Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

The Lord the Shepherd

A psalm of David.

³⁹ “‘This is what the Lord God says: People of Israel, go serve your idols for now. But later you will listen to me; you will not continue to dishonor my holy name with your gifts and gods. ⁴⁰ On my holy mountain, the high mountain of Israel, all Israel will serve me in the land, says the Lord God. There I will accept you. There I will expect your offerings, the first harvest of your offerings, and all your holy gifts. ⁴¹ I will accept you like the pleasing smell of sacrifices when I bring you out from the foreign nations and gather you from the lands where you are scattered. Then through you I will show how holy I am so the nations will see. ⁴² When I bring you into the land of Israel, the land I promised your ancestors, you will know that I am the Lord. ⁴³ There you will remember everything you did that made you unclean, and then you will hate yourselves for all the evil things you have done. ⁴⁴ I will deal with you for the sake of my name, not because of your evil ways or unclean actions. Then you will know I am the Lord, people of Israel, says the Lord God.’”

6 Then I watched while the Lamb opened the first of the seven seals. I heard one of the four living creatures say with a voice like thunder, “Come!” ² I looked, and there before me was a white horse. The rider on the horse held a bow, and he was given a crown, and he rode out, determined to win the victory.

³ When the Lamb opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!” ⁴ Then another horse came out, a red one. Its rider was given power to take away peace from the earth and to make people kill each other, and he was given a big sword.

⁵ When the Lamb opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature say, “Come!” I looked, and there before me was a black horse, and its rider held a pair of scales in his hand. ⁶ Then I heard something that sounded like a voice coming from the middle of the four living creatures. The voice said, “A quart of wheat for a day’s pay, and three quarts of barley for a day’s pay, and do not damage the olive oil and wine!”

⁷ When the Lamb opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature say, “Come!” ⁸ I looked, and there before me was a pale horse. Its rider was named death, and Hades^[a] was following close behind him. They were given power over a fourth of the earth to kill people by war, by starvation, by disease, and by the wild animals of the earth.

⁹ When the Lamb opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been killed because they were faithful to the word of God and to the message they had received. ¹⁰ These souls shouted in a loud voice, “Holy and true Lord, how long until you judge the people of the earth and punish them for killing us?” ¹¹ Then each one of them was given a white robe and was told to wait a short time longer. There were still some of their fellow servants and brothers and sisters in the service of Christ who must be killed as they were. They had to wait until all of this was finished.

¹² Then I watched while the Lamb opened the sixth seal, and there was a great earthquake. The sun became black like rough black cloth, and the whole moon became red like blood. ¹³ And the stars in the sky fell to the earth like figs falling from a fig tree when the wind blows. ¹⁴ The sky disappeared as a scroll when it is rolled up, and every mountain and island was moved from its place.

¹⁵ Then the kings of the earth, the rulers, the generals, the rich people, the powerful people, the slaves, and the free people hid themselves in caves and in the rocks on the mountains. ¹⁶ They called to the mountains and the rocks, “Fall on us. Hide us from the face of the One who sits on the throne and from the anger of the Lamb! ¹⁷ The great day for their anger has come, and who can stand against it?”

The 144,000 People of Israel

7 After the vision of these things I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth. The angels were holding the four winds of the earth to keep them from blowing on the land or on the sea or on any tree. ² Then I saw another angel coming up from the east who had the seal of the living God. And he called out in a loud voice to the four angels to whom God had given power to harm the earth and the sea. ³ He said to them, “Do not harm the land or the sea or the trees until we mark with a sign the foreheads of the people who serve our God.” ⁴ Then I heard how many people were marked with the sign. There were one hundred forty-four thousand from every tribe of the people of Israel.