Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

Praise to God the King

A psalm of praise. Of David.

The Lord Calls His People Back

1 In the eighth month of the second year Darius was king, the Lord spoke his word to the prophet Zechariah son of Berekiah, who was the son of Iddo. The Lord said, ² “The Lord was very angry with your ancestors. ³ So tell the people: This is what the Lord All-Powerful says: ‘Return to me, and I will return to you,’ says the Lord All-Powerful. ⁴ Don’t be like your ancestors. In the past the prophets said to them: This is what the Lord All-Powerful says: ‘Stop your evil ways and evil actions.’ But they wouldn’t listen or pay attention to me, says the Lord. ⁵ Your ancestors are dead, and those prophets didn’t live forever. ⁶ I commanded my words and laws to my servants the prophets, and they preached to your ancestors, who returned to me. They said, ‘The Lord All-Powerful did as he said he would. He punished us for the way we lived and for what we did.’”

The Vision of the Horses

⁷ It was on the twenty-fourth day of the eleventh month, which is the month of Shebat, in Darius’s second year as king. The Lord spoke his word to the prophet Zechariah son of Berekiah, who was the son of Iddo.

⁸ During the night I had a vision. I saw a man riding a red horse. He was standing among some myrtle trees in a ravine, with red, brown, and white horses behind him.

⁹ I asked, “What are these, sir?”

The angel who was talking with me answered, “I’ll show you what they are.”

¹⁰ Then the man standing among the myrtle trees explained, “They are the ones the Lord sent through all the earth.”

¹¹ Then they spoke to the Lord’s angel, who was standing among the myrtle trees. They said, “We have gone through all the earth, and everything is calm and quiet.”

¹² Then the Lord’s angel asked, “Lord All-Powerful, how long will it be before you show mercy to Jerusalem and the cities of Judah? You have been angry with them for seventy years now.” ¹³ So the Lord answered the angel who was talking with me, and his words were comforting and good.

¹⁴ Then the angel who was talking to me said to me, “Announce this: This is what the Lord All-Powerful says: ‘I have a strong love for Jerusalem. ¹⁵ And I am very angry with the nations that feel so safe. I was only a little angry at them, but they made things worse.’

¹⁶ “So this is what the Lord says: ‘I will return to Jerusalem with mercy. My Temple will be rebuilt,’ says the Lord All-Powerful, ‘and the measuring line will be used to rebuild Jerusalem.’

¹⁷ “Also announce: This is what the Lord All-Powerful says: ‘My towns will be rich again. The Lord will comfort Jerusalem again, and I will again choose Jerusalem.’”

²² The crowd listened to Paul until he said this. Then they began shouting, “Get rid of him! He doesn’t deserve to live!” ²³ They shouted, threw off their coats,^[a] and threw dust into the air.^[b]

²⁴ Then the commander ordered the soldiers to take Paul into the army building and beat him. He wanted to make Paul tell why the people were shouting against him like this. ²⁵ But as the soldiers were tying him up, preparing to beat him, Paul said to an officer nearby, “Do you have the right to beat a Roman citizen^[c] who has not been proven guilty?”

²⁶ When the officer heard this, he went to the commander and reported it. The officer said, “Do you know what you are doing? This man is a Roman citizen.”

²⁷ The commander came to Paul and said, “Tell me, are you really a Roman citizen?”

He answered, “Yes.”

²⁸ The commander said, “I paid a lot of money to become a Roman citizen.”

But Paul said, “I was born a citizen.”

²⁹ The men who were preparing to question Paul moved away from him immediately. The commander was frightened because he had already tied Paul, and Paul was a Roman citizen.

Paul Speaks to Leaders

³⁰ The next day the commander decided to learn why the Jews were accusing Paul. So he ordered the leading priests and the council to meet. The commander took Paul’s chains off. Then he brought Paul out and stood him before their meeting.

23 Paul looked at the council and said, “Brothers, I have lived my life without guilt feelings before God up to this day.” ² Ananias,^[d] the high priest, heard this and told the men who were standing near Paul to hit him on the mouth. ³ Paul said to Ananias, “God will hit you, too! You are like a wall that has been painted white. You sit there and judge me, using the law of Moses, but you are telling them to hit me, and that is against the law.”

⁴ The men standing near Paul said to him, “You cannot insult God’s high priest like that!”

⁵ Paul said, “Brothers, I did not know this man was the high priest. It is written in the Scriptures, ‘You must not curse a leader of your people.’”^[e]

⁶ Some of the men in the meeting were Sadducees, and others were Pharisees. Knowing this, Paul shouted to them, “My brothers, I am a Pharisee, and my father was a Pharisee. I am on trial here because I believe that people will rise from the dead.”

⁷ When Paul said this, there was an argument between the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and the group was divided. ⁸ (The Sadducees do not believe in angels or spirits or that people will rise from the dead. But the Pharisees believe in them all.) ⁹ So there was a great uproar. Some of the teachers of the law, who were Pharisees, stood up and argued, “We find nothing wrong with this man. Maybe an angel or a spirit did speak to him.”

¹⁰ The argument was beginning to turn into such a fight that the commander was afraid some evil people would tear Paul to pieces. So he told the soldiers to go down and take Paul away and put him in the army building.

¹¹ The next night the Lord came and stood by Paul. He said, “Be brave! You have told people in Jerusalem about me. You must do the same in Rome.”