Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
Psalm 78
A Contemplative Maskil of Asaph.
1 Give ear, O my people, to my teaching;
incline your ears to the words of my mouth.
2 I will open my mouth in a parable;
I will utter insightful sayings of old,
3 which we have heard and known,
what our fathers have told us.
4 We will not hide them from their children,
but will tell the coming generation
the praises of the Lord,
and His strength, and the wonderful works that He has done.
52 Then He led out His own people like sheep
and guided them in the wilderness like a flock;
53 He led them in safety, so that they were not afraid,
but the sea overwhelmed their enemies.
54 He brought them to the border of His holy land,
to the mountain that His right hand had acquired.
55 He cast out the nations also before them,
and divided for them their tribal allotments,
and made the tribes of Israel dwell in their tents.
56 Yet they tested and provoked the Most High God,
and did not keep His commands,
57 but turned back and acted unfaithfully like their fathers;
they turned aside like a deceitful bow.
58 For they provoked Him to anger with their high places
and moved Him to jealousy with their graven images.
59 When God heard this, He was full of wrath
and greatly rejected Israel
60 so that He left the tabernacle at Shiloh,
the tent where He lived among people,
61 and delivered His strength to captivity
and His glory into the enemy’s hand.
62 He gave His people over also to the sword;
He was enraged with His inheritance.
63 The fire consumed their young men,
and their maidens were not given to marriage in song.
64 Their priests fell by the sword,
and their widows made no lamentation.
65 Then the Lord awoke as one out of sleep,
and like a mighty man who shouts because of wine.
66 He routed His enemies back,
and He made them a perpetual reproach.
67 Moreover, He rejected the tent of Joseph,
and He did not choose the tribe of Ephraim,
68 but chose the tribe of Judah,
Mount Zion which He loves.
69 He built His sanctuary like the high heavens,
like the earth that He has established perpetually.
70 He chose David His servant
and took him from the sheepfolds;
71 from following the nursing ewes He brought him
to shepherd Jacob His people,
and Israel His inheritance.
72 So he shepherded them according to the integrity of his heart
and guided them by the skillfulness of his hands.
David at Nob
21 Then David came to Nob to Ahimelek the priest. And Ahimelek trembled coming to meet David and said to him, “Why are you alone and no man is with you?”
2 And David said to Ahimelek the priest, “The king commanded me a matter and said to me, ‘Let no man know anything of the business which I am sending you and what I have commanded you.’ But to the young men I made known a certain place to meet. 3 Now therefore what is in your hand? Give me five loaves of bread in my hand, or whatever can be found.”
4 The priest answered David and said, “There is no common bread at hand. But there is holy bread, if the young men have indeed been kept from women.”
5 David answered the priest and said to him, “Indeed women have been kept from us. As previously, when I went out the vessels of the young men were holy even if it was an ordinary journey. How much more then today will their vessels be holy?” 6 So the priest gave him holy bread. For there was no bread there but the showbread that was removed from before the Lord, in order to place hot bread there on the day when it was taken away.
The Healing at the Pool
5 After this there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 2 Now in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate there is a pool, which in Hebrew is called Bethesda, having five porches. 3 In these lay a great crowd of invalids, blind, lame, and paralyzed, waiting for the moving of the water. 4 For an angel went down at a certain time into the pool and stirred up the water. After the stirring of the water, whoever stepped in first was healed of whatever disease he had. 5 A certain man was there who had an illness for thirty-eight years. 6 When Jesus saw him lying there, and knew that he had been in that condition now a long time, He said to him, “Do you want to be healed?”
7 The sick man answered Him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred. But while I am coming, another steps down before me.”
8 Jesus said to him, “Rise, take up your bed and walk.” 9 Immediately the man was healed, took up his bed, and walked.
That day was the Sabbath. 10 The Jews therefore said to him who was cured, “It is the Sabbath day. It is not lawful for you to carry your bed.”
11 He answered them, “He who healed me said to me, ‘Take up your bed and walk.’ ”
12 So they asked him, “Who is the Man who said to you, ‘Take up your bed and walk’?”
13 Now the man who was healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had withdrawn, as there was a crowd in that place.
14 Afterward Jesus found him in the temple, and said to him, “See, you have become whole. Sin no more lest something worse happens to you.” 15 The man departed and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had healed him.
16 So the Jews persecuted Jesus and sought to kill Him, because He had done these things on the Sabbath day. 17 Jesus answered them, “My Father is working still, and I am working.” 18 So the Jews sought even more to kill Him, because He not only had broken the Sabbath, but also said that God was His Father, making Himself equal with God.
The Holy Bible, Modern English Version. Copyright © 2014 by Military Bible Association. Published and distributed by Charisma House.