Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

²² And Paul, having stood in the midst of the Areopagus, said, `Men, Athenians, in all things I perceive you as over-religious;

²³ for passing through and contemplating your objects of worship, I found also an erection on which had been inscribed: To God -- unknown; whom, therefore -- not knowing -- ye do worship, this One I announce to you.

²⁴ `God, who did make the world, and all things in it, this One, of heaven and of earth being Lord, in temples made with hands doth not dwell,

²⁵ neither by the hands of men is He served -- needing anything, He giving to all life, and breath, and all things;

²⁶ He made also of one blood every nation of men, to dwell upon all the face of the earth -- having ordained times before appointed, and the bounds of their dwellings --

²⁷ to seek the Lord, if perhaps they did feel after Him and find, -- though, indeed, He is not far from each one of us,

²⁸ for in Him we live, and move, and are; as also certain of your poets have said: For of Him also we are offspring.

²⁹ `Being, therefore, offspring of God, we ought not to think the Godhead to be like to gold, or silver, or stone, graving of art and device of man;

³⁰ the times, indeed, therefore, of the ignorance God having overlooked, doth now command all men everywhere to reform,

³¹ because He did set a day in which He is about to judge the world in righteousness, by a man whom He did ordain, having given assurance to all, having raised him out of the dead.'

⁸ Bless, ye peoples, our God, And sound the voice of His praise,

⁹ Who hath placed our soul in life, And suffered not our feet to be moved.

¹⁰ For Thou hast tried us, O God, Thou hast refined us as the refining of silver.

¹¹ Thou hast brought us into a net, Thou hast placed pressure on our loins.

¹² Thou hast caused man to ride at our head. We have entered into fire and into water, And Thou bringest us out to a watered place.

¹³ I enter Thy house with burnt-offerings, I complete to Thee my vows,

¹⁴ For opened were my lips, And my mouth spake in my distress:

¹⁵ `Burnt-offerings of fatlings I offer to Thee, With perfume of rams, I prepare a bullock with he-goats.' Selah.

¹⁶ Come, hear, all ye who fear God, And I recount what he did for my soul.

¹⁷ Unto Him [with] my mouth I have called, And exaltation [is] under my tongue.

¹⁸ Iniquity, if I have seen in my heart, The Lord doth not hear.

¹⁹ But God hath heard, He hath attended to the voice of my prayer.

²⁰ Blessed [is] God, Who hath not turned aside my prayer, And His loving-kindness, from me!

¹³ and who [is] he who will be doing you evil, if of Him who is good ye may become imitators?

¹⁴ but if ye also should suffer because of righteousness, happy [are ye]! and of their fear be not afraid, nor be troubled,

¹⁵ and the Lord God sanctify in your hearts. And [be] ready always for defence to every one who is asking of you an account concerning the hope that [is] in you, with meekness and fear;

¹⁶ having a good conscience, that in that in which they speak against you as evil-doers, they may be ashamed who are traducing your good behaviour in Christ;

¹⁷ for [it is] better doing good, if the will of God will it, to suffer, than doing evil;

¹⁸ because also Christ once for sin did suffer -- righteous for unrighteous -- that he might lead us to God, having been put to death indeed, in the flesh, and having been made alive in the spirit,

¹⁹ in which also to the spirits in prison having gone he did preach,

²⁰ who sometime disbelieved, when once the long-suffering of God did wait, in days of Noah -- an ark being preparing -- in which few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water;

²¹ also to which an antitype doth now save us -- baptism, (not a putting away of the filth of flesh, but the question of a good conscience in regard to God,) through the rising again of Jesus Christ,

²² who is at the right hand of God, having gone on to heaven -- messengers, and authorities, and powers, having been subjected to him.

¹⁵ `If ye love me, my commands keep,

¹⁶ and I will ask the Father, and another Comforter He will give to you, that he may remain with you -- to the age;

¹⁷ the Spirit of truth, whom the world is not able to receive, because it doth not behold him, nor know him, and ye know him, because he doth remain with you, and shall be in you.

¹⁸ `I will not leave you bereaved, I come unto you;

¹⁹ yet a little, and the world doth no more behold me, and ye behold me, because I live, and ye shall live;

²⁰ in that day ye shall know that I [am] in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you;

²¹ he who is having my commands, and is keeping them, that one it is who is loving me, and he who is loving me shall be loved by my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.'