Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

79 Unto the end, for them that shall he changed, a testimony for Asaph, a psalm.

² Give ear, O thou that rulest Israel: thou that leadest Joseph like a sheep. Thou that sittest upon the cherubims, shine forth

³ Before Ephraim, Benjamin, and Manasses. Stir up thy might, and come to save us.

⁴ Convert us, O God: and shew us thy face, and we shall be saved.

⁵ O Lord God of hosts, how long wilt thou be angry against the prayer of thy servant?

⁶ How long wilt thou feed us with the bread of tears: and give us for our drink tears in measure?

⁷ Thou hast made us to be a contradiction to our neighbours: and our enemies have scoffed at us.

⁸ O God of hosts, convert us: and shew thy face, and we shall be saved.

⁹ Thou hast brought a vineyard out of Egypt: thou hast cast cut the Gentiles and planted it.

¹⁴ Thus saith the Lord against all my wicked neighbours, that touch the inheritance that I have shared out to my people Israel: Behold I will pluck them out of their land, and I will pluck the house of Juda out of the midst of them.

¹⁵ And when I shall have plucked them out, I will return, and have mercy on them: and I will bring them back, every man to his inheritance, and every man to his land.

¹⁶ And it shall come to pass, if they will be taught, and will learn the ways of my people, to swear by my name: The Lord liveth, as they have taught my people to swear by baal: that they shall be built up in the midst of my people.

¹⁷ But if they will not hear, I will utterly pluck out and destroy that nation, saith the Lord.

13 Thus saith the Lord to me: Go, and get thee a linen girdle, and thou shalt put it about thy loins, and shalt not put it into water.

² And I got a girdle accoding to the word of the Lord, and put it about my loins.

³ And the word of the Lord came to me the second time, saying:

⁴ Take the girdle which thou hast got, which is about thy loins, and arise, and go to the Euphrates, and hide it there in a hole of the rock.

⁵ And I went, and hid it by the Euphrates, as the Lord had commanded me.

⁶ And it came to pass after many days, that the Lord said to me: Arise, go to the Euphrates, and take from thence the girdle, which I commanded thee to hide there.

⁷ And I went to the Euphrates, and digged, and took the girdle out of the place where I had hid it: and behold the girdle was rotten, so that it was fit for no use.

⁸ And the word of the Lord came to me, saying:

⁹ Thus saith the Lord: after this manner will I make the pride of Juda, and the great pride of Jerusalem to rot.

¹⁰ This wicked people, that will not hear my words, and that walk in the perverseness of their heart, and have gone after strange gods to serve them, and to adore them: and they shall be as this girdle which is fit for no use.

¹¹ For as the girdle sticketh close to the loins of a man, so have I brought close to me all of the house of Israel, and all the house of Juda, saith the Lord: that they might be my people, and for a name, and for a praise, and for a glory: but they would not hear.

3 What advantage then hath the Jew, or what is the profit of circumcision?

² Much every way. First indeed, because the words of God were committed to them.

³ For what if some of them have not believed? shall their unbelief make the faith of God without effect? God forbid.

⁴ But God is true; and every man a liar, as it is written, That thou mayest be justified in thy words, and mayest overcome when thou art judged.

⁵ But if our injustice commend the justice of God, what shall we say? Is God unjust, who executeth wrath?

⁶ (I speak according to man.) God forbid: otherwise how shall God judge this world?

⁷ For if the truth of God hath more abounded through my lie, unto his glory, why am I also yet judged as a sinner?

⁸ And not rather (as we are slandered, and as some affirm that we say) let us do evil, that there may come good? whose damnation is just.