Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

⁶⁸ Blessed (praised and extolled and thanked) be the Lord, the God of Israel, because He has come and brought deliverance and redemption to His people!

⁶⁹ And He has raised up a Horn of salvation [a mighty and valiant Helper, the Author of salvation] for us in the house of David His servant—

⁷⁰ This is as He promised by the mouth of His holy prophets from the most ancient times [in the memory of man]—

⁷¹ That we should have deliverance and be saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who detest and pursue us with hatred;

⁷² To make true and show the mercy and compassion and kindness [promised] to our forefathers and to remember and carry out His holy covenant [to bless, which is ^[a]all the more sacred because it is made by God Himself],

⁷³ That covenant He sealed by oath to our forefather Abraham:

⁷⁴ To grant us that we, being delivered from the hand of our foes, might serve Him fearlessly

⁷⁵ In holiness (divine consecration) and righteousness [in accordance with the everlasting principles of right] within His presence all the days of our lives.

⁷⁶ And you, little one, shall be called a prophet of the Most High; for you shall go on before the face of the Lord to make ready His ways,^(A)

⁷⁷ To bring and give the knowledge of salvation to His people in the forgiveness and remission of their sins.

⁷⁸ Because of and through the heart of tender mercy and loving-kindness of our God, a Light from on high will dawn upon us and visit [us]^(B)

⁷⁹ To shine upon and give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to direct and guide our feet in a straight line into the way of peace.^(C)

21 The word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord when King Zedekiah sent to him Pashhur son of Malchiah, and Zephaniah the priest, the son of Maaseiah, saying,

² Inquire, I pray you, of the Lord for us, for ^[a] Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon is making war against us. Perhaps the Lord will deal with us according to all His wonderful works, forcing him to withdraw from us.

³ Then said Jeremiah to them, Say this to Zedekiah:

⁴ Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: Behold, I will turn back and dull the edge of the weapons of war that are in your hands, with which you fight against the king of Babylon and the Chaldeans who are besieging you outside the walls; and I will bring them into the midst of this city [Jerusalem].

⁵ And I Myself will fight against you with an outstretched hand and with a strong arm in anger, in fury, and in great indignation and wrath.

⁶ And I will smite the inhabitants of this city, both man and beast; they will die of a great pestilence.

⁷ And afterward, says the Lord, I will deliver Zedekiah king of Judah and his servants and the people in this city who survive the pestilence, the sword, and the famine, into the hand of Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon and into the hands of their enemies, into the hands of those who seek their lives. And he will smite them with the edge of the sword; he will not spare them nor have pity or mercy and compassion upon them.

⁸ And to this people you [Jeremiah] shall say, Thus says the Lord: Behold, I set before you the way of life and the way of death.

⁹ He who remains in this city [Jerusalem] shall die by the sword and by famine and by pestilence. But he who goes out and passes over to the Chaldeans who besiege you, he shall live, and his life shall be to him his only booty [as a prize of war].

¹⁰ For I have set My face against this city for evil and not for good, says the Lord. It shall be given into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall burn it with fire.

¹¹ And concerning the royal house of the king of Judah, hear the word of the Lord:

¹² O house of David, thus says the Lord: Execute justice in the morning, and deliver from the hand of the oppressor him who has been robbed, lest My wrath go forth like fire and burn so that none can quench it—because of the evil of your doings.

¹³ Behold, I am against you, O inhabitant of the valley, O rock of the plain, says the Lord—you who say, Who shall come down against us? Or, Who shall enter into our dwelling places?

¹⁴ And I will punish you according to the fruit of your doings, says the Lord. I will kindle a fire in your forest, and it will devour all that is round about you.

²³ By such means, therefore, it was necessary for the [earthly] copies of the heavenly things to be purified, but the actual heavenly things themselves [required far] better and nobler sacrifices than these.

²⁴ For Christ (the Messiah) has not entered into a sanctuary made with [human] hands, only a copy and pattern and type of the true one, but [He has entered] into heaven itself, now to appear in the [very] presence of God on our behalf.

²⁵ Nor did He [enter into the heavenly sanctuary to] offer Himself regularly again and again, as the high priest enters the [Holy of] Holies every year with blood not his own.

²⁶ For then would He often have had to suffer [over and over again] since the foundation of the world. But as it now is, He has once for all at the consummation and close of the ages appeared to put away and abolish sin by His sacrifice [of Himself].

²⁷ And just as it is appointed for [all] men once to die, and after that the [certain] judgment,

²⁸ Even so it is that Christ, having been offered to take upon Himself and bear as a burden the sins of many once and ^[a]once for all, will appear a second time, not to carry any burden of sin nor to deal with sin, but to bring to full salvation those who are [eagerly, constantly, and patiently] waiting for and expecting Him.