Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)
Book 5
(Psalms 107-150)
107 Praise the Lord, because he is good!
His faithful love will last forever!
2 Everyone the Lord has saved should repeat that word of thanks.
Praise him, all who have been rescued from the enemy.
3 He gathered his people together from many different countries.
He brought them from east and west, north and south.[a]
4 Some of them wandered in the dry desert.
They were looking for a place to live,
but they could not find a city.
5 They were hungry and thirsty
and growing weak.
6 Then they called to the Lord for help,
and he saved them from their troubles.
7 He led them straight to the city where they would live.
8 Thank the Lord for his faithful love
and for the amazing things he does for people.
9 He satisfies those who are thirsty.
He fills those who are hungry with good things.
43 Whoever is wise will remember these things
and begin to understand the Lord’s faithful love.
The Sadness of Exile
9 Israel, don’t celebrate like the nations do. Don’t be happy. You acted like a prostitute and left your God. You committed your sexual sin[a] on every threshing floor. 2 But the grain from those threshing floors will not provide enough food for Israel. There will not be enough wine for Israel.
3 The Israelites will not stay in the Lord’s land. Ephraim will return to Egypt. In Assyria they will eat food that they should not eat. 4 They will not be able to give offerings of wine to the Lord. None of their sacrifices will please him. What they offer will be like food eaten at a funeral—whoever eats it will become unclean. They can eat that food for their own hunger, but it cannot be taken into the Lord’s Temple. 5 They will not be able to celebrate the Lord’s feasts or festivals.[b]
6 The people of Israel left because the enemy took everything from them. But Egypt will take the people themselves. Memphis[c] will bury them. Weeds will grow over their silver treasures, and thorns will grow where the Israelites lived.
Israel Rejected the True Prophets
7 The prophet says, “Israel, learn this: The time of punishment has come. The time has come for you to pay for the evil things you did.” But the people of Israel say, “The prophet is a fool. This man with God’s Spirit is crazy.” The prophet says, “You will be punished for your terrible sins. You will be punished for your hate.” 8 God and the prophet are like guards watching over Ephraim, but there are many traps along his way. And people hate the prophet, even in the house of his God.
9 The Israelites have gone deep into ruin as in the time of Gibeah. God will remember the Israelites’ sins, and he will punish them.
Israel Is Ruined by Its Worship of Idols
10 “At the time I, the Lord, found Israel, they were like fresh grapes in the desert. They were like the first figs on a fig tree at the beginning of the season. But when they came to Baal Peor,[d] they changed. So I had to cut them off like rotten fruit.[e] They became like the terrible things that they loved.
The Israelites Will Have No Children
11 “Like a bird, Ephraim’s glory will fly away. There will be no more pregnancies, no more births, and no more babies. 12 But even if the Israelites do raise their children, it will not help, because I will take the children away from them. I will leave them, and they will have nothing but troubles.”
13 I can see that Ephraim is leading his children into a trap. Ephraim will lead his children out to the killer. 14 Lord, give them what you will. Give them a womb that loses babies and breasts that cannot give milk.
15 All their evil is in Gilgal;
I began hating them there.
I will force them to leave my house
because of the evil things they do.
I will not love them anymore.
Their leaders are rebels who turned against me.
16 Ephraim will be punished.
Their root is dying.
They will not have any more babies.
They might give birth to babies,
but I will kill the precious babies who come from their bodies.
17 Those people will not listen to my God,
so he will refuse to listen to them.
And they will wander among the nations without a home.
The Way You Should Live
17 I have something from the Lord to tell you. I warn you: Don’t continue living like those who don’t believe. Their thoughts are worth nothing. 18 They have no understanding, and they know nothing because they refuse to listen. So they cannot have the life that God gives. 19 They have lost their feeling of shame and use their lives to do what is morally wrong. More and more they want to do all kinds of evil. 20 But that way of life is nothing like what you learned when you came to know Christ. 21 I know that you heard about him, and in him you were taught the truth. Yes, the truth is in Jesus. 22 You were taught to leave your old self. This means that you must stop living the evil way you lived before. That old self gets worse and worse, because people are fooled by the evil they want to do. 23 You must be made new in your hearts and in your thinking. 24 Be that new person who was made to be like God, truly good and pleasing to him.
Copyright © 2006 by Bible League International