Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

148 Praise the Lord, O heavens! Praise him from the skies! ² Praise him, all his angels, all the armies of heaven. ³ Praise him, sun and moon and all you twinkling stars. ⁴ Praise him, skies above. Praise him, vapors high above the clouds.

⁵ Let everything he has made give praise to him. For he issued his command, and they came into being; ⁶ he established them forever and forever. His orders will never be revoked.

⁷ And praise him down here on earth, you creatures of the ocean depths. ⁸ Let fire and hail, snow, rain, wind, and weather all obey. ⁹ Let the mountains and hills, the fruit trees and cedars, ¹⁰ the wild animals and cattle, the snakes and birds, ¹¹ the kings and all the people with their rulers and their judges, ¹² young men and maidens, old men and children— ¹³ all praise the Lord together. For he alone is worthy. His glory is far greater than all of earth and heaven. ¹⁴ He has made his people strong, honoring his godly ones—the people of Israel, the people closest to him.

Hallelujah! Yes, praise the Lord!

9 Wisdom has built a palace supported on seven pillars, ² and has prepared a great banquet, and mixed the wines, ³ and sent out her maidens inviting all to come. She calls from the busiest intersections in the city, ⁴ “Come, you simple ones without good judgment; ⁵ come to wisdom’s banquet and drink the wines that I have mixed. ⁶ Leave behind your foolishness and begin to live; learn how to be wise.”

^7-8 If you rebuke a mocker, you will only get a smart retort; yes, he will snarl at you. So don’t bother with him; he will only hate you for trying to help him. But a wise man, when rebuked, will love you all the more. ⁹ Teach a wise man, and he will be the wiser; teach a good man, and he will learn more. ¹⁰ For the reverence and fear of God are basic to all wisdom. Knowing God results in every other kind of understanding. ¹¹ “I, Wisdom, will make the hours of your day more profitable and the years of your life more fruitful.” ¹² Wisdom is its own reward, and if you scorn her, you hurt only yourself.

⁸ But don’t forget this, dear friends, that a day or a thousand years from now is like tomorrow to the Lord. ⁹ He isn’t really being slow about his promised return, even though it sometimes seems that way. But he is waiting, for the good reason that he is not willing that any should perish, and he is giving more time for sinners to repent. ¹⁰ The day of the Lord is surely coming, as unexpectedly as a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a terrible noise, and the heavenly bodies will disappear in fire, and the earth and everything on it will be burned up.

¹¹ And so since everything around us is going to melt away, what holy, godly lives we should be living! ¹² You should look forward to that day and hurry it along—the day when God will set the heavens on fire, and the heavenly bodies will melt and disappear in flames. ¹³ But we are looking forward to God’s promise of new heavens and a new earth afterwards, where there will be only goodness.^[a]