Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

A Prayer of Moses the man of God.

¹ ¶ Lord, thou hast been our refuge from generation to generation.

² Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God.

³ Thou dost turn unto man until he is broken and thou saith, Become converted, ye sons of Adam.

⁴ For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past and as a watch in the night.

⁵ Thou dost cause them to pass by as the waters of a river; they are as a dream, which is strong in the morning like grass.

⁶ In the morning it blossoms and grows up; in the evening it is cut down and withers.

¹³ Return unto us, O LORD, how long? and let it repent thee concerning thy slaves.

¹⁴ O satisfy us early with thy mercy, and we shall sing and be glad all our days.

¹⁵ Make us glad according to the days in which thou hast afflicted us and the years in which we have seen evil.

¹⁶ Let thy work appear in thy slaves and thy glory upon their sons.

¹⁷ And let the beauty of the LORD our God be upon us, and set thou aright the work of our hands upon us; yea, set thou aright the work of our hands.

¹⁴ ¶ And the LORD said unto Moses, Behold, thy days are fulfilled that thou must die; call Joshua and wait in the tabernacle of the testimony that I may give him a charge. And Moses and Joshua went and waited in the tabernacle of the testimony.

¹⁵ And the LORD appeared in the tabernacle in the pillar of cloud, and the pillar of the cloud stood over the door of the tabernacle.

¹⁶ And the LORD said unto Moses, Behold, thou shalt sleep with thy fathers, and this people shall rise up and fornicate after the gods of the strangers of the land where they go when they shall be among them and will forsake me and break my covenant which I have made with them.

¹⁷ Then my anger shall be kindled against them in that same day, and I will forsake them, and I will hide my face from them, and they shall be devoured, and many evils and troubles shall befall them so that they will say in that day, Are not these evils come upon us because our God is not among us?

¹⁸ But I will surely hide my face in that day for all the evils which they shall have wrought, in that they are turned unto other gods.

¹⁹ Now therefore write ye this song for you and teach it to the sons of Israel; put it in their mouths that this song may be a witness for me against the sons of Israel.

²⁰ For I shall bring them into the land which I swore unto their fathers, that flows with milk and honey, and they shall eat and fill themselves and wax fat; then they will turn unto other gods and serve them and provoke me and break my covenant.

²¹ And it shall come to pass when many evils and troubles are befallen them, that this song shall reply to them in their face as a witness, for it shall not be forgotten out of the mouths of their seed; for I know their imagination which they go about, even now, before I have brought them into the land which I swore.

²² ¶ Moses therefore wrote this song the same day and taught it to the sons of Israel.

⁵ ¶ For this cause I left thee in Crete, that thou should correct that which is lacking and set in place elders in every city, as I had commanded thee:

⁶ ¶ He who is blameless, the husband of one wife, having faithful children who can not be accused of dissoluteness, nor insubordinate.

⁷ For the bishop must be blameless, as a steward of God; not arrogant, not quick to anger, not given to wine, not hurtful, not greedy of dishonest gain,

⁸ but a lover of hospitality, a lover of good men, temperate, just, holy, gentle,

⁹ holding fast the doctrine according to the faithful word, that he may be able by sound doctrine both to exhort and to convince the gainsayers.

¹⁰ For there are many insubordinate and vain talkers and deceivers of souls, especially those of the circumcision,

¹¹ whose mouths it is expedient to stop, who subvert whole houses, teaching things which they ought not, for dishonest gain.

¹² One of themselves, even a prophet of their own, said, The Cretians are always liars, evil beasts, lazy bellies.

¹³ This witness is true. Therefore rebuke them sharply, that they may be sound in the faith;

¹⁴ not giving heed to Jewish fables and commandments of men, that turn from the truth.

¹⁵ For unto the pure all things are pure, but unto those that are defiled and unfaithful, nothing is pure, but even their soul and conscience is defiled.

¹⁶ They profess that they know God, but in works they deny him, being abominable and rebellious and reprobate unto every good work.