Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

A Psalm of David.

¹ ¶ Judge me, O LORD, for I have walked in my integrity; I have trusted also in the LORD; therefore I shall not slide.

² Examine me, O LORD and prove me; melt my kidneys and my heart.

³ For thy mercy is before my eyes, and I walk in thy truth.

⁴ I have not sat with vain persons, neither will I go in with hypocrites.

⁵ I have hated the congregation of evil doers and will not sit with the wicked.

⁶ ¶ I will wash my hands in innocency, so I will walk near unto thine altar, O LORD:

⁷ That I may publish with the voice of thanksgiving and tell of all thy wondrous works.

⁸ LORD, I have loved the habitation of thy house and the place of the tabernacle of thy glory.

⁹ Gather not my soul with the sinners, nor my life with those who have blood on their hands:

¹⁰ In whose hands are wicked devices, and their right hand is full of bribes.

¹¹ But as for me, I will walk in my integrity; ransom me and be merciful unto me.

¹² I have walked uprightly; in the congregations I will bless the LORD.

4 ¶ Then Eliphaz, the Temanite, answered and said,

² If we attempt to commune with thee, thou wilt be grieved. But who can withhold himself from speaking?

³ Behold, thou hast instructed many, and thou hast strengthened the weak hands.

⁴ Thy words have upheld the one that was falling, and thou hast strengthened the feeble knees.

⁵ But now that it is come upon thee, thou art grieved; it touches thee, and thou art troubled.

⁶ Is not this thy fear, thy confidence, thy hope, and the integrity of thy ways?

⁷ ¶ Remember, I pray thee, who ever perished, being innocent? Or where were the righteous cut off?

⁸ Even as I have seen, those that plow iniquity and sow wickedness, reap the same.

⁹ By the breath of God they perish, and by the spirit of his anger they are consumed.

¹⁰ The roaring of the lion and the voice of the fierce lion and the teeth of the young lions, are broken.

¹¹ The old lion perishes for lack of prey, and the stout lion’s whelps are scattered abroad.

¹² ¶ Now the matter was also hidden from me, but my ear has perceived a little of it.

¹³ In imaginations of visions of the night, when deep sleep falls upon men,

¹⁴ fear came upon me and trembling, which made all my bones to shake.

¹⁵ Then a spirit passed before me which caused the hair of my flesh to stand up.

¹⁶ A ghost stood in front of me, whose face I did not recognize, and I heard it say,

¹⁷ Shall mortal man be more just than God? Shall a man be more pure than his maker?

¹⁸ Behold, he put no trust in his slaves, and his angels he charged with folly.

¹⁹ How much more with those that dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the dust, who shall be crushed by the moth!

²⁰ They are destroyed from morning to evening; they perish for ever without anyone regarding it.

²¹ Does their beauty perish with them? They die and do not know.

8 ¶ So that now, there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ, Jesus, who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.

² For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ, Jesus, has made me free from the law of sin and death.

³ For that which was impossible to the law, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh

⁴ that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.

⁵ For those that are according to the flesh know the things that are of the flesh; but those that are according to the Spirit, the things that are of the Spirit.

⁶ For the prudence of the flesh is death, but the prudence of the Spirit, life and peace,

⁷ because the prudence of the flesh is enmity against God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, neither indeed can it.

⁸ So then, those that are carnal cannot please God.

⁹ But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, because the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, that person is not of him.

¹⁰ ¶ But if Christ is in you, the body is truly dead because of sin, but the Spirit is alive because of righteousness.

¹¹ And if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he that raised up the Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwells in you.