Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

Psalm 53

To the Chief Musician; in a mournful strain. A skillful song, or didactic or reflective poem of David.

¹ The [empty-headed] fool has said in his heart, There is no God. Corrupt and evil are they, and doing abominable iniquity; there is none who does good.

² God looked down from heaven upon the children of men to see if there were any who understood, who sought (inquired after and desperately required) God.

³ Every one of them has gone back [backslidden and fallen away]; they have altogether become filthy and corrupt; there is none who does good, no, not one.^(A)

⁴ Have those who work evil no knowledge (no understanding)? They eat up My people as they eat bread; they do not call upon God.

⁵ There they are, in terror and dread, where there was [and had been] no terror and dread! For God has scattered the bones of him who encamps against you; you have put them to shame, because God has rejected them.

⁶ Oh, that the salvation and deliverance of Israel would come out of Zion! When God restores the fortunes of His people, then will Jacob rejoice and Israel be glad.

¹⁰ Then the word of the Lord came to Samuel, saying,

¹¹ I regret making Saul king, for he has turned back from following Me and has not performed My commands. And Samuel was grieved and angry [with Saul], and he cried to the Lord all night.

¹² When Samuel rose early to meet Saul in the morning, he was told, Saul came to Carmel, and behold, he set up for himself a monument or trophy [of his victory] and passed on and went down to Gilgal.

¹³ And Samuel came to Saul, and Saul said to him, Blessed are you of the Lord. I have performed what the Lord ordered.

¹⁴ And Samuel said, What then means this bleating of the sheep in my ears, and the lowing of the oxen which I hear?

¹⁵ Saul said, They have brought them from the Amalekites; for the people spared the best of the sheep and oxen to sacrifice to the Lord your God, but the rest we have utterly destroyed.

¹⁶ Then Samuel said to Saul, Stop! I will tell you what the Lord said to me tonight. Saul said to him, Say on.

¹⁷ Samuel said, When you were small in your own sight, were you not made the head of the tribes of Israel, and the Lord anointed you king over Israel?

¹⁸ And the Lord sent you on a mission and said, Go, utterly destroy the sinners, the Amalekites; and fight against them until they are consumed.

¹⁹ Why then did you not obey the voice of the Lord, but swooped down upon the plunder and did evil in the Lord’s sight?

²⁰ Saul said to Samuel, Yes, I have obeyed the voice of the Lord and have gone the way which the Lord sent me, and have brought Agag king of Amalek and have utterly destroyed the Amalekites.

²¹ But the people took from the spoil sheep and oxen, the chief of the things to be utterly destroyed, to sacrifice to the Lord your God in Gilgal.

²² Samuel said, Has the Lord as great a delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams.

²³ For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as idolatry and teraphim (household good luck images). Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, He also has rejected you from being king.

²² I saw no temple in the city, for the Lord God Omnipotent [Himself] and the Lamb [Himself] are its temple.

²³ And the city has no need of the sun nor of the moon to give light to it, for the splendor and radiance (glory) of God illuminate it, and the Lamb is its lamp.^(A)

²⁴ The nations shall walk by its light and the rulers and leaders of the earth shall bring into it their glory.

²⁵ And its gates shall never be closed by day, and there shall be no night there.^(B)

²⁶ They shall bring the glory (the splendor and majesty) and the honor of the nations into it.

²⁷ But nothing that defiles or profanes or is ^[a]unwashed shall ever enter it, nor anyone who commits abominations (unclean, detestable, morally repugnant things) or practices falsehood, but only those whose names are recorded in the Lamb’s Book of Life.

22 Then he showed me the river whose waters give life, sparkling like crystal, flowing out from the throne of God and of the Lamb

² Through the middle of the broadway of the city; also, on either side of the river was the tree of life with its twelve varieties of fruit, yielding each month its fresh crop; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing and the restoration of the nations.^(C)

³ There shall no longer exist there anything that is accursed (detestable, foul, offensive, impure, hateful, or horrible). But the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it, and His servants shall worship Him [pay divine honors to Him and do Him holy service].^(D)

⁴ They shall see His face, and His name shall be on their foreheads.^(E)

⁵ And there shall be no more night; they have no need for lamplight or sunlight, for the Lord God will illuminate them and be their light, and they shall reign [as kings] forever and ever (through the eternities of the eternities).