Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)
116 I love the Lord because he hears my prayers and answers them. 2 Because he bends down and listens, I will pray as long as I breathe!
12 But now what can I offer Jehovah for all he has done for me? 13 I will bring him an offering of wine[a] and praise his name for saving me. 14 I will publicly bring him the sacrifice I vowed I would. 15 His loved ones are very precious to him, and he does not lightly let them die.[b]
16 O Lord, you have freed me from my bonds, and I will serve you forever. 17 I will worship you and offer you a sacrifice of thanksgiving. 18-19 Here in the courts of the Temple in Jerusalem, before all the people, I will pay everything I vowed to the Lord. Praise the Lord.
24 Abraham was now a very old man, and God blessed him in every way. 2 One day Abraham said to his household administrator, who was his oldest servant,
3 “Swear by Jehovah, the God of heaven and earth, that you will not let my son marry one of these local girls, these Canaanites. 4 Go instead to my homeland, to my relatives, and find a wife for him there.”
5 “But suppose I can’t find a girl who will come so far from home?” the servant asked. “Then shall I take Isaac there, to live among your relatives?”
6 “No!” Abraham warned. “Be careful that you don’t do that under any circumstance. 7 For the Lord God of heaven told me to leave that land and my people, and promised to give me and my children this land. He will send his angel on ahead of you, and he will see to it that you find a girl from there to be my son’s wife. 8 But if you don’t succeed, then you are free from this oath; but under no circumstances are you to take my son there.”
9 So the servant vowed[a] to follow Abraham’s instructions.
35 And so God sent back the same man his people had previously rejected by demanding, ‘Who made you a ruler and judge over us?’ Moses was sent to be their ruler and savior. 36 And by means of many remarkable miracles he led them out of Egypt and through the Red Sea, and back and forth through the wilderness for forty years.
37 “Moses himself told the people of Israel, ‘God will raise up a Prophet much like me[a] from among your brothers.’ 38 How true this proved to be, for in the wilderness, Moses was the go-between—the mediator between the people of Israel and the Angel who gave them the Law of God—the Living Word—on Mount Sinai.
39 “But our fathers rejected Moses and wanted to return to Egypt. 40 They told Aaron, ‘Make idols for us, so that we will have gods to lead us back; for we don’t know what has become of this Moses, who brought us out of Egypt.’ 41 So they made a calf idol and sacrificed to it, and rejoiced in this thing they had made.
42 “Then God turned away from them and gave them up, and let them serve the sun, moon, and stars as their gods! In the book of Amos’ prophecies the Lord God asks, ‘Was it to me you were sacrificing during those forty years in the desert, Israel? 43 No, your real interest was in your heathen gods—Sakkuth, and the star god Kaiway, and in all the images you made. So I will send you into captivity far away beyond Babylon.’
The Living Bible copyright © 1971 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.