Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)
23 “All who fear the Lord, praise him!
All the seed of Jacob, glorify him!
All the seed of Israel, fear him!
24 For he does not despise nor detest the afflicted person;
he does not hide his face from him,
but he hears him when he cries out to him.”
25 My praise in the great congregation is because of you;
I will pay my vows before those who fear you.[a]
26 The afflicted will eat and be satisfied;
those who seek the Lord will praise him,
“May you[b] live forever!”
27 All the ends of the earth will remember and turn to the Lord;
all the families of the nations will bow in submission to the Lord.
28 Indeed, the kingdom belongs to the Lord;
he rules over the nations.
29 All the prosperous people will eat and bow down in submission.
All those who are about to go down to the grave[c]
will bow down in submission,
along with the one who can no longer keep himself alive.
30 Our[d] descendants will serve him,
and that generation will be told about the Lord.
31 They will come and declare his righteousness
to a people yet to be born;
indeed, he has accomplished it!
Sarai, Hagar, and Ishmael
16 Now Abram’s wife Sarai had not borne a child for him. She had an Egyptian servant girl whose name was Hagar. 2 So Sarai told Abram, “You are well aware that the Lord has prevented me from giving birth to a child. Go have sex with my servant, so that I may possibly bear a son[a] through her.”
Abram listened to Sarai’s suggestion, 3 so Abram’s wife Sarai took her Egyptian servant, Hagar, and gave her as a wife to her husband Abram. This took place[b] ten years after Abram had settled in the land of Canaan. 4 He had sex with Hagar, and she became pregnant. When she realized that she was pregnant, she looked with contempt on her mistress.
5 Then Sarai told Abram, “My suffering is your fault! I gave you my servant so you could have sex with her,[c] and when she discovered that she was pregnant, she looked on me with contempt. May the Lord judge between you and me!”
6 Abram answered Sarai, “Look, your servant is under your control, so do to her as you wish.”[d] So Sarai dealt so harshly with Hagar[e] that she ran away from Sarai.[f]
The Example of Abraham
4 What, then, are we to say about Abraham, our human ancestor? 2 For if Abraham was justified by actions, he would have had something to boast about—though not before God. 3 For what does the Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.”[a]
4 Now to someone who works, wages are not considered a gift but an obligation. 5 However, to someone who does not work, but simply believes in the one who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited as righteousness. 6 Likewise, David also speaks of the blessedness of the person whom God regards as righteous apart from actions:
7 “How blessed are those whose iniquities are forgiven
and whose sins are covered!
8 How blessed is the person whose sins
the Lord[b] will never charge against him!”[c]
9 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.
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