◀ All Reading Plans / Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous) / Psalm 139:1-12 23-24 (You have searched me and known me); Isaiah 44:1-5 (God’s blessing on Israel: “Do not fear”); Hebrews 2:1-9 (Warning to pay attention) (New English Translation)

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Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

Daily Bible readings that follow the church liturgical year, with sequential stories told across multiple weeks.

Duration: 1245 days

Psalm 139:1-12

Psalm 139^[a]

For the music director, a psalm of David.

139 O Lord, you examine me^[b] and know me.
²You know when I sit down and when I get up;
even from far away you understand my motives.
³You carefully observe me when I travel or when I lie down to rest;^[c]
you are aware of everything I do.^[d]
⁴Certainly^[e] my tongue does not frame a word
without you, O Lord, being thoroughly aware of it.^[f]
⁵You squeeze me in from behind and in front;
you place your hand on me.
⁶Your knowledge is beyond my comprehension;
it is so far beyond me, I am unable to fathom it.^[g]
⁷Where can I go to escape your Spirit?
Where can I flee to escape your presence?^[h]
⁸If I were to ascend^[i] to heaven, you would be there.
If I were to sprawl out^[j] in Sheol, there you would be.^[k]
⁹If I were to fly away^[l] on the wings of the dawn,^[m]
and settle down on the other side^[n] of the sea,
¹⁰even there your hand would guide me,
your right hand would grab hold of me.
¹¹If I were to say, “Certainly the darkness will cover me,^[o]
and the light will turn to night all around me,”^[p]
¹²even the darkness is not too dark for you to see,^[q]
and the night is as bright as^[r] day;
darkness and light are the same to you.^[s]

Footnotes

Psalm 139:1 sn Psalm 139. The psalmist acknowledges that God, who created him, is aware of his every action and thought. He invites God to examine his motives, for he is confident they are pure.
Psalm 139:1 tn The statement is understood as generalizing—the psalmist describes what God typically does.
Psalm 139:3 tn Heb “my traveling and my lying down you measure.” The verb זָרָה (zarah, “to measure”) is probably here a denominative from זֶרֶת (zeret, “a span; a measure”), though some derive it from זָרָה (zarat, “to winnow; to sift”; see BDB 279-80 s.v. זָרָה).
Psalm 139:3 tn Heb “all my ways.”
Psalm 139:4 tn Or “for.”
Psalm 139:4 tn Heb “look, O Lord, you know all of it.”
Psalm 139:6 tn Heb “too amazing [is this] knowledge for me, it is elevated, I cannot attain to it.”
Psalm 139:7 tn Heb “Where can I go from your spirit, and where from your face can I flee?” God’s “spirit” may refer here (1) to his presence (note the parallel term, “your face,” and see Ps 104:29-30, where God’s “face” is his presence and his “spirit” is the life-giving breath he imparts) or (2) to his personal Spirit (see Ps 51:10).
Psalm 139:8 tn The Hebrew verb סָלַק (salaq, “to ascend”) occurs only here in the OT, but the word is well-attested in Aramaic literature from different time periods and displays a wide semantic range (see DNWSI 2:788-90).
Psalm 139:8 tn The verb יָצַע (yatzaʿ) is rare in the Bible (see Isa 58:5 also Hiphil, and Isa 1:14; Est 4:3 for Hophal examples). There are three main options for understanding this phrase. It may mean “to descend to Sheol,” as in the LXX. This takes the motion in the verb as very generic for this context and understands “Sheol” without a preposition as the default “to Sheol.” Many translations take it as spreading out [something] to act as a bed, couch, or area to lie down. It is uncertain that the idea of a bed has to be implied and this does not required to fit the other contexts. Or, as taken here, it may “to spread [oneself] out, to sprawl.” Each view has merits and it is difficult to decide because the are so few examples.
Psalm 139:8 tn Heb “look, you.”
Psalm 139:9 tn Heb “rise up.”
Psalm 139:9 sn On the wings of the dawn. This personification of the “dawn” may find its roots in mythological traditions about the god Shachar, whose birth is described in an Ugaritic myth (see G. R. Driver, Canaanite Myths and Legends, 126) and who is mentioned in Isa 14:12 as the father of Helel.
Psalm 139:9 tn Heb “at the end.”
Psalm 139:11 tn The Hebrew verb שׁוּף (shuf), which means “to crush; to wound,” in Gen 3:15 and Job 9:17, is problematic here. For a discussion of attempts to relate the verb to Arabic roots, see L. C. Allen, Psalms 101-150 (WBC), 251. Many emend the form to יְשׂוּכֵּנִי (y^esukkeni), from the root שָׂכַך (sakhakh, “to cover,” an alternate form of סָכַך [sakhakh]), a reading assumed in the present translation.
Psalm 139:11 tn Heb “and night, light, around me.”
Psalm 139:12 tn The words “to see” are supplied in the translation for clarification and for stylistic reasons.
Psalm 139:12 tn Heb “shines like.”
Psalm 139:12 tn Heb “like darkness, like light.”

