Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

^(A)Morning Prayer for Help^[a]

Solomon's Prayer^(A)

²² Then in the presence of the people Solomon went and stood in front of the altar, where he raised his arms ²³ and prayed, “Lord God of Israel, there is no god like you in heaven above or on earth below! You keep your covenant with your people and show them your love when they live in wholehearted obedience to you. ²⁴ You have kept the promise you made to my father David; today every word has been fulfilled. ^25 (B)And now, Lord God of Israel, I pray that you will also keep the other promise you made to my father when you told him that there would always be one of his descendants ruling as king of Israel, provided they obeyed you as carefully as he did. ²⁶ So now, O God of Israel, let everything come true that you promised to my father David, your servant.

^27 (C)“But can you, O God, really live on earth? Not even all of heaven is large enough to hold you, so how can this Temple that I have built be large enough? ²⁸ Lord my God, I am your servant. Listen to my prayer, and grant the requests I make to you today. ^29 (D)Watch over this Temple day and night, this place where you have chosen to be worshiped. Hear me when I face this Temple and pray. ³⁰ Hear my prayers and the prayers of your people when they face this place and pray. In your home in heaven hear us and forgive us.

^9 (A)“You yourselves must watch out. You will be arrested and taken to court. You will be beaten in the synagogues; you will stand before rulers and kings for my sake to tell them the Good News. ¹⁰ But before the end comes, the gospel must be preached to all peoples. ¹¹ And when you are arrested and taken to court, do not worry ahead of time about what you are going to say; when the time comes, say whatever is then given to you. For the words you speak will not be yours; they will come from the Holy Spirit. ¹² Men will hand over their own brothers to be put to death, and fathers will do the same to their children. Children will turn against their parents and have them put to death. ^13 (B)Everyone will hate you because of me. But whoever holds out to the end will be saved.

The Awful Horror^(C)

^14 (D)“You will see ‘The Awful Horror’ standing in the place where he should not be.” (Note to the reader: understand what this means!) “Then those who are in Judea must run away to the hills. ^15 (E)Someone who is on the roof of a house must not lose time by going down into the house to get anything to take along. ¹⁶ Someone who is in the field must not go back to the house for a cloak. ¹⁷ How terrible it will be in those days for women who are pregnant and for mothers with little babies! ¹⁸ Pray to God that these things will not happen in the winter! ^19 (F)For the trouble of those days will be far worse than any the world has ever known from the very beginning when God created the world until the present time. Nor will there ever be anything like it again. ²⁰ But the Lord has reduced the number of those days; if he had not, nobody would survive. For the sake of his chosen people, however, he has reduced those days.

²¹ “Then, if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Messiah!’ or, ‘Look, there he is!’—do not believe it. ²² For false Messiahs and false prophets will appear. They will perform miracles and wonders in order to deceive even God's chosen people, if possible. ²³ Be on your guard! I have told you everything ahead of time.