Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

Greetings and thanksgiving

1 Paul, Silvanus and Timothy, to the assembly of Thessalonians in God our father and the Lord Jesus, the Messiah: ² grace to you and peace from God our father and the Lord Jesus, the Messiah.

³ We owe God a constant debt of gratitude concerning you, my dear family. It is only right and proper. Your faith is growing marvelously, and the love which every single one of you has for each other is multiplying. ⁴ As a result, we ourselves can tell all the churches of God how proud we are of you—of your patience and loyalty in all your troubles, and in all the sufferings you are going through.

¹¹ To that end we always pray for you, that our God may make you worthy of his call, and may complete every plan he has to do you good, and every work of faith in power, ¹² so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in him, according to the grace of our God and of the Lord Jesus, the Messiah.

The calling of Zacchaeus

19 They went into Jericho and passed through. ² There was a man named Zacchaeus, a chief tax-collector, who was very rich. ³ He was trying to see who Jesus was, but, being a small man, he couldn’t, because of the crowd. ⁴ So he ran on ahead, along the route Jesus was going to take, and climbed up into a sycamore tree to see him.

⁵ When Jesus came to the place, he looked up. “Zacchaeus,” he said to him, “hurry up and come down. I have to stay at your house today.” ⁶ So he hurried up, came down, and welcomed him with joy.

⁷ Everybody began to murmur when they saw it. “He’s gone in to spend time with a proper old sinner!” they were saying.

⁸ But Zacchaeus stood there and addressed the master.

“Look, Master,” he said, “I’m giving half my property to the poor. And if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I’m giving it back to them four times over.”

⁹ “Today,” said Jesus, “salvation has come to this house, because he too is a son of Abraham. ¹⁰ You see, the son of man came to seek and to save the lost.”