Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

28 Unto Thee will I cry, O Lord my rock; be not silent to me, lest, if Thou be silent, I become like them that go down into the pit.

² Hear the voice of my supplications when I cry unto Thee, when I lift up my hands toward the oracle of Thy sanctuary.

³ Draw me not away with the wicked and with the workers of iniquity, who speak peace to their neighbors, but mischief is in their hearts.

⁴ Give to them according to their deeds and according to the wickedness of their endeavors; give to them according to the work of their hands; render to them their deserts.

⁵ Because they regard not the works of the Lord, nor the operation of His hands, He shall destroy them and not build them up.

⁶ Blessed be the Lord, because He hath heard the voice of my supplications!

⁷ The Lord is my strength and my shield; my heart trusted in Him, and I am helped. Therefore my heart greatly rejoiceth, and with my song will I praise Him.

⁸ The Lord is their strength, and He is the saving strength of His anointed.

⁹ Save the people, and bless Thine inheritance; feed them also, and lift them up forever.

²⁹ And Reuben returned unto the pit, and behold, Joseph was not in the pit; and he rent his clothes.

³⁰ And he returned unto his brethren and said, “The child is no more; and I, whither shall I go?”

³¹ And they took Joseph’s coat, and killed a kid from the goats, and dipped the coat in the blood.

³² And they sent the coat of many colors, and they brought it to their father and said, “This have we found. Know now whether it be thy son’s coat or not?”

³³ And he knew it, and said, “It is my son’s coat. An evil beast hath devoured him. Joseph is without doubt rent in pieces.”

³⁴ And Jacob rent his clothes, and put sackcloth upon his loins, and mourned for his son many days.

³⁵ And all his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him; but he refused to be comforted, and he said, “For I will go down into the grave unto my son, mourning.” Thus his father wept for him.

³⁶ And the Midianites sold him into Egypt unto Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh’s and captain of the guard.

⁴ For if God spared not the angels who sinned, but cast them down to hell and delivered them into chains of darkness to be reserved unto judgment;

⁵ and spared not the old world, but saved Noah, the eighth person, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the Flood upon the world of the ungodly;

⁶ and, turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them to be overthrown, making them an example unto those who thereafter should live ungodly;

⁷ and if He delivered righteous Lot, vexed with the filthy conduct of the wicked

⁸ (for that righteous man, having dwelt among them seeing and hearing, was vexed in his righteous soul day after day with their unlawful deeds)—

⁹ then the Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptations and to reserve the unjust unto the Day of Judgment to be punished,

¹⁰ but chiefly those who walk after the flesh in the lust of uncleanness, and despise governance. Presumptuous are they and selfwilled; they are not afraid to speak evil of dignities,