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Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

Daily Bible readings that follow the church liturgical year, with sequential stories told across multiple weeks.
Duration: 1245 days
International Standard Version (ISV)
Version
Psalm 69:1-5

To the Director: To the tune of[a] “The Lilies”. Davidic.

When God Seems Distant

69 Deliver me, God,
    because the waters are up to my neck.[b]
I am sinking in deep mire,
    and there is no solid ground.[c]
I have come into deep water,
    and the flood overwhelms me.
I am exhausted from calling for help.
    My throat is parched.
        My eyes are strained from looking for God.

Those who hate me without cause
    are more than the hairs of my head.
My persecutors are mighty,
    and they want to destroy me.
        Must I be forced to return what I did not steal?
God, you know my sins,
    and my guilt is not hidden from you.

Psalm 69:30-36

30 Let me praise the name of God with a song
    that I may magnify him with thanksgiving.
31 That will please the Lord
    more than oxen and bulls with horns and hooves.

32 The afflicted will watch and rejoice.
    May you who seek God take courage.
33 For the Lord listens to the needy
    and doesn’t despise those in bondage.
34 Let the heavens and earth praise him,
    along with the sea and its swarming creatures.[a]
35 For God will deliver Zion
    and will rebuild the cities of Judah
        so they may live there and possess them.
36 The descendants of his servants will inherit it,
    and those who cherish his name will live there.

Genesis 17:1-13

God Appears to Abram

17 When Abram was 99 years old, the Lord appeared to Abram and announced, “I am God Almighty. Live in constant awareness that I’m always with you,[a] and be blameless. I’ll establish my covenant between me and you, and I’ll greatly increase your numbers.” Then Abram fell to the ground[b] as God continued speaking to him. “Look, I’ve made a covenant with you. You will be the father of many nations. Your name is no longer to be Abram.[c] Instead your name will be Abraham,[d] since I’ll make you the father of many nations. I’m going to cause you to have many descendants, and I’ll bring nations from you. Kings will come from you. I’m establishing my covenant between me and you, and with your descendants who come after you, generation after generation, as an eternal covenant, to be your God and your descendants’ God after you. I’ll give to you and to your descendants the land to which you have traveled—all the land of Canaan—as an eternal possession. I will be their God.”

The Sign of the Covenant

God continued to speak to Abraham, “You and your descendants who are born in the future are to keep my covenant—that is, you and your descendants, generation after generation. 10 Here is my covenant that you are to observe, between me and you and your descendants: Every male among you is to be circumcised. 11 You are all to be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskin, and this is to be the sign of the covenant between me and you. 12 Generation after generation, every male among you is to be circumcised on the eighth day after his birth,[e] including the servant born in your house or the one purchased from a foreigner, who is not of your offspring. 13 The servant born in your house or the one purchased with money is to be circumcised. My covenant is to remain in your flesh as an eternal covenant.

Romans 4:1-12

The Example of Abraham

What, then, are we to say about Abraham, our human ancestor? For if Abraham was justified by actions, he would have had something to boast about—though not before God. For what does the Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.”[a]

Now to someone who works, wages are not considered a gift but an obligation. However, to someone who does not work, but simply believes in the one who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited as righteousness. Likewise, David also speaks of the blessedness of the person whom God regards as righteous apart from actions:

“How blessed are those whose iniquities are forgiven
    and whose sins are covered!
How blessed is the person whose sins
    the Lord[b] will never charge against him!”[c]

Now does this blessedness come to the circumcised alone, or also to the uncircumcised? For we say, “Abraham’s faith was credited to him as righteousness.”[d] 10 Under what circumstances was it credited? Was he circumcised or uncircumcised? He had not yet been circumcised, but was uncircumcised. 11 Afterward he received the mark of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised. Therefore, he is the ancestor of all who believe while uncircumcised, in order that righteousness may be credited to them. 12 He is also the ancestor of the circumcised—those who are not only circumcised, but who also walk in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised.

International Standard Version (ISV)

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