Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)
12 Blessed is the nation whose God is Jehovah,
The people whom he hath chosen for his own inheritance.
13 Jehovah looketh from heaven;
He beholdeth all the sons of men;
14 From the place of his habitation he looketh forth
Upon all the inhabitants of the earth,
15 He that fashioneth the hearts of them all,
That considereth all their works.
16 There is no king saved by [a]the multitude of a host:
A mighty man is not delivered by great strength.
17 A horse is a vain thing for safety;
Neither doth he deliver any by his great power.
18 Behold, the eye of Jehovah is upon them that fear him,
Upon them that [b]hope in his lovingkindness;
19 To deliver their soul from death,
And to keep them alive in famine.
20 Our soul hath waited for Jehovah:
He is our help and our shield.
21 For our heart shall rejoice in him,
Because we have trusted in his holy name.
22 Let thy lovingkindness, O Jehovah, be upon us,
According as we [c]have hoped in thee.
6 There is an evil which I have seen under the sun, and it is heavy upon men: 2 a man to whom God giveth riches, wealth, and honor, so that he lacketh nothing for his soul of all that he desireth, yet God giveth him not power to eat thereof, but an alien eateth it; this is vanity, and it is an evil disease. 3 If a man beget a hundred children, and live many years, so that the days of his years are many, but his soul be not filled with good, and moreover he have no burial; I say, that an untimely birth is better than he: 4 for it cometh in vanity, and departeth in darkness, and the name thereof is covered with darkness; 5 moreover it hath not seen the sun [a]nor known it; [b]this hath rest rather than the other: 6 yea, though he live a thousand years twice told, and yet enjoy no good, do not all go to one place?
7 And the high priest said, Are these things so? 2 And he said,
Brethren and fathers, hearken: The God of glory appeared unto our father Abraham, when he was in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Haran, 3 and said unto him, Get thee out of thy land, and from thy kindred, and come into the land which I shall show thee. 4 Then came he out of the land of the Chaldaeans, and dwelt in Haran: and from thence, when his father was dead, God removed him into this land, wherein ye now dwell: 5 and he gave him none inheritance in it, no, not so much as to set his foot on: and he promised that he would give it to him in possession, and to his seed after him, when as yet he had no child. 6 And God spake on this wise, that his seed should sojourn in a strange land, and that they should bring them into bondage, and treat them ill, four hundred years. 7 And the nation to which they shall be in bondage will I judge, said God: and after that shall they come forth, and serve me in this place. 8 And he gave him the covenant of circumcision: and so Abraham begat Isaac, and circumcised him the eighth day; and Isaac begat Jacob, and Jacob the twelve patriarchs.
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