Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

For the choir director; by David.

¹⁵ he began to line the inside walls of the temple with cedar boards. He paneled the inside of the temple with wood from floor to ceiling. He covered the floor of the temple with cypress planks.

¹⁶ He sectioned off a 30-foot-long room at the rear of the temple with cedar boards from the floor to the rafters. He built it to serve as an inner room, the most holy place. ¹⁷ The 60-foot-long room at the front of the temple served as the main hall. ¹⁸ Gourds and flowers were carved into the cedar paneling inside the temple. Everything was ⌞covered with⌟ cedar. No stone could be seen.

¹⁹ He prepared the inner room of the temple in order to put the ark of the Lord’s promise there. ²⁰ The inner room was 30 feet long, 30 feet wide, and 30 feet high. Solomon covered it and the cedar altar with pure gold. ²¹ He covered the inside of the temple with pure gold. He put golden chains across the front of the inner room which was covered with gold. ²² He covered the entire inside of the temple with gold. He also covered the entire altar in the inner room with gold.

²³ In the inner room he made two 15-foot-tall angels ^[a] out of olive wood. ²⁴ Each wing of the angels was 7½ feet long. The distance from the tip of one wing to the tip of the other was 15 feet. ²⁵ Both angels had a 15-foot ⌞wingspan⌟. Both had the same measurements and the same shape. ²⁶ Each was 15 feet high. ²⁷ Solomon put the angels in the inner room of the temple. The wings of the angels extended so that the wing of one of the angels touched the one wall, and the wing of the other touched the other wall. Their remaining wings touched each other in the center of the room. ²⁸ He covered the angels with gold.

²⁹ He carved angels, palm trees, and flowers into the walls all around the inner and outer rooms of the temple. ³⁰ He covered the floor of the inner and outer rooms of the temple with gold.

³¹ He made doors for the entrance to the inner room out of olive wood. The doorposts had five sides. ³² The two doors were ⌞made out of⌟ olive wood. He carved angels, palm trees, and flowers into them and covered them with gold. The gold was hammered onto the angels and the palm trees.

³³ In the same way he made square doorposts out of olive wood for the temple’s entrance. ³⁴ He made two doors from cypress. Each of the doors had two folding panels. ³⁵ On them he carved angels, palm trees, and flowers. He evenly covered them with gold.

³⁶ He built the inner courtyard with three courses of finished stones and a course of finished cedar beams.

³⁷ In the month of Ziv of the fourth year of Solomon’s reign, the foundation of the Lord’s temple was laid. ³⁸ In the month of Bul (the eighth month) of the eleventh year ⌞of his reign⌟, the temple was finished according to all its plans and specifications. He spent seven years building it.

¹⁶ You didn’t choose me, but I chose you. I have appointed you to go, to produce fruit that will last, and to ask the Father in my name to give you whatever you ask for. ¹⁷ Love each other. This is what I’m commanding you to do.

¹⁸ “If the world hates you, realize that it hated me before it hated you. ¹⁹ If you had anything in common with the world, the world would love you as one of its own. But you don’t have anything in common with the world. I chose you from the world, and that’s why the world hates you. ²⁰ Remember what I told you: ‘A servant isn’t greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they did what I said, they will also do what you say. ²¹ Indeed, they will do all this to you because you are committed to me, since they don’t know the one who sent me. ²² If I hadn’t come and spoken to them, they wouldn’t have any sin. But now they have no excuse for their sin. ²³ The person who hates me also hates my Father. ²⁴ If I hadn’t done among them what no one else has done, they wouldn’t have any sin. But now they have seen and hated both me and my Father. ²⁵ In this way what is written in their Scriptures has come true: ‘They hate me for no reason.’