Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)
18 Oh, that I [Jeremiah] could comfort myself against sorrow, [for my grief is beyond healing], my heart is sick and faint within me!
19 Behold [says the prophet, listen to the voice of] the cry of the daughter of my people [for help] because of those who dwell in a far country: Is not the Lord in Zion? Is not her King in her? [But the Lord answers] Why have they provoked Me to anger with their carved images and with foreign idols?
20 The harvest is past, the summer has ended and the gathering of fruit is over, yet we are not saved! [comes again the voice of the people.]
21 For the hurt of the daughter of my people am I [Jeremiah] hurt; I go around mourning; dismay has taken hold on me.
22 Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why then is not the health of the daughter of my people restored? [Because Zion no longer enjoyed the presence of the Great Physician!](A)
9 Oh, that my head were waters and my eyes a reservoir of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people!
Psalm 79
A Psalm of Asaph.
1 O God, the nations have come into [the land of Your people] Your inheritance; Your sacred temple have they defiled; they have made Jerusalem heaps of ruins.
2 The dead bodies of Your servants they have given as food to the birds of the heavens, the flesh of Your saints to the beasts of the earth.
3 Their blood they have poured out like water round about Jerusalem, and there was none to bury them.
4 [Because of such humiliation] we have become a taunt and reproach to our neighbors, a mocking and derision to those who are round about us.
5 How long, O Lord? Will You be angry forever? Shall Your jealousy [which cannot endure a divided allegiance] burn like fire?
6 Pour out Your wrath on the Gentile nations who do not acknowledge You, and upon the kingdoms that do not call on Your name.(A)
7 For they have devoured Jacob and laid waste his dwelling and his pasture.
8 O do not [earnestly] remember against us the iniquities and guilt of our forefathers! Let Your compassion and tender mercy speedily come to meet us, for we are brought very low.
9 Help us, O God of our salvation, for the glory of Your name! Deliver us, forgive us, and purge away our sins for Your name’s sake.
2 First of all, then, I admonish and urge that petitions, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be offered on behalf of all men,
2 For kings and all who are in positions of authority or high responsibility, that [outwardly] we may pass a quiet and undisturbed life [and inwardly] a peaceable one in all godliness and reverence and seriousness in every way.
3 For such [praying] is good and right, and [it is] pleasing and acceptable to God our Savior,
4 Who wishes all men to be saved and [increasingly] to perceive and recognize and discern and know precisely and correctly the [divine] Truth.
5 For there [is only] one God, and [only] one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus,
6 Who gave Himself as a ransom for all [people, a fact that was] attested to at the right and proper time.
7 And of this matter I was appointed a preacher and an apostle (special messenger)—I am speaking the truth in Christ, I do not falsify [when I say this]—a teacher of the Gentiles in [the realm of] faith and truth.
16 Also [Jesus] said to the disciples, There was a certain rich man who had a [a]manager of his estate, and accusations [against this man] were brought to him, that he was squandering his [master’s] possessions.
2 And he called him and said to him, What is this that I hear about you? Turn in the account of your management [of my affairs], for you can be [my] manager no longer.
3 And the manager of the estate said to himself, What shall I do, seeing that my master is taking the management away from me? I am not able to dig, and I am ashamed to beg.
4 I have come to know what I will do, so that they [my master’s debtors] may accept and welcome me into their houses when I am put out of the management.
5 So he summoned his master’s debtors one by one, and he said to the first, How much do you owe my master?
6 He said, A hundred measures [about 900 gallons] of oil. And he said to him, Take back your written acknowledgement of [b]obligation, and sit down quickly and write fifty [about 450 gallons].
7 After that he said to another, And how much do you owe? He said, A hundred measures [about 900 bushels] of wheat. He said to him, Take back your written acknowledgement of [c]obligation, and write eighty [about 700 bushels].
8 And [his] master praised the dishonest (unjust) manager for acting [d]shrewdly and [e]prudently; for the sons of this age are shrewder and more prudent and wiser in [[f]relation to] their own generation [to their own age and [g]kind] than are the sons of light.
9 And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of unrighteous mammon ([h]deceitful riches, money, possessions), so that when it fails, they [those you have favored] may receive and welcome you into the everlasting habitations (dwellings).
10 He who is faithful in a very little [thing] is faithful also in much, and he who is dishonest and unjust in a very little [thing] is dishonest and unjust also in much.
11 Therefore if you have not been faithful in the [case of] unrighteous mammon ([i]deceitful riches, money, possessions), who will entrust to you the true riches?
12 And if you have not proved faithful in that which belongs to another [whether God or man], who will give you that which is your own [that is, [j]the true riches]?
13 No servant is able to 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 the other. You cannot serve God and mammon (riches, or [k]anything in which you trust and on which you rely).
Copyright © 1954, 1958, 1962, 1964, 1965, 1987 by The Lockman Foundation