Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

To the Overcomer: Maschil, for the sons of Korah.

¹ ¶ As the hart pants after the water brooks, so does my soul pant after thee, O God.

² My soul thirsts for God, for the living God; when shall I come and appear before God?

³ My tears have been my food day and night, while they continually say unto me, Where is thy God?

⁴ I will remember these things; I will pour out my soul in me. When I shall be included in the number; I will go with them to the house of God with voice of joy and praise, dancing in the multitude.

⁵ Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted against me? Wait thou for God, for I shall yet praise him for the wellbeing of his presence.

⁶ ¶ O my God, my soul is cast down within me; therefore I will remember thee from the land of Jordan, and of the Hermonites, from the mountain of Mizar.

⁷ Deep calls unto deep at the voice of thy waterspouts; all thy waves and thy billows are gone over me.

⁸ Yet the LORD will command his mercy in the daytime, and in the night his song shall be with me, and my prayer unto the God of my life.

⁹ I will say unto God, My rock, why hast thou forgotten me? Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?

¹⁰ It is as death in my bones when my enemies reproach me; while they say daily unto me, Where is thy God?

¹¹ Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted within me? Wait thou for God, for I shall yet praise him, who is the saving health of my countenance and my God.

18 ¶ When Jethro, the priest of Midian, Moses’ father-in-law, heard of all that God had done with Moses and with Israel his people and how the LORD had brought Israel out of Egypt,

² then Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, took Zipporah, Moses’ wife, after he had sent her back,

³ and her two sons, of which the name of the one was Gershon, for he said, I have been an alien in a strange land,

⁴ and the name of the other was Eliezer, for the God of my father, said he, helped me and delivered me from the sword of Pharaoh;

⁵ and Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, came with his sons and his wife unto Moses into the wilderness, where he was camped next to the mount of God;

⁶ and he said unto Moses, I, thy father-in-law Jethro, am come unto thee and thy wife and her two sons with her.

⁷ ¶ And Moses went out to meet his father-in-law and did obeisance and kissed him; and they asked each other of their peace; and they came into the tent.

⁸ And Moses told his father-in-law all that the LORD had done unto Pharaoh and to the Egyptians for Israel’s sake and all the travail that had come upon them in the way and how the LORD delivered them.

⁹ And Jethro rejoiced for all the goodness which the LORD had done to Israel, whom he had delivered out of the hand of the Egyptians.

¹⁰ And Jethro said, Blessed be the LORD, who has delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians and out of the hand of Pharaoh, who has delivered the people from under the hand of the Egyptians.

¹¹ Now I know that the LORD is greater than all gods; for in the thing in which they dealt proudly he prevailed against them.

¹² And Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, took burnt offerings and sacrifices for God; and Aaron came, and all the elders of Israel, to eat bread with Moses’ father-in-law before God.

³ ¶ I thank my God upon every remembrance of you

⁴ always in every prayer of mine for you all, making request with joy,

⁵ for your fellowship in the gospel from the first day until now,

⁶ being confident of this very thing, that he who has begun a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Jesus Christ.

⁷ ¶ Even as it is right for me to think this of you all because I have you in my heart; inasmuch as both in my bonds and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel, ye all are joint partakers of my grace.

⁸ For God is my record, how greatly I long after you all in the bowels of Jesus Christ.

⁹ ¶ And this I pray that your charity may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all perception,

¹⁰ that ye may approve the best, that ye may be sincere and without offense until the day of Christ,

¹¹ being filled with fruits of righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ, unto the glory and praise of God.

¹² ¶ But I would ye should understand, brethren, that the things which happened unto me have fallen out rather unto the furtherance of the gospel,

¹³ so that my bonds in Christ are manifest in all the palace and in all other places;

¹⁴ and many of the brethren in the Lord, waxing confident by my bonds, are much more bold to speak the word without fear.