Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)
86 Bend down and hear my prayer, O Lord, and answer me, for I am deep in trouble.
2 Protect me from death, for I try to follow all your laws. Save me, for I am serving you and trusting you. 3 Be merciful, O Lord, for I am looking up to you in constant hope. 4 Give me happiness, O Lord, for I worship only you. 5 O Lord, you are so good and kind, so ready to forgive, so full of mercy for all who ask your aid.
6 Listen closely to my prayer, O God. Hear my urgent cry. 7 I will call to you whenever trouble strikes, and you will help me.
8 Where among the heathen gods is there a god like you? Where are their miracles? 9 All the nations—and you made each one—will come and bow before you, Lord, and praise your great and holy name. 10 For you are great and do great miracles. You alone are God.
35 “Move on to Bethel now, and settle there,” God said to Jacob, “and build an altar to worship me—the God who appeared to you when you fled from your brother Esau.”
2 So Jacob instructed all those in his household to destroy the idols they had brought with them, and to wash themselves and to put on fresh clothing. 3 “For we are going to Bethel,” he told them, “and I will build an altar there to the God who answered my prayers in the day of my distress, and was with me on my journey.”
4 So they gave Jacob all their idols and their earrings, and he buried them beneath the oak tree near Shechem.
17 The High Priest and his relatives and friends among the Sadducees reacted with violent jealousy 18 and arrested the apostles, and put them in the public jail.
19 But an angel of the Lord came at night, opened the gates of the jail and brought them out. Then he told them, 20 “Go over to the Temple and preach about this Life!”
21 They arrived at the Temple about daybreak and immediately began preaching! Later that morning[a] the High Priest and his courtiers arrived at the Temple, and, convening the Jewish Council and the entire Senate, they sent for the apostles to be brought for trial. 22 But when the police arrived at the jail, the men weren’t there, so they returned to the Council and reported, 23 “The jail doors were locked, and the guards were standing outside, but when we opened the gates, no one was there!”
24 When the police captain[b] and the chief priests heard this, they were frantic, wondering what would happen next and where all this would end! 25 Then someone arrived with the news that the men they had jailed were out in the Temple, preaching to the people!
26-27 The police captain went with his officers and arrested them (without violence, for they were afraid the people would kill them if they roughed up the disciples) and brought them in before the Council.
The Living Bible copyright © 1971 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.