram listened to Sarai. 3 So after Abram had been living for ten years in the land of Canaan, Sarai, his wife, took Hagar her maid, the Egyptian, and gave her to her husband Abram to be his wife. 4 He went in to Hagar, and she conceived.
When she saw that she had conceived, she began to despise her mistress. 5 Then Sarai said to Abram, “May the wrong done to me be on you! I gave my maid into your arms; and when she saw that she had conceived, I became despised in her eyes. May the Lord judge between you and me.”
6 But Abram said to Sarai, “Indeed, your maid is in your power; do to her as you please.” Then Sarai dealt harshly with her, and she fled from her presence.
The Example of Abraham
4 What then shall we say that Abraham, our father according to the flesh, has found? 2 If Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. 3 What does the Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.”[a]
4 Now to him who works, wages are not given as a gift, but as a debt. 5 But to him who does not work, but believes in Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited as righteousness. 6 Even David describes the blessedness of the man to whom God credits righteousness without works:
7 “Blessed are those
whose iniquities are forgiven,
and whose sins are covered;
8 blessed is the man
to whom the Lord shall not impute sin.”[b]
9 Does this blessedness then come upon the circumcised only, or upon the uncircumcised also? We are saying that faith was credited to Abraham as righteousness. 10 How then was it credited? When he was in circumcision? Or in uncircumcision? Not in circumcision, but in uncircumcision. 11 And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith that he had while being uncircumcised, so that he might be the father of all those who believe, though they are uncircumcised, that righteousness might be credited to them also, 12 and the father of circumcision to those who are not of the circumcision only, but who also walk in the steps of the faith of our father Abraham, which he had while still being uncircumcised.
The Holy Bible, Modern English Version. Copyright © 2014 by Military Bible Association. Published and distributed by Charisma House.