Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

David and Bathsheba

11 ^(A)The following spring, at the time of the year when kings usually go to war, David sent out Joab with his officers and the Israelite army; they defeated the Ammonites and besieged the city of Rabbah. But David himself stayed in Jerusalem.

² One day, late in the afternoon, David got up from his nap and went to the palace roof. As he walked around up there, he saw a woman taking a bath in her house. She was very beautiful. ³ So he sent a messenger to find out who she was, and learned that she was Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam and the wife of Uriah the Hittite. ⁴ David sent messengers to get her; they brought her to him and he made love to her. (She had just finished her monthly ritual of purification.) Then she went back home. ⁵ Afterward she discovered that she was pregnant and sent a message to David to tell him.

⁶ David then sent a message to Joab: “Send me Uriah the Hittite.” So Joab sent him to David. ⁷ When Uriah arrived, David asked him if Joab and the troops were well, and how the fighting was going. ⁸ Then he said to Uriah, “Go on home and rest a while.” Uriah left, and David had a present sent to his home. ⁹ But Uriah did not go home; instead he slept at the palace gate with the king's guards. ¹⁰ When David heard that Uriah had not gone home, he asked him, “You have just returned after a long absence; why didn't you go home?”

¹¹ Uriah answered, “The men of Israel and Judah are away in battle, and the Covenant Box is with them; my commander Joab and his officers are camping out in the open. How could I go home, eat and drink, and sleep with my wife? By all that's sacred, I swear that I could never do such a thing!”

¹² So David said, “Then stay here the rest of the day, and tomorrow I'll send you back.” So Uriah stayed in Jerusalem that day and the next. ¹³ David invited him to supper and got him drunk. But again that night Uriah did not go home; instead he slept on his blanket^[a] in the palace guardroom.

¹⁴ The next morning David wrote a letter to Joab and sent it by Uriah. ¹⁵ He wrote: “Put Uriah in the front line, where the fighting is heaviest, then retreat and let him be killed.”

Human Wickedness^[a](A)

The Love of Christ

¹⁴ For this reason I fall on my knees before the Father, ¹⁵ from whom every family in heaven and on earth receives its true name. ¹⁶ I ask God from the wealth of his glory to give you power through his Spirit to be strong in your inner selves, ¹⁷ and I pray that Christ will make his home in your hearts through faith. I pray that you may have your roots and foundation in love, ^18 (A)so that you, together with all God's people, may have the power to understand how broad and long, how high and deep, is Christ's love. ¹⁹ Yes, may you come to know his love—although it can never be fully known—and so be completely filled with the very nature of God.

²⁰ To him who by means of his power working in us is able to do so much more than we can ever ask for, or even think of: ²¹ to God be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus for all time, forever and ever! Amen.

Jesus Feeds Five Thousand^(A)

6 After this, Jesus went across Lake Galilee (or, Lake Tiberias, as it is also called). ² A large crowd followed him, because they had seen his miracles of healing the sick. ³ Jesus went up a hill and sat down with his disciples. ⁴ The time for the Passover Festival was near. ⁵ Jesus looked around and saw that a large crowd was coming to him, so he asked Philip, “Where can we buy enough food to feed all these people?” (⁶ He said this to test Philip; actually he already knew what he would do.)

⁷ Philip answered, “For everyone to have even a little, it would take more than two hundred silver coins^[a] to buy enough bread.”

⁸ Another one of his disciples, Andrew, who was Simon Peter's brother, said, ⁹ “There is a boy here who has five loaves of barley bread and two fish. But they will certainly not be enough for all these people.”

¹⁰ “Make the people sit down,” Jesus told them. (There was a lot of grass there.) So all the people sat down; there were about five thousand men. ¹¹ Jesus took the bread, gave thanks to God, and distributed it to the people who were sitting there. He did the same with the fish, and they all had as much as they wanted. ¹² When they were all full, he said to his disciples, “Gather the pieces left over; let us not waste a bit.” ¹³ So they gathered them all and filled twelve baskets with the pieces left over from the five barley loaves which the people had eaten.

¹⁴ Seeing this miracle that Jesus had performed, the people there said, “Surely this is the Prophet^[b] who was to come into the world!” ¹⁵ Jesus knew that they were about to come and seize him in order to make him king by force; so he went off again to the hills by himself.

Jesus Walks on the Water^(B)

¹⁶ When evening came, Jesus' disciples went down to the lake, ¹⁷ got into a boat, and went back across the lake toward Capernaum. Night came on, and Jesus still had not come to them. ¹⁸ By then a strong wind was blowing and stirring up the water. ¹⁹ The disciples had rowed about three or four miles when they saw Jesus walking on the water, coming near the boat, and they were terrified. ²⁰ “Don't be afraid,” Jesus told them, “it is I!” ²¹ Then they willingly took him into the boat, and immediately the boat reached land at the place they were heading for.