Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)
Former Times of Help and Present Troubles.
To the Chief Musician. A Psalm of the sons of Korah. A skillful song, or a didactic or reflective poem.
44 We have heard with our ears, O God,
Our fathers have told us
The work You did in their days,
In the days of old.
2
You drove out the [pagan] nations with Your own hand;
Then you planted and established them (Israel);
[It was by Your power that] You uprooted the [pagan] peoples,
Then You spread them abroad.
3
For our fathers did not possess the land [of Canaan] by their own sword,
Nor did their own arm save them,
But Your right hand and Your arm and the light of Your presence,
Because You favored and delighted in them.
4
You are my King, O God;
Command victories and deliverance for Jacob (Israel).
5
Through You we will gore our enemies [like a bull];
Through Your name we will trample down those who rise up against us.
6
For I will not trust in my bow,
Nor will my sword save me.
7
But You have saved us from our enemies,
And You have put them to shame and humiliated those who hate us.
8
In God we have boasted all the day long,
And we will praise and give thanks to Your name forever. Selah.
9
But now You have rejected us and brought us to dishonor,
And You do not go out with our armies [to lead us to victory].
10
You make us turn back from the enemy,
And those who hate us have taken spoil for themselves.
11
You have made us like sheep to be eaten [as mutton]
And have scattered us [in exile] among the nations.
12
You sell Your people cheaply,
And have not increased Your wealth by their sale.
13
You have made us the reproach and taunt of our neighbors,
A scoffing and a derision to those around us.
14
You make us a byword among the nations,
A [a]laughingstock among the people.
15
My dishonor is before me all day long,
And humiliation has covered my face,
16
Because of the voice of the taunter and reviler,
Because of the presence of the enemy and the avenger.
17
All this has come upon us, yet we have not forgotten You,
Nor have we been false to Your covenant [which You made with our fathers].
18
Our heart has not turned back,
Nor have our steps wandered from Your path,
19
Yet You have [distressingly] crushed us in the place of jackals
And covered us with [the deep darkness of] the shadow of death.
20
If we had forgotten the name of our God
Or stretched out our hands to a strange god,
21
Would not God discover this?
For He knows the secrets of the heart.
22
[b]But for Your sake we are killed all the day long;
We are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.(A)
23
Awake! Why do You sleep, O Lord?
Awaken, do not reject us forever.
24
Why do You hide Your face
And forget our affliction and our oppression?
25
For our life has melted away into the dust;
Our body clings to the ground.
26
Rise up! Come be our help,
And ransom us for the sake of Your steadfast love.
Restoration of Israel
14
“Therefore, behold, I will allure Israel
And bring her into the wilderness,
And I will speak tenderly to her [to reconcile her to Me].
15
“Then I will give her her vineyards from there,
And make the Valley of Achor a door of hope and expectation [anticipating the time when I will restore My favor on her].
And she will sing there and respond as in the days of her youth
As in the day when she came up from the land of Egypt.(A)
16
“It shall come about in that day,” says the Lord,
“That you will call Me Ishi (my husband)
And will no longer call Me Baali (my [a]Baal).
17
“For I will remove the names of the Baals from her mouth,
So that they will no longer be mentioned or remembered by their names.(B)
18
“And in that day I will make a covenant for Israel
With the animals of the open country
And with the birds of the heavens
And with the creeping things of the ground.
And I will abolish the bow and the sword and [banish] war from the land
And will make them lie down in safety.
19
“And I will betroth you (Israel) to Me forever;
Yes, I will betroth you to Me in righteousness and in justice,
In lovingkindness and loyalty, and in compassion.
20
“I will betroth you to Me in stability and in faithfulness.
Then you will know (recognize, appreciate) the Lord [and respond with loving faithfulness].
21
“It will come about in that day that I will respond,” says the Lord.
“I will respond to the heavens [which ask for rain to pour on the earth], and they will respond to the earth [which begs for the rain],
22
And the earth shall respond to the grain and the new wine and the oil [which beg it to bring them forth],
And they will respond to Jezreel [My Israel, who will now be restored].
23
“I will sow her for Myself in the land.
I will also have mercy on her who had not obtained mercy;
And I will say to those who were not My people,
‘You are My people,’
And they will say, ‘You are my God!’”(C)
Hosea’s Second Symbolic Marriage
3 Then the Lord said to me, “Go again, love a woman ([b]Gomer) who is beloved by her husband and yet is an adulteress, even as the Lord loves the [c]children of Israel, though they turn to other gods and love the raisin cakes [used in the feasts in pagan worship].” 2 So I bought her for myself for [d]fifteen pieces of silver and a homer and a half of barley [the price of a common slave]. 3 And I said to her, “You shall stay with me for many days. You shall not play the prostitute nor shall you have a man; so I will also be toward you [until you have proved your faithfulness].” 4 For the sons of Israel will remain for many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or [idolatrous] pillar, and without [e]ephod or teraphim (household idols). 5 Afterward the sons of Israel will return [in deep repentance] and seek the Lord their God and [seek from the line of] David their king [the King of kings—the Messiah]; and they will come trembling to the Lord and to His goodness and blessing in the last days.(D)
16 Therefore let no one judge you in regard to food and drink or in regard to [the observance of] a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath day. 17 Such things are only a shadow of what is to come and they have only symbolic value; but the substance [the reality of what is foreshadowed] belongs to Christ. 18 Let no one defraud you of your prize [your freedom in Christ and your salvation] by insisting on mock humility and the worship of angels, going into detail about visions [he claims] he has seen [to justify his authority], puffed up [in conceit] by his unspiritual mind, 19 and not holding fast to the head [of the body, Jesus Christ], from whom the entire body, supplied and knit together by its joints and ligaments, grows with the growth [that can come only] from God.
20 If you have died with Christ to the [a]elementary principles of the world, why, as if you were still living in the world, do you submit to rules and regulations, such as, 21 “Do not handle [this], do not taste [that], do not [even] touch!”? 22 (these things all perish with use)—in accordance with the commandments and teachings of men.(A) 23 These practices indeed have the appearance [that popularly passes as that] of wisdom in self-made religion and mock humility and severe treatment of the body (asceticism), but are of no value against sinful indulgence [because they do not honor God].
Put On the New Self
3 Therefore if you have been raised with Christ [to a new life, sharing in His resurrection from the dead], keep seeking the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.(B)
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