Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)
Psalm 121
The Lord Our Protector
A song of ascents.
1 I lift my eyes toward the mountains.
Where will my help come from?(A)
2 My help comes from the Lord,
the Maker of heaven and earth.(B)
3 He will not allow your foot to slip;
your Protector will not slumber.(C)
4 Indeed, the Protector of Israel
does not slumber or sleep.(D)
14 “This day is to be a memorial for you, and you must celebrate it as a festival to the Lord. You are to celebrate it throughout your generations as a permanent statute.(A) 15 You must eat unleavened bread for seven days. On the first day you must remove yeast(B) from your houses. Whoever eats what is leavened from the first day through the seventh day must be cut off(C) from Israel. 16 You are to hold a sacred assembly(D) on the first day and another sacred assembly on the seventh day. No work may be done on those days except for preparing what people need to eat—you may do only that.
17 “You are to observe the Festival of Unleavened Bread because on this very day I brought your military divisions out of the land of Egypt.(E) You must observe this day throughout your generations as a permanent statute. 18 You are to eat unleavened bread in the first month,(F) from the evening of the fourteenth day of the month until the evening of the twenty-first day. 19 Yeast must not be found in your houses for seven days. If anyone eats something leavened, that person, whether a resident alien or native of the land, must be cut off from the community of Israel. 20 Do not eat anything leavened; eat unleavened bread in all your homes.”[a]
21 Then Moses summoned all the elders of Israel and said to them, “Go, select an animal from the flock according to your families, and slaughter the Passover animal.(G) 22 Take a cluster of hyssop, dip it in the blood(H) that is in the basin, and brush the lintel and the two doorposts with some of the blood in the basin. None of you may go out the door of his house until morning. 23 When the Lord passes through to strike Egypt and sees the blood on the lintel and the two doorposts, he will pass over the door and not let the destroyer enter your houses to strike you.(I)
24 “Keep this command permanently as a statute for you and your descendants. 25 When you enter the land that the Lord will give you as he promised, you are to observe this ceremony. 26 When your children(J) ask you, ‘What does this ceremony mean to you?’ 27 you are to reply, ‘It is the Passover sacrifice(K) to the Lord, for he passed over the houses of the Israelites in Egypt when he struck the Egyptians, and he spared our homes.’” So the people knelt low and worshiped. 28 Then the Israelites went and did this; they did just as the Lord had commanded Moses and Aaron.
A Call to Good Works
11 Dear friends, I urge you as strangers and exiles(A) to abstain(B) from sinful(C) desires that wage war against the soul.(D) 12 Conduct(E) yourselves honorably among the Gentiles,[a] so that when they slander you as evildoers, they will observe your good works and will glorify God on the day he visits.(F)
13 Submit(G) to every human authority because of the Lord, whether to the emperor[b] as the supreme authority(H) 14 or to governors as those sent out by him to punish those who do what is evil and to praise those who do what is good. 15 For it is God’s will(I) that you silence the ignorance(J) of foolish people by doing good. 16 Submit as free people, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil,(K) but as God’s slaves.(L) 17 Honor everyone. Love(M) the brothers and sisters.(N) Fear God.(O) Honor the emperor.
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