Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)
Psalm 78
God’s Goodness and Israel’s Ingratitude
A Maskil of Asaph.
1 Give ear, O my people, to my teaching;
incline your ears to the words of my mouth.(A)
2 I will open my mouth in a parable;
I will utter dark sayings from of old,(B)
3 things that we have heard and known,
that our ancestors have told us.(C)
4 We will not hide them from their children;
we will tell to the coming generation
the glorious deeds of the Lord and his might
and the wonders that he has done.(D)
5 He established a decree in Jacob
and appointed a law in Israel,
which he commanded our ancestors
to teach to their children,(E)
6 that the next generation might know them,
the children yet unborn,
and rise up and tell them to their children,(F)
7 so that they should set their hope in God,
and not forget the works of God,
but keep his commandments;(G)
Joshua Renews the Covenant
30 [a]Then Joshua built on Mount Ebal an altar to the Lord, the God of Israel,(A) 31 just as Moses the servant of the Lord had commanded the Israelites, as it is written in the book of the law of Moses, “an altar of unhewn[b] stones, on which no iron tool has been used,” and they offered on it burnt offerings to the Lord and sacrificed offerings of well-being.(B) 32 And there, in the presence of the Israelites, Joshua[c] wrote on the stones a copy of the law of Moses that he had written.(C) 33 All Israel, alien as well as native-born, with their elders and officers and their judges, stood on opposite sides of the ark in front of the Levitical priests who carried the ark of the covenant of the Lord, half of them in front of Mount Gerizim and half of them in front of Mount Ebal, as Moses the servant of the Lord had commanded earlier, that they should bless the people of Israel.(D) 34 And afterward he read all the words of the law, blessings and curses, according to all that is written in the book of the law.(E) 35 There was not a word of all that Moses commanded that Joshua did not read before all the assembly of Israel, and the women, and the little ones, and the aliens who resided among them.(F)
13 Then the sixth angel blew his trumpet, and I heard a voice from the horns[a] of the golden altar before God,(A) 14 saying to the sixth angel who had the trumpet, “Release the four angels who are bound at the great River Euphrates.”(B) 15 So the four angels were released, who had been held ready for the hour, the day, the month, and the year, to kill a third of humankind. 16 The number of the troops of cavalry was two hundred million; I heard their number.(C) 17 And this was how I saw the horses in my vision: the riders wore breastplates the color of fire and of sapphire[b] and of sulfur; the heads of the horses were like lions’ heads, and fire and smoke and sulfur came out of their mouths.(D) 18 By these three plagues a third of humankind was killed, by the fire and smoke and sulfur coming out of the horses’[c] mouths. 19 For the power of the horses is in their mouths and in their tails; their tails are like serpents, with heads, and with them they inflict harm.
20 The rest of humankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands or give up worshiping demons and idols of gold and silver and bronze and stone and wood, which cannot see or hear or walk.(E) 21 And they did not repent of their murders or their sorceries or their prostitution or their thefts.
New Revised Standard Version, Updated Edition. Copyright © 2021 National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.