Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)
3 Let us bless God, the father of our Lord Jesus, the Messiah! He has blessed us in the Messiah with every spirit-inspired blessing in the heavenly realm.
The choice and the plan
4 He chose us in him before the world was made, so as to be holy and irreproachable before him in love. 5 He foreordained us for himself, to be adopted as sons and daughters through Jesus the Messiah. That’s how he wanted it, and that’s what gave him delight, 6 so that the glory of his grace, the grace he poured on us in his beloved one, might receive its due praise.
7 In the Messiah, and through his blood, we have deliverance—that is, our sins have been forgiven—through the wealth of his grace 8 which he lavished on us. Yes, with all wisdom and insight 9 he has made known to us the secret of his purpose, just as he wanted it to be and set it forward in him 10 as a blueprint for when the time was ripe. His plan was to sum up the whole cosmos in the Messiah—yes, everything in heaven and on earth, in him.
The inheritance and the spirit
11 In him we have received the inheritance! We were foreordained to this, following the intention of the one who does all things in accordance with the counsel of his purpose. 12 This was so that we, we who first hoped in the Messiah, might live for the praise of his glory. 13 In him you too, who heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed it—in him you were marked out with the spirit of promise, the holy one. 14 The spirit is the guarantee of our inheritance, until the time when the people who are God’s special possession are finally reclaimed and freed. This, too, is for the praise of his glory.
The speculations of Herod
14 Jesus’ name became well known, and reached the ears of King Herod.
“It’s John the Baptist,” he said, “risen from the dead! That’s why these powers are at work in him.”
15 Other people said, “It’s Elijah!”
Others said, “He’s a prophet, like one of the old prophets.”
16 “No,” said Herod when he heard this. “It’s John. I cut off his head, and he’s been raised.”
Herod and John the Baptist
17 What had happened was this. Herod had married Herodias, his brother Philip’s wife. 18 John regularly told Herod it wasn’t right for him to take his brother’s wife; so Herod gave the word, arrested him and tied him up in prison. 19 Herodias kept up a grudge against him and wanted to kill him, but couldn’t; 20 Herod knew that John was a just and holy man, and he was afraid of him. So he protected him, and used to listen to him regularly. What he heard disturbed him greatly, and yet he enjoyed listening to him.
21 And then, one day, the moment came. There was a great party. It was Herod’s birthday, and he gave a feast for his leading retainers, militia officers, and the great and good of Galilee. 22 Herodias’s daughter came in and danced, and Herod and his guests were delighted.
“Tell me what you’d like,” said the king to the girl, “and I’ll give it you!”
23 He swore to her, over and over again, “Whatever you ask me, I’ll give it you—right up to half my kingdom!”
24 She went out, and said to her mother, “What shall I ask for?”
“The head of John the Baptist,” she replied.
25 So she went back at once to the king, all eager, and made her request: “I want you to give me, right now, on a dish—the head of John the Baptist!”
26 The king was distraught. But his oaths on the one hand, and his guests on the other, meant he hadn’t the guts to refuse her. 27 So he sent a jailer straight away with orders to bring John’s head. He went and beheaded him in the prison, 28 brought the head on a dish, and gave it to the girl. The girl gave it to her mother.
29 When John’s followers heard about it, they came and took his body, and buried it in a tomb.
Scripture quotations from The New Testament for Everyone are copyright © Nicholas Thomas Wright 2011, 2018, 2019.