Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

A Prayer for Israel

83 O God, do not keep quiet. Do not be quiet, O God, and do not hold Your peace. ² For, look, those who hate You are making much noise. Those who fight against You have honored themselves. ³ They make bad plans against Your people. They plan against those You care for. ⁴ They say, “Come, let us destroy them as a nation. Let the name of Israel be remembered no longer.”

¹³ O my God, make them like dust turning in the wind, like parts of the grass that have no worth and are blown away. ¹⁴ As the fire that burns up the trees and spreads over the mountains, ¹⁵ so go behind them with Your storm. Make them afraid with Your storm. ¹⁶ Fill their faces with shame, so they will look to Your name, O Lord. ¹⁷ Let them be ashamed and afraid forever. Let them be put to shame and lost. ¹⁸ Then they may know that You alone, Whose name is the Lord, are the Most High over all the earth.

Water Becomes Blood

¹⁴ The Lord said to Moses, “Pharaoh’s heart is not changed. He will not let the people go. ¹⁵ Go to Pharaoh in the morning when he is going out to the water. Wait for him beside the Nile River. Take in your hand the special stick that became a snake. ¹⁶ And say to him, ‘The Lord, the God of the Hebrews, sent me to you, saying, “Let My people go, so they may worship Me in the desert. But see, you have not yet listened.” ¹⁷ So the Lord says, “By this you will know that I am the Lord. I will hit the water of the Nile with the special stick that is in my hand. And the water will be changed to blood. ¹⁸ The fish that are in the Nile will die. And the Nile will have a bad smell. The Egyptians will not be able to drink water from the Nile.”’” ¹⁹ Then the Lord said to Moses, “Say to Aaron, ‘Take your special stick and put your hand out over the waters of Egypt, over their rivers, their pools, and all their man-made lakes of water, so they will become blood. There will be blood through all the land of Egypt, even in pots of wood and pots of stone.’”

²⁰ Moses and Aaron did what the Lord had told them. Aaron raised the special stick and hit the water of the Nile in front of Pharaoh and his servants. And all the water in the Nile was turned into blood. ²¹ The

fish that were in the Nile died. And the Nile had a bad smell. So the Egyptians could not drink water from the Nile. The blood was through all the land of Egypt. ²² But the wonder-workers of Egypt did the same thing using their secret ways. And Pharaoh’s heart was hard. He did not listen to them, just as the Lord had said. ²³ Then Pharaoh turned and went into his house, without even thinking what had happened. ²⁴ And all the Egyptians dug around the Nile for water to drink. For they could not drink the water of the Nile. ²⁵ Seven days passed after the Lord had hit the Nile.

A Nation That Cannot Stand ^(A)

²² Then they brought to Him a man who had a demon. He was blind and could not speak. Jesus healed him and he could talk and see. ²³ All the people were surprised and said, “Can this Man be the Son of David?” ²⁴ But when the proud religious law-keepers heard it, they said, “This Man puts out demons only by Satan, the leader of demons.”

²⁵ Jesus knew their thoughts and said to them, “Every nation divided into groups that fight each other is going to be destroyed. Every city or family divided into groups that fight each other will not stand. ²⁶ If the devil puts out the devil, he is divided against himself. How will his nation stand? ²⁷ If I put out demons by Satan, by whom do your followers put them out? So your followers will say if you are guilty. ²⁸ But if I put out demons by the Spirit of God, then the holy nation of God is come to you. ²⁹ How can anyone go into a strong man’s house and take away his things, unless he ties up the strong man first? Only then can he take things from his house.

The Sin That Cannot Be Forgiven

³⁰ “Whoever is not with Me is against Me. Whoever is not gathering with Me is sending everywhere. ³¹ I tell you, every sin and every bad word men speak against God will be forgiven, but bad words spoken against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven. ³² Whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven in this life or in the life to come.