Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)
19 Remember my affliction and my misery,
the wormwood and the bitterness.
20 My soul still remembers them,
and is bowed down within me.
21 This I recall to my mind;
therefore I have hope.
22 It is because of Yahweh’s loving kindnesses that we are not consumed,
because his mercies don’t fail.
23 They are new every morning.
Great is your faithfulness.
24 “Yahweh is my portion,” says my soul.
“Therefore I will hope in him.”
25 Yahweh is good to those who wait for him,
to the soul who seeks him.
26 It is good that a man should hope
and quietly wait for the salvation of Yahweh.
52 Zedekiah was twenty-one years old when he began to reign. He reigned eleven years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Hamutal the daughter of Jeremiah of Libnah. 2 He did that which was evil in Yahweh’s sight, according to all that Jehoiakim had done. 3 For through Yahweh’s anger this happened in Jerusalem and Judah, until he had cast them out from his presence.
Zedekiah rebelled against the king of Babylon. 4 In the ninth year of his reign, in the tenth month, in the tenth day of the month, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came, he and all his army, against Jerusalem, and encamped against it; and they built forts against it round about. 5 So the city was besieged to the eleventh year of King Zedekiah.
6 In the fourth month, in the ninth day of the month, the famine was severe in the city, so that there was no bread for the people of the land. 7 Then a breach was made in the city, and all the men of war fled, and went out of the city by night by the way of the gate between the two walls, which was by the king’s garden. Now the Chaldeans were against the city all around. The men of war went toward the Arabah, 8 but the army of the Chaldeans pursued the king, and overtook Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho; and all his army was scattered from him. 9 Then they took the king, and carried him up to the king of Babylon to Riblah in the land of Hamath; and he pronounced judgment on him. 10 The king of Babylon killed the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes. He also killed all the princes of Judah in Riblah. 11 He put out the eyes of Zedekiah; and the king of Babylon bound him in fetters, and carried him to Babylon, and put him in prison until the day of his death.
8 “To the angel of the assembly in Smyrna write:
“The first and the last, who was dead, and has come to life says these things:
9 “I know your works, oppression, and your poverty (but you are rich), and the blasphemy of those who say they are Jews, and they are not, but are a synagogue of Satan. 10 Don’t be afraid of the things which you are about to suffer. Behold, the devil is about to throw some of you into prison, that you may be tested; and you will have oppression for ten days. Be faithful to death, and I will give you the crown of life. 11 He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the assemblies. He who overcomes won’t be harmed by the second death.
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