Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)
13 You are the one who created my innermost parts;
you knit me together while I was still in my mother’s womb.
14 I give thanks to you that I was marvelously set apart.
Your works are wonderful—I know that very well.
15 My bones weren’t hidden from you
when I was being put together in a secret place,
when I was being woven together in the deep parts of the earth.
16 Your eyes saw my embryo,
and on your scroll every day was written that was being formed for me,[a]
before any one of them had yet happened.[b]
17 God, your plans are incomprehensible to me!
Their total number is countless!
18 If I tried to count them—they outnumber grains of sand!
If I came to the very end—I’d still be with you.[c]
3 Jacob sent messengers ahead of him to his brother Esau, toward the land of Seir, the open country of Edom. 4 He gave them these orders: “Say this to my master Esau. This is the message of your servant Jacob: ‘I’ve lived as an immigrant with Laban, where I’ve stayed till now. 5 I own cattle, donkeys, flocks, men servants, and women servants. I’m sending this message to my master now to ask that he[a] be kind.’”
6 The messengers returned to Jacob and said, “We went out to your brother Esau, and he’s coming to meet you with four hundred men.”
7 Jacob was terrified and felt trapped, so he divided the people with him, and the flocks, cattle, and camels, into two camps. 8 He thought, If Esau meets the first camp and attacks it, at least one camp will be left to escape.
9 Jacob said, “Lord, God of my father Abraham, God of my father Isaac, who said to me, ‘Go back to your country and your relatives, and I’ll make sure things go well for you,’ 10 I don’t deserve how loyal and truthful you’ve been to your servant. I went away across the Jordan with just my staff, but now I’ve become two camps. 11 Save me from my brother Esau! I’m afraid he will come and kill me, the mothers, and their children. 12 You were the one who told me, ‘I will make sure things go well for you, and I will make your descendants like the sand of the sea, so many you won’t be able to count them.’”
13 Jacob spent that night there. From what he had acquired, he set aside a gift for his brother Esau: 14 two hundred female goats and twenty male goats, two hundred ewes and twenty rams, 15 thirty nursing camels with their young, forty cows and ten bulls, and twenty female donkeys and ten male donkeys. 16 He separated these herds and gave them to his servants. He said to them, “Go ahead of me and put some distance between each of the herds.” 17 He ordered the first group, “When my brother Esau meets you and asks you, ‘Who are you with? Where are you going? And whose herds are these in front of you?’ 18 say, ‘They are your servant Jacob’s, a gift sent to my master Esau. And Jacob is actually right behind us.’” 19 He also ordered the second group, the third group, and everybody following the herds, “Say exactly the same thing to Esau when you find him. 20 Say also, ‘Your servant Jacob is right behind us.’” Jacob thought, I may be able to pacify Esau with the gift I’m sending ahead. When I meet him, perhaps he will be kind to me. 21 So Jacob sent the gift ahead of him, but he spent that night in the camp.
12 This calls for the endurance of the saints, who keep God’s commandments and keep faith with Jesus.
13 And I heard a voice from heaven say, “Write this: Favored are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.”
“Yes,” says the Spirit, “so they can rest from their labors, because their deeds follow them.”
Two harvests of the earth
14 Then I looked, and there was a white cloud. On the cloud was seated someone who looked like the Human One.[a] He had a gold crown on his head and a sharp sickle in his hand. 15 Another angel came out of the temple, calling in a loud voice to the one seated on the cloud: “Use your sickle to reap the harvest, for the time to harvest has come, and the harvest of the earth is ripe.” 16 So the one seated on the cloud swung his sickle over the earth, and the earth was harvested.
17 Then another angel came out of the temple in heaven, and he also had a sharp sickle. 18 Still another angel, who has power over fire, came out from the altar. He said in a loud voice to the one who had the sharp sickle, “Use your sharp sickle to cut the clusters in the vineyard of the earth, because its grapes are ripe.” 19 So the angel swung his sickle into the earth, and cut the vineyard of the earth, and he put what he reaped into the great winepress of God’s passionate anger. 20 Then the winepress was trampled outside the city, and the blood came out of the winepress as high as the horses’ bridles for almost two hundred miles.[b]
Copyright © 2011 by Common English Bible