Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)
146 Halleluyah!
Praise Adonai, my soul!
2 I will praise Adonai as long as I live.
I will sing praise to my God all my life.
3 Don’t put your trust in princes
or in mortals, who cannot help.
4 When they breathe their last, they return to dust;
on that very day all their plans are gone.
5 Happy is he whose help is Ya‘akov’s God,
whose hope is in Adonai his God.
6 He made heaven and earth,
the sea and everything in them;
he keeps faith forever.
7 He secures justice for the oppressed,
he gives food to the hungry.
Adonai sets prisoners free,
8 Adonai opens the eyes of the blind,
Adonai lifts up those who are bent over.
Adonai loves the righteous.
9 Adonai watches over strangers,
he sustains the fatherless and widows;
but the way of the wicked he twists.
10 Adonai will reign forever,
your God, Tziyon, through all generations.
Halleluyah!
9 This is why justice is far from us,
and righteousness doesn’t catch up with us;
we look for light, but see only darkness,
for brightness, but we walk in gloom.
10 We grope for the wall like the blind;
like people without eyes we feel our way;
we stumble at noonday as if it were dusk,
we are in dark places like the dead.
11 We growl, all of us, like bears
and moan pitifully like doves;
we look for justice, but there is none;
for salvation, but it is far from us.
12 For our crimes multiply before you,
our sins testify against us;
for our crimes are present with us;
and our sins, we know them well:
13 rebelling and denying Adonai,
turning away from following our God,
talking about oppression and revolt,
uttering lies which our hearts have conceived.
14 Thus justice is repelled,
righteousness stands apart, at a distance;
for truth stumbles in the public court,
and uprightness cannot enter.
15 Honesty is lacking,
he who leaves evil becomes a target.
Adonai saw it, and it displeased him
that there was no justice.
16 He saw that there was no one,
was amazed that no one interceded.
Therefore his own arm brought him salvation,
and his own righteousness sustained him.
17 He put on righteousness as his breastplate,
salvation as a helmet on his head;
he clothed himself with garments of vengeance
and wrapped himself in a mantle of zeal.
18 He repays according to their deeds —
fury to his foes, reprisal to his enemies;
to the coastlands he will repay their due;
19 in the west they will fear the name of Adonai,
and likewise, in the east, his glory.
For he will come like a pent-up stream,
impelled by the Spirit of Adonai.
9 Meanwhile, Sha’ul, still breathing murderous threats against the Lord’s talmidim, went to the cohen hagadol 2 and asked him for letters to the synagogues in Dammesek, authorizing him to arrest any people he might find, whether men or women, who belonged to “the Way,” and bring them back to Yerushalayim.
3 He was on the road and nearing Dammesek, when suddenly a light from heaven flashed all around him. 4 Falling to the ground, he heard a voice saying to him, “Sha’ul! Sha’ul! Why do you keep persecuting me?” 5 “Sir, who are you?” he asked. “I am Yeshua, and you are persecuting me. 6 But get up, and go into the city, and you will be told what you have to do.”
7 The men traveling with him stood speechless, hearing the voice but seeing no one. 8 They helped Sha’ul get up off the ground; but when he opened his eyes, he could see nothing. So, leading him by the hand, they brought him into Dammesek. 9 For three days he remained unable to see, and he neither ate nor drank.
10 There was a talmid in Dammesek, Hananyah by name; and in a vision the Lord said to him, “Hananyah!” He said, “Here I am, Lord.” 11 The Lord said to him, “Get up and go to Straight Street, to Y’hudah’s house; and ask for a man from Tarsus named Sha’ul; for he is praying, 12 and in a vision he has seen a man named Hananyah coming in and placing his hands on him to restore his sight.” 13 But Hananyah answered, “Lord, many have told me about this man, how much harm he has done to your people in Yerushalayim; 14 and here he has a warrant from the head cohanim to arrest everyone who calls on your name.” 15 But the Lord said to him, “Go, because this man is my chosen instrument to carry my name to the Goyim, even to their kings, and to the sons of Isra’el as well. 16 For I myself will show him how much he will have to suffer on account of my name.”
17 So Hananyah left and went into the house. Placing his hands on him, he said, “Brother Sha’ul, the Lord — Yeshua, the one who appeared to you on the road as you were coming here — has sent me so that you may see again and be filled with the Ruach HaKodesh.” 18 In that moment, something like scales fell away from Sha’ul’s eyes; and he could see again. He got up and was immersed; 19 then he ate some food and regained his strength.
Sha’ul spent some days with the talmidim in Dammesek, 20 and immediately he began proclaiming in the synagogues that Yeshua is the Son of God.
Copyright © 1998 by David H. Stern. All rights reserved.