Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)
Praise for the Lord’s Kindness
113 Praise the Lord!
Praise him, you servants of the Lord;
praise the name of the Lord.
2 The Lord’s name should be praised
now and forever.
3 The Lord’s name should be praised
from where the sun rises to where it sets.
4 The Lord is supreme over all the nations;
his glory reaches to the skies.
5 No one is like the Lord our God,
who rules from heaven,
6 who bends down to look
at the skies and the earth.
7 The Lord lifts the poor from the dirt
and takes the helpless from the ashes.
8 He seats them with princes,
the princes of his people.
9 He gives children to the woman who has none
and makes her a happy mother.
Praise the Lord!
30 When Rachel saw that she was not having children for Jacob, she envied her sister Leah. She said to Jacob, “Give me children, or I’ll die!” 2 Jacob became angry with her and said, “Can I do what only God can do? He is the one who has kept you from having children.”
3 Then Rachel said, “Here is my slave girl Bilhah. Have sexual relations with her so she can give birth to a child for me. Then I can have my own family through her.”
4 So Rachel gave Bilhah, her slave girl, to Jacob as a wife, and he had sexual relations with her. 5 She became pregnant and gave Jacob a son. 6 Rachel said, “God has judged me innocent. He has listened to my prayer and has given me a son,” so she named him Dan.[a]
7 Bilhah became pregnant again and gave Jacob a second son. 8 Rachel said, “I have struggled hard with my sister, and I have won.” So she named that son Naphtali.[b]
9 Leah saw that she had stopped having children, so she gave her slave girl Zilpah to Jacob as a wife. 10 When Zilpah had a son, 11 Leah said, “I am lucky,” so she named him Gad.[c] 12 Zilpah gave birth to another son, 13 and Leah said, “I am very happy! Now women will call me happy,” so she named him Asher.[d]
14 During the wheat harvest Reuben went into the field and found some mandrake[e] plants and brought them to his mother Leah. But Rachel said to Leah, “Please give me some of your son’s mandrakes.”
15 Leah answered, “You have already taken away my husband, and now you are trying to take away my son’s mandrakes.”
But Rachel answered, “If you will give me your son’s mandrakes, you may sleep with Jacob tonight.”
16 When Jacob came in from the field that night, Leah went out to meet him. She said, “You will have sexual relations with me tonight because I have paid for you with my son’s mandrakes.” So Jacob slept with her that night.
17 Then God answered Leah’s prayer, and she became pregnant again. She gave birth to a fifth son 18 and said, “God has given me what I paid for, because I gave my slave girl to my husband.” So Leah named her son Issachar.[f]
19 Leah became pregnant again and gave birth to a sixth son. 20 She said, “God has given me a fine gift. Now surely Jacob will honor me, because I have given him six sons,” so she named him Zebulun.[g] 21 Later Leah gave birth to a daughter and named her Dinah.
22 Then God remembered Rachel and answered her prayer, making it possible for her to have children. 23 When she became pregnant and gave birth to a son, she said, “God has taken away my shame,” 24 and she named him Joseph.[h] Rachel said, “I wish the Lord would give me another son.”
Our Future Glory
18 The sufferings we have now are nothing compared to the great glory that will be shown to us. 19 Everything God made is waiting with excitement for God to show his children’s glory completely. 20 Everything God made was changed to become useless, not by its own wish but because God wanted it and because all along there was this hope: 21 that everything God made would be set free from ruin to have the freedom and glory that belong to God’s children.
22 We know that everything God made has been waiting until now in pain, like a woman ready to give birth. 23 Not only the world, but we also have been waiting with pain inside us. We have the Spirit as the first part of God’s promise. So we are waiting for God to finish making us his own children, which means our bodies will be made free. 24 We were saved, and we have this hope. If we see what we are waiting for, that is not really hope. People do not hope for something they already have. 25 But we are hoping for something we do not have yet, and we are waiting for it patiently.
26 Also, the Spirit helps us with our weakness. We do not know how to pray as we should. But the Spirit himself speaks to God for us, even begs God for us with deep feelings that words cannot explain. 27 God can see what is in people’s hearts. And he knows what is in the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit speaks to God for his people in the way God wants.
28 We know that in everything God works for the good of those who love him.[a] They are the people he called, because that was his plan. 29 God knew them before he made the world, and he chose them to be like his Son so that Jesus would be the firstborn[b] of many brothers and sisters. 30 God planned for them to be like his Son; and those he planned to be like his Son, he also called; and those he called, he also made right with him; and those he made right, he also glorified.
The Holy Bible, New Century Version®. Copyright © 2005 by Thomas Nelson, Inc.