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Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

Daily Bible readings that follow the church liturgical year, with sequential stories told across multiple weeks.
Duration: 1245 days
The Voice (VOICE)
Version
Psalm 72

Psalm 72

A song of Solomon.

True God, bestow Your honest judgments upon the king
    and anoint the king’s son with Your righteousness.
May he be honest and fair in his judgments over Your people
    and offer justice to the burdened and suffering.
Under his reign, may this land of mountains and hills know peace
    and experience justice for all the people.
May the king offer justice to the burdened and suffering,
    rescue the poor and needy,
    and demolish the oppressor!

[May the people fear You][a] for as long as the sun shines,
    as long as the moon rises in the night sky, throughout the generations.
May the king be like the refreshing rains, which fall upon fields of freshly mown grass—
    like showers that cool and nourish the earth.
May good and honest people flourish for as long as he reigns,
    and may peace fill the land until the moon no longer rises.

May the king rule from one sea to the next,
    and may his rule extend from the Euphrates River to the far reaches of the earth.
Let the desert wanderers bow down before him
    and his enemies lay prostrate and taste the dirt.
10 Let the kings of Tarshish and the island kings
    shower him with gifts
And the kings of Sheba and Seba bring him presents as well.
11 Let every king on earth bow down before him
    and every nation be in his service.
12 For he will rescue the needy when they ask for help!
    He will save the burdened and come to the aid of those who have no other help.
13 He offers compassion to the weak and the poor;
    he will help and protect the lives of the needy!
14 He will liberate them from the fierce sting of persecution and violence;
    in his eyes, their blood is precious.

15 May he live a long, long time
    and the gold of Sheba be given to him.
May the people constantly lift up prayers for him,
    and may they call upon God to bless him always.
16 Let grain grow plentifully in this land of promise,
    let it sway in the breeze on the hilltops,
    let it grow strong as do the cedars of Lebanon,

Woven throughout the psalms are songs describing and praising those anointed as kings over God’s people. Psalm 2, one of the introductory psalms, describes the king as the son of God, the ruler of nations, and the anointed one. During the monarchical period in Israel, psalms like these were tied to the kings themselves, idealizing them as perfectly just and righteous and victorious. But during the exile, God’s exiled people longed for freedom and the implications of these songs began to change. Many Jews began to interpret these psalms as referring to a coming ruler, a Davidic king who would usher in an eternal kingdom and perfect peace. This hope was realized in Jesus. So this is why the earliest followers of Jesus went back to the psalms again and again. They found within many of the psalms, the story of Jesus anticipated and celebrated.

And may those who live in the city bloom and flourish
    just as the grass of the fields and meadows.
17 May his name live on forever
    and his reputation grow for as long as the sun gives light.
May people from all nations find in him a blessing;
    may all peoples declare him blessed.

18 May the Eternal God, the God of Israel, be blessed,
    for He alone works miracles and wonders!
19 May His glorious name be blessed forever
    and the whole earth be filled with His eternal glory!
Amen. Amen.

20 The prayers of King David, Jesse’s son, are ended.

Jeremiah 31:7-14

    Sing a song of joy for Jacob; shout for this greatest of nations.
        Shout it out with praise in your hearts:
    “O Eternal, save Your people—
        rescue the remnant of Israel.”
    Watch now, as I bring them from the land to the north,
        as I gather My people from the ends of the earth.
    Look who is among those returning home: the blind and the lame,
        expectant mothers and even those giving birth—
    All of these together in the multitude on its way home.
    Listen, as they come home weeping and repenting,
        praying for direction, pleading for mercy as I bring them back.
    In that day I will lead them beside quiet streams of water
        and take them upon a straight path where they will not stumble.
    Why? Because I am Israel’s father, and Ephraim is My firstborn son.

10 Listen to the word of the Eternal, you nations of the earth;
    take this story to distant shores and make it known:
The One who scattered Israel will now gather His people
    and watch over His flock as a shepherd.
11 For the Eternal has rescued Jacob
    and redeemed him from people who are too strong for him.
12 The redeemed will return home and shout for joy from the top of Mount Zion;
    they will shine with the sheer goodness of the Eternal—
The harvests of grain, wine, and oil; the healthy flocks and herds.
    Their lives will be like a lush, well-watered garden.
From that day on, they will never know sorrow.

