Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

(A song by David for worship.)

Thanking the Lord for Victory

The Water Goes Down

8 God did not forget about Noah and the animals with him in the boat. So God made a wind blow, and the water started going down. ² God stopped up the places where the water had been gushing out from under the earth. He also closed up the sky, and the rain stopped. ³ For 150 days the water slowly went down. ⁴ Then on the seventeenth day of the seventh month of the year, the boat came to rest somewhere in the Ararat mountains. ⁵ The water kept going down, and the mountain tops could be seen on the first day of the tenth month.

^6-7 Forty days later Noah opened a window to send out a raven, but it kept flying around until the water had dried up. ⁸ Noah wanted to find out if the water had gone down, so he sent out a dove. ⁹ Deep water was still everywhere, and when the dove could not find a place to land, it flew back to the boat. Then Noah held out his hand and helped it back in.

¹⁰ Seven days later Noah sent the dove out again. ¹¹ It returned in the evening, holding in its beak a green leaf from an olive tree. Noah knew the water was finally going down. ¹² He waited seven more days before sending the dove out again, and this time it did not return.

¹³ Noah was now 601 years old. And by the first day of that year, almost all the water had gone away. Noah made an opening in the roof of the boat^[a] and saw that the ground was getting dry. ¹⁴ By the twenty-seventh day of the second month, the earth was completely dry.

¹⁵ God said to Noah, ¹⁶ “You, your wife, your sons, and your daughters-in-law may now leave the boat. ¹⁷ Let out the birds, animals, and reptiles, so they can mate and live all over the earth.” ¹⁸ After Noah and his family had left the boat, ¹⁹ the living creatures left in groups of their own kind.

Dead to Sin but Alive because of Christ

6 What should we say? Should we keep on sinning, so that God's gift of undeserved grace will show up even better? ² No, we should not! If we are dead to sin, how can we go on sinning? ³ Don't you know that all who share in Christ Jesus by being baptized also share in his death? ^4 (A) When we were baptized, we died and were buried with Christ. We were baptized, so we would live a new life, as Christ was raised to life by the glory of God the Father.

⁵ If we shared in Jesus' death by being baptized, we will be raised to life with him. ⁶ We know that the persons we used to be were nailed to the cross with Jesus. This was done, so our sinful bodies would no longer be the slaves of sin. ⁷ We know sin doesn't have power over dead people.

⁸ As surely as we died with Christ, we believe we will also live with him. ⁹ We know that death no longer has any power over Christ. He died and was raised to life, never again to die. ¹⁰ When Christ died, he died for sin once and for all. But now he is alive, and he lives only for God. ¹¹ In the same way, you must think of yourselves as dead to the power of sin. But Christ Jesus has given life to you, and you live for God.