Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

Psalm 52

To the Chief Musician. A skillful song, or a didactic or reflective poem. [A Psalm] of David, when Doeg the Edomite came and told Saul, David has come to the house of Ahimelech.

¹ Why boast you of mischief done against the loving-kindness of God [and the godly], O mighty [sinful] man, day after day?

² Your tongue devises wickedness; it is like a sharp razor, working deceitfully.

³ You love evil more than good, and lying rather than to speak righteousness, justice, and right. Selah [pause, and calmly think of that]!

⁴ You love all destroying and devouring words, O deceitful tongue.

⁵ God will likewise break you down and destroy you forever; He will lay hold of you and pluck you out of your tent and uproot you from the land of the living. Selah [pause, and calmly think of that]!

⁶ The [uncompromisingly] righteous also shall see [it] and be in reverent fear and awe, but about you they will [scoffingly] laugh, saying,

⁷ See, this is the man who made not God his strength (his stronghold and high tower) but trusted in and confidently relied on the abundance of his riches, seeking refuge and security for himself through his wickedness.

⁸ But I am like a green olive tree in the house of God; I trust in and confidently rely on the loving-kindness and the mercy of God forever and ever.

⁹ I will thank You and confide in You forever, because You have done it [delivered me and kept me safe]. I will wait on, hope in and expect in Your name, for it is good, in the presence of Your saints (Your kind and pious ones).

6 Woe to those who are at ease in Zion and to those on the mountain of Samaria who are careless and feel secure, the notable men of the chief [because chosen by God] of the nations, to whom the house of Israel comes!^(A)

² Pass over to Calneh and see, and from there go to Hamath the great [city, north of Damascus]; then go down to Gath of the Philistines. Are they better than these [your] kingdoms? Or are their boundaries greater than your boundaries,

³ O you who put far away the evil day [of punishment], yet cause the sitting of violence [upon you] to come near?

⁴ Woe to those who lie upon beds of ivory and stretch themselves upon their couches, and eat the lambs out of the flock and the calves out of the midst of the stall,

⁵ Who sing idle songs to the sound of the harp and invent for themselves instruments of music like David’s,^(B)

⁶ Who drink wine in bowls and anoint themselves with the finest oils, but are not grieved and sick at heart over the affliction and ruin of Joseph (Israel)!^(C)

⁷ Therefore now shall they go captive with the first who go into exile, and the revelry and banqueting of those who stretch themselves shall be ended.

⁸ The Lord God has sworn by Himself—the Lord, the God of hosts, says: I abhor, reject, and despise the pride and false, futile glory of Jacob (Israel), and I hate his palaces and strongholds; and I will deliver up the city [idol-worshiping Samaria] with all that is in it.

⁹ And it shall come to pass that if there remain ten men in one house, they shall die [by the pestilence that comes with war].

¹⁰ And then a man’s uncle or kinsman, he who is to make a burning to cremate and dispose [of his pestilence-infected body], comes in to bring the bones out of the house, and he shall say to another still alive in the farthest parts of the house, Is there anyone else with you? and he shall say, No. Then shall the newcomer say, Hush! Hold your [cursing] tongue! We dare not so mention the name of the Lord [lest we invoke more punishment].^(D)

¹¹ For behold, the Lord commands and He will smite the great house into ruins and the little house into fragments.

¹² Do horses run upon rocks? Do men plow the ocean with oxen? But you have turned justice into [the poison of] gall and the fruit of righteousness into [the bitterness of] wormwood—

¹³ You who rejoice in Lo-debar [a thing of nought], who say, Have we not by our own strength taken Karnaim or horns [of resistance] for ourselves?

¹⁴ For behold, I will raise up against you a nation, O house of Israel, says the Lord, the God of hosts; and they shall afflict and oppress you [to the entire limits of Israel] from the entrance of Hamath to the brook of the Arabah.

⁴ And when a very great throng was gathering together and people from town after town kept coming to Jesus, He said in a parable:

⁵ A sower went out to sow seed; and as he sowed, some fell along the traveled path and was trodden underfoot, and the birds of the air ate it up.

⁶ And some [seed] fell on the rock, and as soon as it sprouted, it withered away because it had no moisture.

⁷ And other [seed] fell in the midst of the thorns, and the thorns grew up with it and choked it [off].

⁸ And some seed fell into good soil, and grew up and yielded a crop a hundred times [as great]. As He said these things, He called out, He who has ears to hear, let him be listening and let him ^[a]consider and understand by hearing!

⁹ And when His disciples asked Him the meaning of this parable,

¹⁰ He said to them, To you it has been given to [come progressively to] know (to recognize and understand more strongly and clearly) the mysteries and secrets of the kingdom of God, but for others they are in parables, so that, [though] looking, they may not see; and hearing, they may not comprehend.^(A)