Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

⁸ ¶ The voice of my beloved! behold, he comes leaping over the mountains, skipping over the hills.

⁹ My beloved is like a roe or a young hart; behold, he stands behind our wall; he looks through the windows, blossoming through the lattice.

¹⁰ My beloved spoke and said unto me, Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away.

¹¹ For, behold, the winter is past; the rain is over and gone;

¹² the flowers appear on the earth; the time of the song is come, and the voice of the turtle dove has been heard in our land;

¹³ the fig tree has put forth her green figs, and the vines in blossom have given forth their fragrance. Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away.

29 ¶ Then Jacob walked on and came into the land of the people of the east.

² And he looked and saw a well in the field, and, behold, there were three flocks of sheep lying by it, for out of that well they watered the flocks, and a great stone was upon the well’s mouth.

³ And all the flocks gathered there; and they would roll the stone from the well’s mouth and water the sheep and put the stone again upon the well’s mouth in its place.

⁴ And Jacob said unto them, My brethren, where are you from? And they said, We are from Haran.

⁵ And he said unto them, Do you know Laban the son of Nahor? And they said, We know him.

⁶ And he said unto them, Is he well? And they said, He is well, and, behold, Rachel, his daughter, comes with the sheep.

⁷ And he said, behold, it is yet high day; neither is it time that the livestock should be gathered together; water the sheep and go and feed them.

⁸ And they said, We cannot until all the flocks are gathered together and until they roll the stone from the well’s mouth, that we may water the sheep.

⁹ ¶ And while he yet spoke with them, Rachel came with her father’s sheep, for she was the pastor.

¹⁰ And it came to pass when Jacob saw Rachel, the daughter of Laban, his mother’s brother, and the sheep of Laban, his mother’s brother, that Jacob went near and rolled the stone from the well’s mouth and watered the flock of Laban, his mother’s brother.

¹¹ And Jacob kissed Rachel and lifted up his voice and wept.

¹² And Jacob told Rachel that he was of her father’s brethren, and that he was Rebekah’s son, and she ran and told her father.

¹³ And it came to pass when Laban heard the tidings of Jacob his sister’s son that he ran to meet him and embraced him and kissed him and brought him to his house. And he told Laban all these things.

¹⁴ And Laban said to him, Surely thou art my bone and my flesh. And he abode with him the space of a month.

3 ¶ What advantage then has the Jew? or what profit is there of circumcision?

² Much in every way: first, certainly, that the oracles of God have been entrusted unto them.

³ For what if some of them did not believe? Shall their unbelief have made the truth of God without effect?

⁴ No, in no wise: for God is true, and every man a liar; as it is written, That thou might be justified in thy words and might overcome when thou dost judge.

⁵ And if our iniquity commends the righteousness of God, what shall we say? Shall for this reason God be unjust who sends punishment? (I speak as a man.)

⁶ No, in no wise: for then how shall God judge the world?

⁷ For if the truth of God has more abounded through my lie unto his glory, why even so am I also judged as a sinner?

⁸ And why not say (as we are slanderously reported, and as some affirm that we say), Let us do evil, that good may come? The condemnation of whom is just.