Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

For the director of music. A psalm of David to the tune of “Lilies.”

The Tower of Babel

11 The whole world had only one language, and everyone spoke it. ² They moved to the east and found a broad valley in Babylon. There they made their home.

³ They said to one another, “Come on! Let’s make bricks and bake them well.” They used bricks instead of stones. They used tar to hold the bricks together. ⁴ Then they said, “Come on! Let’s build a city for ourselves. Let’s build a tower that reaches to the sky. We’ll make a name for ourselves. Then we won’t be scattered over the whole earth.”

⁵ But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower the people were building. ⁶ He said, “All these people are united and speak the same language. That is why they can do all this. Now they will be able to do anything they plan. ⁷ Come on! Let us go down and mix up their language. Then they will not be able to understand one another.”

⁸ So the Lord scattered them from there over the whole earth. And they stopped building the city. ⁹ There the Lord mixed up the language of the whole world. That’s why the city was called Babel. From there the Lord scattered them over the whole earth.

The Large and Small Gates

¹³ “Enter God’s kingdom through the narrow gate. The gate is large and the road is wide that leads to ruin. Many people go that way. ¹⁴ But the gate is small and the road is narrow that leads to life. Only a few people find it.

True and False Prophets

¹⁵ “Watch out for false prophets. They come to you pretending to be sheep. But on the inside they are hungry wolves. ¹⁶ You can tell each tree by its fruit. Do people pick grapes from bushes? Do they pick figs from thorns? ¹⁷ In the same way, every good tree bears good fruit. But a bad tree bears bad fruit. ¹⁸ A good tree can’t bear bad fruit. And a bad tree can’t bear good fruit. ¹⁹ Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down. It is thrown into the fire. ²⁰ You can tell each tree by its fruit.