Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)
Psalm 50
A Psalm of [a]Asaph.
1 The Mighty One, God, the Lord, speaks and calls the earth from the rising of the sun to its setting.
2 Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God shines forth.
3 Our God comes and does not keep silence; a fire devours before Him, and round about Him a mighty tempest rages.
4 He calls to the heavens above and to the earth, that He may judge His people:
5 Gather together to Me My saints [those who have found grace in My sight], those who have made a covenant with Me by sacrifice.
6 And the heavens declare His righteousness (rightness and justice), for God, He is judge. Selah [pause, and calmly think of that]!
7 Hear, O My people, and I will speak; O Israel, I will testify to you and against you: I am God, your God.
8 I do not reprove you for your sacrifices; your burnt offerings are continually before Me.
22 Now consider this, you who forget God, lest I tear you in pieces, and there be none to deliver.
23 He who brings an offering of praise and thanksgiving honors and glorifies Me; and he who orders his way aright [who prepares the way that I may show him], to him I will demonstrate the salvation of God.
2 Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth! For the Lord has spoken: I have nourished and brought up sons and have made them great and exalted, but they have rebelled against Me and broken away from Me.
3 The ox [instinctively] knows his owner, and the donkey his master’s crib, but Israel does not know or recognize Me [as Lord], My people do not consider or understand.
4 Ah, sinful nation, a people loaded with iniquity, offspring of evildoers, sons who deal corruptly! They have forsaken the Lord, they have despised and shown contempt and provoked the Holy One of Israel to anger, they have become utterly estranged (alienated).
5 Why should you be stricken and punished any more [since it brings no correction]? You will revolt more and more. The whole head is sick, and the whole heart is faint (feeble, sick, and nauseated).
6 From the sole of the foot even to the head there is no soundness or health in [the nation’s body]—but wounds and bruises and fresh and bleeding stripes; they have not been pressed out and closed up or bound up or softened with oil. [No one has troubled to seek a remedy.]
7 [Because of your detestable disobedience] your country lies desolate, your cities are burned with fire; your land—strangers devour it in your very presence, and it is desolate, as overthrown by aliens.
8 And the Daughter of Zion [Jerusalem] is left like a [deserted] booth in a vineyard, like a lodge in a garden of cucumbers, like a besieged city [spared, but in the midst of desolation].
9 Except the Lord of hosts had left us a very small remnant [of survivors], we should have been like Sodom, and we should have been like Gomorrah.(A)
21 How the faithful city has become an [idolatrous] harlot, she who was full of justice! Uprightness and right standing with God [once] lodged in her—but now murderers.
22 Your silver has become dross, your wine is mixed with water.
23 Your princes are rebels and companions of thieves; everyone loves bribes and runs after compensation and rewards. They judge not for the fatherless nor defend them, neither does the cause of the widow come to them [for they delay or turn a deaf ear].
19 Do not [a]gather and heap up and store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust and worm consume and destroy, and where thieves break through and steal.
20 But [b]gather and heap up and store for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust nor worm consume and destroy, and where thieves do not break through and steal;
21 For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.
22 The eye is the lamp of the body. So if your eye is sound, your entire body will be full of light.
23 But if your eye is unsound, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the very light in you [your [c]conscience] is darkened, how dense is that darkness!
24 No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will stand by and be devoted to the one and despise and be [d]against the other. You cannot serve God and mammon ([e]deceitful riches, money, possessions, or [f]whatever is trusted in).
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