Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)
Psalm 65
A Thanksgiving Psalm: You Crown the Year With Goodness
Heading
For the choir director. A psalm by David. A song.
Introduction
1 Praise waits for you,[a] O God, in Zion.
To you vows will be fulfilled.
2 You who hear prayer, to you all mortals[b] will come.
Spiritual Blessings
3 The record of my guilt overpowered me.
You atone for our rebellious acts.
4 How blessed is the one you choose and bring near!
He will dwell in your courtyards.
We will be satisfied by the goodness of your house,
by the holiness of your temple.
Blessings on the Nations
5 In righteousness you answer us with awesome deeds,
O God who saves us.
He is trusted by all the farthest ends of the earth and the sea.
6 He establishes the mountains by his power.
He has wrapped himself with strength.
7 He stills the roaring of the seas,
the roaring of their waves,
and the turmoil of the peoples.
8 Those living at the ends of the earth fear your signs.
From sunrise to sunset you let them shout for joy.
Blessings of the Harvest
9 You visit the earth and water it.
You make it very rich.
God’s stream is filled with water.
You provide grain for them, just as you planned.
10 You drench the land’s furrows. You flatten its plowed ground.
You soften it with showers. You bless its crops.
11 You crown the year with your goodness.
The tracks made by your carts overflow with riches.[c]
12 The pastures of the wilderness drip.
The hills are wrapped with joy.
13 The meadows are clothed with flocks.
The valleys are dressed with grain.
They shout for joy. Yes! They sing.
1 The word of the Lord that came to Joel son of Pethuel.
Warnings and Descriptions of the Locust Plague
2 Hear this, you elders.
Listen, all of you who live in the land.
Has anything like this ever happened in your days
or in the days of your fathers?
3 Tell it to your children,
and let your children tell it to their children,
and their children to the next generation.
4 What the grasshoppers have left, the swarming locusts have eaten.
What the swarming locusts have left, the young locusts have eaten.
What the young locusts have left, the mature locusts have eaten.[a]
5 Wake up, you drunkards, and weep!
Wail,[b] all you wine drinkers,
because of the sweet wine[c] that has been snatched from your mouth.
6 A nation has come up into my land, powerful and without number.
It has teeth like a lion and fangs like a lioness.
7 It has devastated my vines and shredded my fig trees.
It has completely stripped off their bark and thrown it aside,
so that their branches are bare and white.
8 Grieve like a virgin dressed in sackcloth,
who grieves for the husband[d] of her youth.
9 Grain offerings and drink offerings are cut off from the house of the Lord.
The priests are in mourning,
those who minister in the presence of the Lord.
10 The fields are devastated. The soil mourns.
The grain is devastated.
The new wine has run dry. The olive oil runs out.
11 Hang your heads, you farmers.
Wail, you vine growers, for the wheat and for the barley,
because the grain harvest has died in the field.
12 The vine has dried up, and the fig tree has withered.
The pomegranate, the date palm, and the apple tree—
all the trees in the countryside have dried up,
and joy has dried up for all the people.
13 Put on sackcloth, you priests, and lament.
Wail, you who minister in front of the altar.
Come, spend the night in sackcloth,
you who minister before my God,
because the grain offerings and drink offerings
are being held back from the house of your God.
14 Set aside a day of fasting. Call a solemn convocation.
Summon the elders and everyone who lives in the land
to come to the house of the Lord your God.
Cry out to the Lord!
Announcement of the Day of the Lord
15 How terrible that day will be!
Yes, the Day of the Lord is near.
It will come like destruction from the Almighty.[e]
16 Hasn’t the food been cut off right before our eyes?
Happiness and celebration are cut off from the house of our God.
17 The planted seed is dried up under the clods of earth.[f]
The storehouses are in ruins.
The granaries have been broken down, because the grain has dried up.
18 Listen to how the cattle bellow!
The herds of cattle are milling around in confusion, because they have no pasture.
Even the flocks of sheep are suffering punishment.
Closing Prayer
19 To you, O Lord, I call,
because fire has consumed the grazing lands in the wilderness,[g]
and flames have burned up all the trees in the countryside.
20 Even the animals in the countryside pant for you.
The streams of water have dried up,
and fire has consumed the grazing lands in the wilderness.
The Last Days
3 But know this: In the last days there will be terrible times. 2 For people will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, blasphemous, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, 3 unloving, not able to reconcile with others, slanderous, without self-control, savage, haters of what is good, 4 treacherous, reckless, puffed up with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, 5 holding to an outward form of godliness but denying its power. Turn away from such people. 6 For some of them are people who worm their way into households and gain control over vulnerable women who are overwhelmed with sins, led astray by various evil desires, 7 always learning but never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. 8 Just as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so also these people oppose the truth. They are people of depraved minds, disqualified in regard to the faith. 9 But they will not get very far, because their foolishness will be quite clear to everyone, just as it was in the case of Jannes and Jambres.
The Holy Bible, Evangelical Heritage Version®, EHV®, © 2019 Wartburg Project, Inc. All rights reserved.