Psalm 139:23-24

²³Examine me, O God, and probe my thoughts.^[a]
Test me, and know my concerns.^[b]
²⁴See if there is any idolatrous way^[c] in me,
and lead me in the everlasting way.^[d]

Isaiah 44:1-5

The Lord Will Renew Israel

44 “Now, listen, Jacob my servant,
Israel whom I have chosen!”
²This is what the Lord, the one who made you, says—
the one who formed you in the womb and helps you:
“Don’t be afraid, my servant Jacob,
Jeshurun,^[a] whom I have chosen.
³For I will pour water on the parched ground^[b]
and cause streams to flow^[c] on the dry land.
I will pour my Spirit on your offspring
and my blessing on your children.
⁴They will sprout up like a tree in the grass,^[d]
like poplars beside channels of water.
⁵One will say, ‘I belong to the Lord,’
and another will use^[e] the name ‘Jacob.’
One will write on his hand, ‘The Lord’s,’
and use the name ‘Israel.’”^[f]

Hebrews 2:1-9

Warning Against Drifting Away

2 Therefore we must pay closer attention to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away. ²For if the message spoken through angels^[a] proved to be so firm that every violation^[b] or disobedience received its just penalty, ³how will we escape if we neglect such a great salvation? It was first communicated through the Lord and was confirmed to us by those who heard him, ⁴while God confirmed their witness^[c] with signs and wonders and various miracles and gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed^[d] according to his will.

Exposition of Psalm 8: Jesus and the Destiny of Humanity

⁵For he did not put the world to come,^[e] about which we are speaking,^[f] under the control of angels. ⁶Instead someone testified somewhere:

“What is man that you think of him^[g] or the son of man that you care for him?
⁷You made him lower than the angels for a little while.
You crowned him with glory and honor.^[h]
⁸You put all things under his control.”^[i]

For when he put all things under his control, he left nothing outside of his control. At present we do not yet see all things under his control,^[j] ⁹but we see Jesus, who was made lower than the angels for a little while,^[k] now crowned with glory and honor because he suffered death,^[l] so that by God’s grace he would experience^[m] death on behalf of everyone.

Footnotes

Hebrews 2:2 sn The message spoken through angels refers to the OT law, which according to Jewish tradition was mediated to Moses through angels (cf. Deut 33:2; Ps 68:17-18; Acts 7:38, 53; Gal 3:19; and Jub. 1:27, 29; Josephus, Ant. 15.5.3 [15.136]).
Hebrews 2:2 tn Grk “through angels became valid and every violation.”
Hebrews 2:4 tn Grk “God bearing witness together” (the phrase “with them” is implied).
Hebrews 2:4 tn Grk “and distributions of the Holy Spirit.”
Hebrews 2:5 sn The phrase the world to come means “the coming inhabited earth,” using the Greek term which describes the world of people and their civilizations.
Hebrews 2:5 sn See the previous reference to the world in Heb 1:6.
Hebrews 2:6 tn Grk “remember him.”
Hebrews 2:7 tc Several witnesses, many of them early and significant (א A C D* P Ψ 0243 0278 33 1739 1881 al lat co), have at the end of v 7, “You have given him dominion over the works of your hands.” Other mss, not quite as impressive in weight, lack the words (P⁴⁶ B D² M). In spite of the impressive external evidence for the longer reading, it is most likely a scribal addition to conform the text of Hebrews to Ps 8:6 (8:7 LXX). Conformity of a NT quotation of the OT to the LXX was a routine scribal activity, and can hardly be in doubt here as to the cause of the longer reading.
Hebrews 2:8 tn Grk “you subjected all things under his feet.”sn A quotation from Ps 8:4-6.
Hebrews 2:8 sn The expression all things under his control occurs three times in 2:8. The latter two occurrences are not exactly identical to the Greek text of Ps 8:6 quoted at the beginning of the verse, but have been adapted by the writer of Hebrews to fit his argument.
Hebrews 2:9 tn Or “who was made a little lower than the angels.”
Hebrews 2:9 tn Grk “because of the suffering of death.”
Hebrews 2:9 tn Grk “would taste.” Here the Greek verb does not mean “sample a small amount” (as a typical English reader might infer from the word “taste”), but “experience something cognitively or emotionally; come to know something” (cf. BDAG 195 s.v. γεύομαι 2).

New English Translation (NET)

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Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

Psalm 139[a]

For the music director, a psalm of David.

Footnotes

Footnotes

The Lord Will Renew Israel

Footnotes

Warning Against Drifting Away

Exposition of Psalm 8: Jesus and the Destiny of Humanity

Footnotes

Psalm 139^[a]