Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)
The Folly of the Godless and God’s Final Triumph
For the music director. Of David.[a]
14 The fool says in his heart, “There is no God.”
They are corrupt.
They do abominable deeds.
There is none who does good.
2 Yahweh looks down from heaven upon the children of humankind
to see whether there is one who has insight,
one who cares about God.
3 All have gone astray;
they are altogether corrupt.
There is not one who does good;
there is not even one.
4 All who do evil—do they not know,
they who eat my people as though they were eating bread?
They do not call on Yahweh.
5 There they are very fearful[b]
because God is with the generation of the righteous.
6 You would put to shame the plan of the poor,
because[c] Yahweh is his refuge.
7 Oh that from Zion[d] would come salvation for Israel!
When Yahweh returns the fortunes of his people,
Jacob will rejoice; Israel will be happy.
4 If you return, O Israel,” declares[a] Yahweh,
“you return to me.
And if you remove your abominations from my presence,[b]
and you do not wander,
2 and you swear, ‘As Yahweh lives,’[c]
in truth, in justice, and in righteousness,
then nations will be blessed by him,
and in him they will boast.”
3 For thus says Yahweh
to the men[d] of Judah and to Jerusalem,
“Break up for yourselves prepared virgin soil,
and you must not sow among thornbushes.
4 Circumcise yourselves to Yahweh,
and remove the foreskins of your hearts,[e]
men[f] of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem,
lest my wrath goes forth like the fire and burns,
and there is no one who extinguishes it,[g]
because of the evil of your deeds.”
An Invasion from the North
5 Declare in Judah and proclaim in Jerusalem and say,
“Blow a horn through the land,
call with a loud voice[h] and say,
‘Be gathered and let us go into the fortified cities.’
6 Lift up a signal toward Zion,
bring yourselves to safety; you must not remain standing,
for I am bringing evil from the north,
and a great destruction.
7 A lion has gone up from his thicket,
and a destroyer of nations has set out.
He has gone out from his place to make your land as a horror,
your cities will go to ruin without[i] inhabitant.
8 Because of this gird yourselves with sackcloth,[j] lament and wail,
for the burning anger[k] of Yahweh has not turned back from us.
9 And then on that day,” declares[l] Yahweh,
“the heart of the king and the heart of the officials will be destroyed,
and the priests will be appalled,
and the prophets will be astonished.”
10 Then I said, “Ah, Lord Yahweh, surely you have utterly deceived this people and Jerusalem, saying, ‘It will be peace for you,’ while the sword reaches up to the throat.”
The Rise and Fall of the False Teachers
2 But there were also false prophets among the people, as there will be false teachers among you also, who will bring in destructive heresies[a], even denying the Master who bought them, thus[b] bringing on themselves swift destruction. 2 And many will follow their licentious ways, because of whom the way of truth will be reviled. 3 And in greediness they will exploit you with false words, whose condemnation from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep.
4 For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but held them captive in Tartarus with chains of darkness and handed them over to be kept for judgment, 5 and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a proclaimer of righteousness, and seven others[c] when he[d] brought a flood on the world of the ungodly, 6 and condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes, having appointed them as an example for those who are going to be ungodly, 7 and rescued righteous Lot, worn down by the way of life of lawless persons in licentiousness 8 (for that righteous man, as he[e] lived among them day after day, was tormenting his righteous soul by the lawless deeds he was seeing and hearing), 9 then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to reserve the unrighteous to be punished at[f] the day of judgment, 10 and especially those who go after the flesh in defiling lust[g] and who despise authority.
Bold and arrogant, they do not tremble in awe as they[h] blaspheme majestic beings,
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