Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

⁵ My soul, keep silent to God only (for my hope is from Him).

⁶ He alone is my strength and my salvation, my defense. I shall not be moved.

⁷ In God is my salvation and my glory, the rock of my strength. In God is my trust.

⁸ Trust in Him always, you people. Pour out your hearts before Him, God our Hope. Selah.

⁹ Surely, men of low degree are a vapor, and the chief men liars. To lay them upon a scale, they are altogether lighter than a breath.

¹⁰ Do not trust in oppression or in robbery. Do not be vain. If riches increase, do not set your heart thereon.

¹¹ God has spoken once, twice I have heard it, that power belongs to God;

¹² and to You, O LORD, mercy. For You reward everyone according to his work. A Psalm of David, when he was in the wilderness of Judah

⁷ O LORD, You have persuaded me, and I am laid open. You are stronger than me and have prevailed. I am in derision daily. Everyone mocks me.

⁸ For when I speak, I cry out of wrong. And I proclaim desolation. Therefore, the Word of the LORD has become a reproach to me and a daily derision.

⁹ Then I said, “I will not make mention of Him or speak in His Name anymore.” But His Word was in my heart as a burning fire, shut up in my bones. And I was weary with restraining it. And I could not.

¹⁰ For I had heard the whispering of many, fear on every side, saying, “Declare! And we will declare it!” All my friends watched for my halting, saying, “It may be that he is deceived. So, we shall prevail against him. And we shall execute our vengeance upon him.”

¹¹ But the LORD is with me like a mighty giant. Therefore, my persecutors shall be overthrown, and shall not prevail, and shall be greatly confounded. For they have done unwisely, and their everlasting shame shall never be forgotten.

¹² But, O, LORD of Hosts! Who tries the righteous and sees the inner core and the heart! Let me see Your vengeance on them! For to You have I opened my cause.

¹³ Sing to the LORD! Praise the LORD! For He has delivered the soul of the poor from the hand of the wicked.

3 This second letter I now write to you, beloved (with which I stir up and warn your pure minds),

² to remind you of the words which were foretold by the holy Prophets; and of the Commandment by us, the Apostles of the Lord and Savior.

³ First, understand this: that in the last days there shall come mockers, who will walk after their lusts

⁴ and say, “Where is the promise of His coming? For since the Fathers died, all things continue just as from the beginning of the creation.”

⁵ For of this they are willingly ignorant: that the heavens were of old; and the Earth—which was of the water and by the water—by the Word of God;

⁶ through which water the world that then existed perished, being flooded.

⁷ But the heavens and Earth which exist now are stored up by the same Word, and reserved for fire until the Day of Condemnation, and of the destruction of ungodly men.