Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

137 By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down; yea, we wept when we remembered Zion.

² We hung our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof.

³ For there they that carried us away captive required of us a song, and they that wasted us required of us mirth, saying, “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”

⁴ How shall we sing the Lord’s song in a strange land?

⁵ If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cleverness.

⁶ If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth, if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy.

⁷ Remember, O Lord, the children of Edom in the day of Jerusalem’s fall, who said, “Raze it, raze it, even to the foundation thereof!”

⁸ O daughter of Babylon who art to be destroyed, happy shall he be, that rewardeth thee as thou hast served us.

⁹ Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones.

¹⁶ For these things I weep; mine eye, mine eye runneth down with water, because the Comforter that should relieve my soul is far from me. My children are desolate, because the enemy prevailed.”

¹⁷ Zion spreadeth forth her hands, and there is none to comfort her. The Lord hath commanded concerning Jacob, that his adversaries should be round about him; Jerusalem is as a menstruous woman among them.

¹⁸ “The Lord is righteous, for I have rebelled against His commandment. Hear, I pray you, all people, and behold my sorrow; my virgins and my young men are gone into captivity.

¹⁹ I called for my lovers, but they deceived me; my priests and mine elders gave up the ghost in the city, while they sought their meat to relieve their souls.

²⁰ “Behold, O Lord, for I am in distress; my bowels are troubled. Mine heart is turned within me, for I have grievously rebelled. Abroad the sword bereaveth; at home there is as death.

²¹ They have heard that I sigh; there is none to comfort me. All mine enemies have heard of my trouble; they are glad that Thou hast done it! Thou wilt bring the day that Thou hast proclaimed, and they shall then be like unto me.

²² Let all their wickedness come before Thee, and do unto them as Thou hast done unto me for all my transgressions; for my sighs are many, and my heart is faint.”

² My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations,

³ knowing this: that the trying of your faith worketh patience.

⁴ But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, lacking nothing.

⁵ If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not, and it shall be given him.

⁶ But let him ask in faith, never wavering; for he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind.

⁷ For let not that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord.

⁸ A doubleminded man is unstable in all his ways.

⁹ Let the brother of low degree rejoice in that he is exalted,

¹⁰ but the rich in that he is made low, because as the flower of the grass he shall pass away.

¹¹ For the sun is no sooner risen with a burning heat than it withereth the grass, and the flower thereof falleth, and the grace of the fashion of it perisheth. So also shall the rich man fade away in his ways.