Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

Jerusalem the Site of God’s Presence

A song of ascents. Of David.^[a]

Esther’s Banquet

7 So the king and Haman went to dine^[a] with Queen Esther. ² And the king again said to Esther, on the second day while they were drinking,^[b] “What is your petition, Queen Esther? It will be given to you. What is your request? It will be given to you—even half the kingdom.” ³ Then Queen Esther answered, and she said, “If I have found favor in your eyes,^[c] O king, and if it is good to the king, let my life be given to me at my petition and my people at my request; ⁴ I and my people have been sold to be destroyed and killed, to be annihilated. If we had been sold as male and female slaves I would have kept quiet, because this^[d] is not a need sufficient to trouble the king.”^{[e] 5} And King Ahasuerus said to Queen Esther, “Who is he, and where is he, who gave himself the right to do this?”^{[f] 6} And Esther said, “The adversary and enemy is this evil Haman!” And Haman was terrified before the king and queen.

Haman is Hanged

⁷ The king rose in his anger from the banquet^[g] and went to the palace garden, and Haman stood to beg for his life from Queen Esther, for he realized that the king was determined to make an end to his life.^{[h] 8} And the king returned from the palace garden to the banquet hall,^[i] where Haman was lying prostrate on the couch that Esther was on, and the king said, “Will he also molest the queen with me in the house?” As the words^[j] went from the king’s mouth they covered Haman’s face. ⁹ And Habrona, one of the eunuchs in the presence of the king, said, “Look, the same gallows that Haman had prepared for Mordecai who spoke good for the sake of the king stands at Haman’s house, fifty cubits high.” And the king said, “Hang him on it.” ¹⁰ And they hanged Haman on the gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai, and the anger of the king was abated.

John’s Vision of the Son of Man

⁹ I, John, your brother and co-sharer in the affliction and kingdom and steadfastness in Jesus, was on the island called Patmos because of the word of God and the testimony about Jesus. ¹⁰ I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and I heard behind me a great sound like a trumpet ¹¹ saying, “What you see, write in a book and send it to the seven churches: to Ephesus and to Smyrna and to Pergamum and to Thyatira and to Sardis and to Philadelphia and to Laodicea.”

¹² And I turned to see the voice which was speaking with me, and when I^[a] turned, I saw seven gold lampstands, ¹³ and in the midst of the lampstands one like a son of man, dressed in a robe reaching to the feet and girded around his^[b] chest with a golden belt, ¹⁴ and his head and hair were white like wool, white as snow, and his eyes were like a fiery flame, ¹⁵ and his feet were like fine bronze when it has been fired in a furnace, and his voice was like the sound of many waters, ¹⁶ and he had in his right hand seven stars, and a sharp double-edged sword coming out of his mouth, and his face was like the sun shining in its strength.

¹⁷ And when I saw him, I fell at his feet like a dead person, and he placed his right hand on me, saying, “Do not be afraid! I am the first and the last, ¹⁸ and the one who lives, and I was dead, and behold, I am living forever and ever^[c], and I hold the keys of death and of Hades. ¹⁹ Therefore, write the things which you saw, and the things which are, and the things which are about to take place after these things. ²⁰ As for the mystery of the seven stars which you saw in my right hand and the seven gold lampstands—the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands are the seven churches.