Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

Worship and Obedience

⁹ Then Moses instructed Aaron, “Say to the whole congregation of the Israelis, ‘Come near into the Lord’s presence, because he has heard your complaints.’”

¹⁰ While Aaron was speaking to all the congregation of the Israelis, they turned toward the desert, and there the glory of the Lord was seen in the cloud. ¹¹ The Lord told Moses, ¹² “I’ve heard the complaints of the Israelis. Tell them, ‘At twilight you are to eat meat and in the morning you are to be filled with bread, so you may know that I am the Lord your God.’”

¹³ Later that evening quail came up and covered the camp, and then in the morning there was a layer of dew around the camp. ¹⁴ When the layer of dew evaporated,^[a] on the surface of the desert a fine flaky substance, as fine as frost, appeared on the ground. ¹⁵ When the Israelis saw it, they asked one another, “What is it?”,^[b] because they did not know what it was.

Moses told them, “It’s the food that the Lord has given you to eat. ¹⁶ This is what the Lord has commanded: ‘You are to gather from it what each person is to eat,^[c] about one omer^[d] per person according to the number of your people, and one person is to gather for everyone in his tent.’”

¹⁷ The Israelis did this, some gathering much, some little. ¹⁸ When they measured it with a vessel the capacity of which was one omer,^[e] the one who gathered much did not have an excess, while the one who gathered little did not lack. They gathered exactly what each needed to eat.^[f]

¹⁹ Then Moses told them, “No one is to leave any of it until morning.” ²⁰ But they did not listen to Moses—some people left part of it until morning, and it produced maggots and smelled bad, so Moses got angry at them. ²¹ Every morning they gathered it, according to what each needed to eat; and when the sun became hot, it melted.

All Believers are One in the Messiah

¹¹ So then, remember that at one time you gentiles by birth^[a] were called “the uncircumcised” by those who called themselves “the circumcised.” They underwent physical circumcision done by human hands. ¹² At that time you were without the Messiah,^[b] excluded from citizenship in Israel,^[c] and strangers to the covenants of promise. You had no hope and were in the world without God. ¹³ But now, in union with the Messiah^[d] Jesus, you who once were far away have been brought near by the blood of the Messiah.^[e]

¹⁴ For it is he who is our peace. Through his mortality^[f] he made both groups one by tearing down the wall of hostility that divided them.^{[g] 15} He rendered the Law inoperative, along with its commandments and regulations, thus creating in himself one new humanity from the two, thereby making peace, ¹⁶ and reconciling both groups to God in one body through the cross, on which he eliminated the hostility. ¹⁷ He came and proclaimed peace for you who were far away and for you who were near. ¹⁸ For through him, both of us^[h] have access to the Father by one Spirit. ¹⁹ That is why you are no longer strangers and foreigners but fellow citizens with the saints and members of God’s household, ²⁰ having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, the Messiah^[i] Jesus himself being the cornerstone.^{[j] 21} In union with him the whole building is joined together and rises into a holy sanctuary for the Lord. ²² You, too, are being built in him, along with the others, into a place for God’s Spirit to dwell.