Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

127 Unless the LORD builds the house, they labor in vain who build it. Unless the LORD keeps the city, the keeper watches in vain.

² It is in vain for you to rise early, to lie down late, and eat the bread of sorrow; but He will surely give rest to His beloved.

³ Behold, children are the inheritance of the LORD, the fruit of the womb His reward.

⁴ As the arrows in the hand of the strong man are the children of youth.

⁵ Blessed is the man who has his quiver full of them. They shall not be ashamed when they speak with enemies in the gate. A song of degrees

¹¹ And all the people who were in the gate, and the elders, said, “We are witnesses. The LORD make the wife who comes into your house like Rachel and like Leah, who between them built the house of Israel. So that you may do worthily in Ephrathah and be famous in Bethlehem,

¹² “and that your house be like the house of Perez (whom Tamar bore to Judah from the seed which the LORD shall give you from this young woman).”

¹³ So Boaz took Ruth; and she was his wife. And when he went into her, the LORD gave, so that she conceived and bore a son.

¹⁴ And the women said to Naomi, “Blessed be the LORD, Who has not left you without a kinsman today. And His name shall be continued in Israel.

¹⁵ And this shall restore your life and nourish your old age. For your daughter-in-law, who loves you, has borne him. And she is better to you than seven sons.”

¹⁶ And Naomi took the child and laid it in her lap and became nurse to it.

¹⁷ And the women, her neighbors, gave it a name, saying, “There is a child born to Naomi.” And they called his name “Obed”. The same was the father of Jesse, the father of David.

¹⁵ And because of this, He is the Mediator of the new Testament, so that through death (which was for the redemption of the transgressions in the former Testament) those who were called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance.

¹⁶ For where there is a Testament, there must be the death of the one who made it.

¹⁷ For the Testament is confirmed after death. It is still of no force so long as the one who made it lives.

¹⁸ Therefore, nor was the first ordained without blood.

¹⁹ For when Moses had spoken every precept to the people (according to the Law), he took the blood of calves and goats, with water and purple wool and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book and all the people,

²⁰ saying, “This is the blood of the Testament which God has commanded you.”

²¹ Moreover, he likewise sprinkled the Tabernacle with blood, and all the implements of ministry.

²² And by the Law, almost all things are purged with blood. And there is no remission without shedding of blood.

²³ It was necessary, then, that the representations of heavenly things should be purified with such things. But the heavenly things themselves are purified with better sacrifices than these.

²⁴ For Christ has not entered into the Holy Places that are made with hands - which are representations of the true things - but into Heaven itself, to appear now in the sight of God for us.