13 Eternal One: Young women will dance for joy;
        young men will join them, old ones too.
    For I will turn their mourning into joy.
        I will comfort My people and replace their sorrow with gladness.
14     From the overflow of sacrifices,
        I will satisfy My priests;
    All My people will feast on My goodness.

The people now cling to this promise as they struggle with exile. Jeremiah returns the focus to the heartbreak of a people being deported to a foreign land.

This is what the Eternal declares!

John 1:1-9

This Gospel begins not with Jesus’ birth or John’s baptism but with a deliberate echo of the creation story in Genesis. It takes us back before time began to the moment when God interrupts the silence and speaks the cosmos into existence. Only John’s Gospel names Jesus as the Logos and declares that He existed long before time was measured. This Greek word carries a variety of meanings, all relating to the act of speaking. It could be translated “word,” a thought that comes to expression, message, declaration, reason, or the content of preaching; most are found in various translations. It is clear that John means that logos is declared to all creation.

John’s use of logos is unique and has often been rendered as “Word.” While this is a useful translation, even a casual understanding demonstrates that “Word” reflects only part of its meaning. Most readers will interpret “word” as a unit of language—a combination of sounds generally spoken but also written—that carries meaning. To understand what John means, readers need something more than their cultural understanding of “word”; they need a new way of thinking about it. This is why we have chosen to offer another rendering, an interpretive, poetic translation, of what may be one of the most theologically loaded words in Scripture. Since logos essentially refers to the act of speaking or bringing thoughts to expression, we have decided to use the word “voice” to capture that reality. John declares that truth has culminated in the person of Jesus. No single word captures the complete meaning of logos, but “voice” has a number of advantages.

First, “voice” manifests the act of speaking. Voice is that which is spoken and that which is heard; it comes on both sides of any communication event, bridging the gap between sender and receiver. John intends that in Jesus God is speaking and revealing Himself to the world.

Second, a voice is distinct and personal. We can distinguish people from one another simply by their voices. In John 10 Jesus describes the fact that the sheep hear the voice of the shepherd when he calls and they follow, but they refuse to follow a stranger because they do not know his voice (John 10:1-5). John desires that we know Jesus as the Son of God and believe in Him personally as the Good Shepherd.

Third, “voice” is dynamic in that it reflects the robust and powerful activity of a living God. It is historical in that any act of speaking comes to expression and takes place in the real world as a “voice” calling, demanding a response. It challenges any notion that the Christian faith can be reduced to rules, propositions, or doctrines that can be merely believed or dismissed and not lived out in our lives. Since in Jesus God is speaking and revealing Himself to the world, and since in Jesus we hear the Voice of God, then this new reality changes everything so we, too, must change.

In the beginning

Before time itself was measured, the Voice was speaking.

    The Voice was and is God.
This celestial Word remained ever present with the Creator;
    His speech shaped the entire cosmos.
Immersed in the practice of creating,
    all things that exist were birthed in Him.
His breath filled all things
    with a living, breathing light—
A light that thrives in the depths of darkness,
    blazes through murky bottoms.
It cannot and will not be quenched.

A man named John, who was sent by God, was the first to clearly articulate the source of this Light. This baptizer put in plain words the elusive mystery of the Divine Light so all might believe through him. Some wondered whether he might be the Light, but John was not the Light. He merely pointed to the Light. The true Light, who shines upon the heart of everyone, was coming into the cosmos.

John 1:10-18

Jesus as the Light does not call out from a distant place but draws near by coming into the world.

10 He entered our world, a world He made; yet the world did not recognize Him. 11 Even though He came to His own people, they refused to listen and receive Him. 12 But for all who did receive and trust in Him, He gave them the right to be reborn as children of God; 13 He bestowed this birthright not by human power or initiative but by God’s will.

14 The Voice took on flesh and became human and chose to live alongside us. We have seen Him, enveloped in undeniable splendor—the one true Son of the Father—evidenced in the perfect balance of grace and truth. 15 John the Baptist testified about Him and shouted, “This is the one I’ve been telling you is coming. He is much greater than I am because He existed long before me.” 16 Through this man we all receive gifts of grace beyond our imagination. 17 You see, Moses gave us rules to live by, but Jesus the Anointed offered us gifts of grace and truth. 18 God, unseen until now, is revealed in the Voice, God’s only Son, straight from the Father’s heart.

The Voice (VOICE)

The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.