Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

To the Overcomer, even to Jeduthun, A Psalm of David.

¹ ¶ I said, I will take heed to my ways that I sin not with my tongue: I will keep my mouth with a bit while the wicked is against me.

² I was dumb with silence; I held my peace, even from good; and my sorrow was stirred.

³ My heart was hot within me, while I was musing the fire burned; then I spoke with my tongue,

⁴ LORD, make me to know my end and the measure of my days, what it is that I may know how long I am to be of this world.

⁵ Behold, thou hast made my days as a handbreadth, and my age is as nothing before thee; verily every man that lives is altogether vanity. Selah.

⁶ Surely man walks in darkness; surely they are disquieted in vain; they heap up riches not knowing who shall gather them.

⁷ ¶ And now, Lord, what shall I wait for? My hope is in thee.

⁸ Deliver me from all my rebellions; do not make me the reproach of the foolish.

⁹ I was dumb, I opened not my mouth because thou didst it.

¹⁰ Remove thy stroke away from me: I am consumed by the blow of thine hand.

¹¹ When thou with chastening dost correct man for iniquity, thou makest his greatness to consume away like a moth; surely every man is vanity. Selah.

¹² Hear my prayer, O LORD, and give ear unto my cry; hold not thy peace at my tears: for I am a stranger with thee and a sojourner, as all my fathers were.

¹³ O spare me, that I may recover strength before I go from here and be no more.

17 ¶ And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,

² Son of man, propose a figure and compose an enigma unto the house of Israel

³ and say: Thus hath the Lord GOD said, A great eagle with great wings and long members, full of feathers of diverse colours, came unto Lebanon and took the highest branch of the cedar:

⁴ he cropped off the principal shoot and carried it into a land of markets; he set it in the city of the merchants.

⁵ He also took of the seed of the land and planted it in a fruitful field; he placed it by great waters and set it as a willow tree.

⁶ And it grew and became a vine of many branches, low of stature, whose branches looked at him, and its roots were under him: so it became a vine and brought forth branches and shot forth sprigs.

⁷ There was also another great eagle with great wings and many feathers; and, behold, this vine joined her roots toward him and extended her branches toward him that he might water it by the furrows of her plantation.

⁸ It was planted in a good soil by many waters that it might bring forth branches and that it might bear fruit, that it might be a goodly vine.

⁹ Say thou: Thus hath the Lord GOD said, Shall it be prospered? Shall he not pull it up its roots and destroy its fruit and let it wither? All of the leaves of her spring shall wither, even without great power or many people plucking it up by its roots.

¹⁰ Yea, behold, being planted, shall it be prospered? Shall it not utterly wither when the east wind touches it? It shall wither in the furrows where it grew.

¹² For as many as have sinned without law shall also perish without law, and as many as have sinned in the law shall be judged by the law

¹³ (for not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified;

¹⁴ for when the Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature that which is of the law, these, not having the law, are a law unto themselves;

¹⁵ which show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, accusing and also excusing their reasonings one with another)

¹⁶ in the day when God shall judge that which men have covered up, according to my gospel by Jesus, the Christ.