Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)
God's Complete Knowledge and Care[a]
139 Lord, you have examined me and you know me.
2 You know everything I do;
from far away you understand all my thoughts.
3 You see me, whether I am working or resting;
you know all my actions.
4 Even before I speak,
you already know what I will say.
5 You are all around me on every side;
you protect me with your power.
6 Your knowledge of me is too deep;
it is beyond my understanding.
13 You created every part of me;
you put me together in my mother's womb.
14 I praise you because you are to be feared;
all you do is strange and wonderful.
I know it with all my heart.
15 When my bones were being formed,
carefully put together in my mother's womb,
when I was growing there in secret,
you knew that I was there—
16 you saw me before I was born.
The days allotted to me
had all been recorded in your book,
before any of them ever began.
17 (A)O God, how difficult I find your thoughts;[a]
how many of them there are!
18 If I counted them, they would be more than the grains of sand.
When I awake, I am still with you.
Elkanah and His Family at Shiloh
1 There was a man named Elkanah, from the tribe of Ephraim, who lived in the town of Ramah in the hill country of Ephraim. He was the son of Jeroham and grandson of Elihu, and belonged to the family of Tohu, a part of the clan of Zuph. 2 Elkanah had two wives, Hannah and Peninnah. Peninnah had children, but Hannah did not. 3 Every year Elkanah went from Ramah to worship and offer sacrifices to the Lord Almighty at Shiloh, where Hophni and Phinehas, the two sons of Eli, were priests of the Lord. 4 Each time Elkanah offered his sacrifice, he would give one share of the meat to Peninnah and one share to each of her children. 5 And even though he loved Hannah very much he would give her only one share, because[a] the Lord had kept her from having children. 6 Peninnah, her rival, would torment and humiliate her, because the Lord had kept her childless. 7 This went on year after year; whenever they went to the house of the Lord, Peninnah would upset Hannah so much that she would cry and refuse to eat anything. 8 Her husband Elkanah would ask her, “Hannah, why are you crying? Why won't you eat? Why are you always so sad? Don't I mean more to you than ten sons?”
Hannah and Eli
9-10 One time, after they had finished their meal in the house of the Lord at Shiloh, Hannah got up. She was deeply distressed, and she cried bitterly as she prayed to the Lord. Meanwhile, Eli the priest was sitting in his place by the door. 11 (A)Hannah made a solemn promise: “Lord Almighty, look at me, your servant! See my trouble and remember me! Don't forget me! If you give me a son, I promise that I will dedicate him to you for his whole life and that he will never have his hair cut.”[b]
12 Hannah continued to pray to the Lord for a long time, and Eli watched her lips. 13 She was praying silently; her lips were moving, but she made no sound. So Eli thought that she was drunk, 14 and he said to her, “Stop making a drunken show of yourself Stop your drinking and sober up!”
15 “No, I'm not drunk, sir,” she answered. “I haven't been drinking! I am desperate, and I have been praying, pouring out my troubles to the Lord. 16 Don't think I am a worthless woman. I have been praying like this because I'm so miserable.”
17 “Go in peace,” Eli said, “and may the God of Israel give you what you have asked him for.”
18 “May you always think kindly of me,” she replied. Then she went away, ate some food, and was no longer sad.
Paul Appeals to the Emperor
25 Three days after Festus arrived in the province, he went from Caesarea to Jerusalem, 2 where the chief priests and the Jewish leaders brought their charges against Paul. They begged Festus 3 to do them the favor of having Paul come to Jerusalem, for they had made a plot to kill him on the way. 4 Festus answered, “Paul is being kept a prisoner in Caesarea, and I myself will be going back there soon. 5 Let your leaders go to Caesarea with me and accuse the man if he has done anything wrong.”
6 Festus spent another eight or ten days with them and then went to Caesarea. On the next day he sat down in the judgment court and ordered Paul to be brought in. 7 When Paul arrived, the Jews who had come from Jerusalem stood around him and started making many serious charges against him, which they were not able to prove. 8 But Paul defended himself: “I have done nothing wrong against the Law of the Jews or against the Temple or against the Roman Emperor.”
9 But Festus wanted to gain favor with the Jews, so he asked Paul, “Would you be willing to go to Jerusalem and be tried on these charges before me there?”
10 Paul said, “I am standing before the Emperor's own judgment court, where I should be tried. I have done no wrong to the Jews, as you yourself well know. 11 If I have broken the law and done something for which I deserve the death penalty, I do not ask to escape it. But if there is no truth in the charges they bring against me, no one can hand me over to them. I appeal to the Emperor.”
12 Then Festus, after conferring with his advisers, answered, “You have appealed to the Emperor, so to the Emperor you will go.”
Good News Translation® (Today’s English Version, Second Edition) © 1992 American Bible Society. All rights reserved. For more information about GNT, visit www.bibles.com and www.gnt.bible.