Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

71 Lord, you are my refuge! Don’t let me down! ² Save me from my enemies, for you are just! Rescue me! Bend down your ear and listen to my plea and save me. ³ Be to me a great protecting Rock, where I am always welcome, safe from all attacks. For you have issued the order to save me. ⁴ Rescue me, O God, from these unjust and cruel men. ⁵ O Lord, you alone are my hope; I’ve trusted you from childhood. ⁶ Yes, you have been with me from birth and have helped me constantly—no wonder I am always praising you!

6 Run, people of Benjamin, run for your lives! Flee from Jerusalem! Sound the alarm in Tekoa; send up a smoke signal at Beth-haccherem; warn everyone that a powerful army is on the way from the north, coming to destroy this nation! ² Helpless as a girl, you are beautiful and delicate—and doomed. ³ Evil shepherds shall surround you. They shall set up camp around the city and divide your pastures for their flocks. ⁴ See them prepare for battle. At noon it has begun. All afternoon it rages until the evening shadows fall. ⁵ “Come,” they say. “Let us attack by night and destroy her palaces!”

⁶ For the Lord Almighty has said to them, Cut down her trees for battering rams; smash down the walls of Jerusalem. This is the city to be punished, for she is vile through and through. ⁷ She spouts evil like a fountain! Her streets echo with the sounds of violence; her sickness and wounds are ever before me.

⁸ This is your last warning, O Jerusalem. If you don’t listen, I will empty the land. ⁹ Disaster on disaster shall befall you. Even the few who remain in Israel shall be gleaned again, the Lord Almighty has said; for as a grape-gatherer checks each vine to pick what he has missed, so the remnant of my people shall be destroyed again.

¹⁰ But who will listen when I warn them? Their ears are closed, and they refuse to hear. The word of God has angered them; they don’t want it at all.

¹¹ For all this I am full of the wrath of God against them. I am weary of holding it in. I will pour it out over Jerusalem, even upon the children playing in the streets, upon the gatherings of young men, and on husbands and wives and grandparents. ¹² Their enemies shall live in their homes and take their fields and wives. For I will punish the people of this land, the Lord has said. ¹³ They are swindlers and liars, from the least of them right to the top! Yes, even my prophets and priests! ¹⁴ You can’t heal a wound by saying it’s not there! Yet the priests and prophets give assurances of peace when all is war. ¹⁵ Were my people ashamed when they worshiped idols? No, not at all—they didn’t even blush. Therefore they shall lie among the slain. They shall die beneath my anger.

¹⁶ Yet the Lord pleads with you still: Ask where the good road is, the godly paths you used to walk in, in the days of long ago. Travel there, and you will find rest for your souls. But you reply, “No, that is not the road we want!” ¹⁷ I set watchmen over you who warned you: “Listen for the sound of the trumpet! It will let you know when trouble comes.” But you said, “No! We won’t pay any attention!”

^18-19 This, then, is my decree against my people: (Listen to it, distant lands; listen to it, O my people in Jerusalem; listen to it, all the earth!) I will bring evil upon this people; it will be the fruit of their own sin because they will not listen to me. They reject my law.

³ If you want to keep from becoming fainthearted and weary, think about his patience as sinful men did such terrible things to him. ⁴ After all, you have never yet struggled against sin and temptation until you sweat great drops of blood.

⁵ And have you quite forgotten the encouraging words God spoke to you, his child? He said, “My son, don’t be angry when the Lord punishes you. Don’t be discouraged when he has to show you where you are wrong. ⁶ For when he punishes you, it proves that he loves you. When he whips you, it proves you are really his child.”

⁷ Let God train you, for he is doing what any loving father does for his children. Whoever heard of a son who was never corrected? ⁸ If God doesn’t punish you when you need it, as other fathers punish their sons, then it means that you aren’t really God’s son at all—that you don’t really belong in his family. ⁹ Since we respect our fathers here on earth, though they punish us, should we not all the more cheerfully submit to God’s training so that we can begin really to live?

¹⁰ Our earthly fathers trained us for a few brief years, doing the best for us that they knew how, but God’s correction is always right and for our best good, that we may share his holiness. ¹¹ Being punished isn’t enjoyable while it is happening—it hurts! But afterwards we can see the result, a quiet growth in grace and character.

¹² So take a new grip with your tired hands, stand firm on your shaky legs, ¹³ and mark out a straight, smooth path for your feet so that those who follow you, though weak and lame, will not fall and hurt themselves but become strong.

¹⁴ Try to stay out of all quarrels, and seek to live a clean and holy life, for one who is not holy will not see the Lord. ¹⁵ Look after each other so that not one of you will fail to find God’s best blessings. Watch out that no bitterness takes root among you, for as it springs up it causes deep trouble, hurting many in their spiritual lives. ¹⁶ Watch out that no one becomes involved in sexual sin or becomes careless about God as Esau did: he traded his rights as the oldest son for a single meal. ¹⁷ And afterwards, when he wanted those rights back again, it was too late, even though he wept bitter tears of repentance. So remember, and be careful.