Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

A Song or Psalm of Asaph.

¹ ¶ Do not keep silence, O God; do not hold thy peace, and do not be still, O God.

² For, behold, thine enemies make a tumult, and those that hate thee have lifted up their head.

³ They have taken prudent counsel in secret against thy people and consulted against thy hidden ones.

⁴ They have said, Come and let us cut them off from being a people that the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance.

⁵ Therefore they have consulted together with one consent; they are confederate against thee:

⁶ The tents of Edom and the Ishmaelites; of Moab and the Hagarenes;

⁷ Gebal and Ammon and Amalek; Philistia with the inhabitants of Tyre;

⁸ Assur also is joined with them: they are an arm unto the sons of Lot. Selah.

⁹ ¶ Do unto them as unto the Midianites, as to Sisera, as to Jabin, at the brook of Kison,

¹⁰ who perished at Endor; they became as dung for the earth.

¹¹ Make them and their captains like Oreb and like Zeeb; all their princes as Zebah and as Zalmunna:

¹² Who have said, Let us inherit for ourselves the habitations of God.

¹³ O my God, make them like a whirlwind, as the stubble before the wind.

¹⁴ As the fire burns a wood and as the flame sets the mountains on fire

¹⁵ so persecute them with thy tempest and make them afraid with thy whirlwind.

¹⁶ Fill their faces with shame that they may seek thy name, O LORD.

¹⁷ Let them be confounded and troubled for ever; let them be put to shame and perish

¹⁸ That they may know that thou, whose name alone is LORD, art the most high over all the earth.

⁵ And I will come near unto you for judgment; and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers and against the adulterers and against false swearers and against those that oppress the hireling in his wages, the widow, and the fatherless, and that turn aside the stranger from his right, and do not fear me, said the LORD of the hosts.

⁶ For I am the LORD, I have not changed; therefore, ye sons of Jacob have not been consumed.

⁷ ¶ Even from the days of your fathers, ye had departed from my ordinances and had never kept them. Return unto me, and I will return unto you, said the LORD of the hosts. But ye said, In what shall we return?

⁸ Will a man rob God? Yet ye have robbed me. But ye say, In what have we robbed thee? In the tithes and the offerings.

⁹ Ye are cursed with a curse: for ye, even this whole nation, have robbed me.

¹⁰ Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, and there shall be food in my house, and prove me now in this, said the LORD of the hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven and pour you out a blessing that there shall not be room enough to receive it.

¹¹ And I will reprehend the devourer for your sakes, and he shall not destroy the fruits of the ground; neither shall the vine in the field abort, said the LORD of the hosts.

¹² And all the Gentiles shall call you blessed: for ye shall be a delightsome land, said the LORD of the hosts.

2 ¶ And again he entered into Capernaum after some days, and it was heard that he was in the house.

² And soon many were gathered together, insomuch that there was no room to receive them, no, not so much as about the door; and he preached the word unto them.

³ And they came unto him, bringing a paralytic, carried by four men.

⁴ And when they could not come near unto him for the crowd, they uncovered the roof of the house where he was; and when they had broken it open, they let down the bed in which the paralytic lay.

⁵ When Jesus saw their faith, he said unto the paralytic, Son, thy sins are forgiven thee.

⁶ But there were certain of the scribes sitting there and thinking in their hearts,

⁷ Why does this fellow so blaspheme? Who can forgive sins but God only?

⁸ And Jesus, knowing afterward in his spirit that they so reasoned within themselves, said unto them, Why think ye these things in your hearts?

⁹ What is easier to say to the paralytic, Thy sins are forgiven thee, or to say, Arise and take up thy bed and walk?

¹⁰ But that ye may know that the Son of man has power on earth to forgive sins (he spoke to the sick of the palsy),

¹¹ I say unto thee, Arise and take up thy bed and go to thy house.

¹² And by and by he arose, took up the bed, and went forth before them all; insomuch that they were all amazed and glorified God, saying, We never saw anything like unto this.