Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

The Justice of the Law of the Lord

The Lord's Reply

^5 (A)Then the Lord said to his people, “Keep watching the nations around you, and you will be astonished at what you see. I am going to do something that you will not believe when you hear about it. ^6 (B)I am bringing the Babylonians to power, those fierce, restless people. They are marching out across the world to conquer other lands. ⁷ They spread fear and terror, and in their pride they are a law to themselves.

⁸ “Their horses are faster than leopards, fiercer than hungry wolves. Their cavalry troops come riding from distant lands; their horses paw the ground. They come swooping down like eagles attacking their prey.

⁹ “Their armies advance in violent conquest, and everyone is terrified as they approach.^[a] Their captives are as numerous as grains of sand. ¹⁰ They treat kings with contempt and laugh at high officials. No fortress can stop them—they pile up earth against it and capture it. ¹¹ Then they sweep on like the wind and are gone, these men whose power is their god.”

Habakkuk Complains to the Lord Again

¹² Lord, from the very beginning you are God. You are my God, holy and eternal. Lord, my God and protector, you have chosen the Babylonians and made them strong so that they can punish us. ¹³ But how can you stand these treacherous, evil men? Your eyes are too holy to look at evil, and you cannot stand the sight of people doing wrong. So why are you silent while they destroy people who are more righteous than they are?

¹⁴ How can you treat people like fish or like a swarm of insects that have no ruler to direct them? ¹⁵ The Babylonians catch people with hooks, as though they were fish. They drag them off in nets and shout for joy over their catch! ¹⁶ They even worship their nets and offer sacrifices to them, because their nets provide them with the best of everything.

¹⁷ Are they going to use their swords forever and keep on destroying nations without mercy?

1 From Simon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ—

To those who through the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ have been given a faith as precious as ours:

² May grace and peace be yours in full measure through your knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.

God's Call and Choice

³ God's divine power has given us everything we need to live a truly religious life through our knowledge of the one who called us to share in his own^[a] glory and goodness. ⁴ In this way he has given us the very great and precious gifts he promised, so that by means of these gifts you may escape from the destructive lust that is in the world, and may come to share the divine nature. ⁵ For this very reason do your best to add goodness to your faith; to your goodness add knowledge; ⁶ to your knowledge add self-control; to your self-control add endurance; to your endurance add godliness; ⁷ to your godliness add Christian affection; and to your Christian affection add love. ⁸ These are the qualities you need, and if you have them in abundance, they will make you active and effective in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. ⁹ But if you do not have them, you are so shortsighted that you cannot see and have forgotten that you have been purified from your past sins.

¹⁰ So then, my friends, try even harder to make God's call and his choice of you a permanent experience; if you do so, you will never abandon your faith.^{[b] 11} In this way you will be given the full right to enter the eternal Kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.