Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)
Psalm 17
A Prayer of David.
1 Hear the right (my righteous cause), O Lord; listen to my shrill, piercing cry! Give ear to my prayer, that comes from unfeigned and guileless lips.
2 Let my sentence of vindication come from You! May Your eyes behold the things that are just and upright.
3 You have proved my heart; You have visited me in the night; You have tried me and find nothing [no evil purpose in me]; I have purposed that my mouth shall not transgress.
4 Concerning the works of men, by the word of Your lips I have avoided the ways of the violent (the paths of the destroyer).
5 My steps have held closely to Your paths [to the tracks of the One Who has gone on before]; my feet have not slipped.
6 I have called upon You, O God, for You will hear me; incline Your ear to me and hear my speech.
7 Show Your marvelous loving-kindness, O You Who save by Your right hand those who trust and take refuge in You from those who rise up against them.
15 As for me, I will continue beholding Your face in righteousness (rightness, justice, and right standing with You); I shall be fully satisfied, when I awake [to find myself] beholding Your form [and having sweet communion with You].
22 But on the third day Laban was told that Jacob had fled.
23 So he took his kinsmen with him and pursued after [Jacob] for seven days, and they overtook him in the hill country of Gilead.
24 But God came to Laban the Syrian [Aramean] in a dream by night and said to him, Be careful that you do not speak from good to bad to Jacob [peaceably, then violently].
25 Then Laban overtook Jacob. Now Jacob had pitched his tent on the hill, and Laban coming with his kinsmen pitched [his tents] on the same hill of Gilead.
26 And Laban said to Jacob, What do you mean stealing away and leaving like this without my knowing it, and carrying off my daughters as if captives of the sword?
27 Why did you flee secretly and cheat me and did not tell me, so that I might have sent you away with joy and gladness and with singing, with tambourine and lyre?
28 And why did you not permit me to kiss my sons [grandchildren] and my daughters good-bye? Now you have done foolishly [in behaving like this].
29 It is in my power to do you harm; but the God of your father spoke to me last night, saying, Be careful that you do not speak from good to bad to Jacob [peaceably, then violently].
30 And now you felt you must go because you were homesick for your father’s house, but why did you steal my [household] [a]gods?
31 Jacob answered Laban, Because I was afraid; for I thought, Suppose you would take your daughters from me by force.
32 The one with whom you find those gods of yours, let him not live. Here before our kinsmen [search my possessions and] take whatever you find that belongs to you. For Jacob did not know that Rachel had stolen [the images].
33 So Laban went into Jacob’s tent and into Leah’s tent and the tent of the two maids, but he did not find them. Then he went from Leah’s tent into Rachel’s tent.
34 Now Rachel had taken the images (gods) and put them in the camel’s saddle and sat on them. Laban searched and felt through all the tent, but did not find them.
35 And [Rachel] said to her father, Do not be displeased, my lord, that I cannot rise up before you, for the period of women is upon me and I am unwell. And he searched, but did not find the gods.
36 Then Jacob became angry and reproached and argued with Laban. And Jacob said to Laban, What is my fault? What is my sin, that you so hotly pursued me?
37 Although you have searched and felt through all my household possessions, what have you found of all your household goods? Put it here before my brethren and yours, that they may judge and decide between us.
38 These twenty years I have been with you; your ewes and your she-goats have not lost their young, and the rams of your flock have not been eaten by me.
39 I did not bring you [the carcasses of the animals] torn by wild beasts; I bore the loss of it; you required of me [to make good] all that was stolen, whether it occurred by day or by night.
40 This was [my lot]; by day the heat consumed me and by night the cold, and I could not sleep.
41 I have been twenty years in your house. I served you fourteen years for your two daughters and six years for your flocks; and you have changed my wages ten times.
42 And if the God of my father, the God of Abraham and the Dread [lest he should fall] and Fear [lest he offend] of Isaac, had not been with me, surely you would have sent me away now empty-handed. God has seen my affliction and humiliation and the [wearying] labor of my hands and rebuked you last night.
8 First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because [the report of] your faith is made known to all the world and is [a]commended everywhere.
9 For God is my witness, Whom I serve with my [whole] spirit [rendering priestly and spiritual service] in [preaching] the Gospel and [telling] the good news of His Son, how incessantly I always mention you when at my prayers.
10 I keep pleading that somehow by God’s will I may now at last prosper and come to you.
11 For I am yearning to see you, that I may impart and share with you some spiritual gift to strengthen and establish you;
12 That is, that we may be mutually strengthened and encouraged and comforted by each other’s faith, both yours and mine.
13 I want you to know, brethren, that many times I have planned and intended to come to you, though thus far I have been hindered and prevented, in order that I might have some fruit (some result of my labors) among you, as I have among the rest of the Gentiles.
14 Both to Greeks and to barbarians (to the cultured and to the uncultured), both to the wise and the foolish, I have an obligation to discharge and a duty to perform and a debt to pay.
15 So, for my part, I am willing and eagerly ready to preach the Gospel to you also who are in Rome.
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