Psalm 118 (Listen)

His Steadfast Love Endures Forever

118   Oh give thanks to the LORD, for he is good;
    for his steadfast love endures forever!
2   Let Israel say,
    “His steadfast love endures forever.”
3   Let the house of Aaron say,
    “His steadfast love endures forever.”
4   Let those who fear the LORD say,
    “His steadfast love endures forever.”
5   Out of my distress I called on the LORD;
    the LORD answered me and set me free.
6   The LORD is on my side; I will not fear.
    What can man do to me?
7   The LORD is on my side as my helper;
    I shall look in triumph on those who hate me.
8   It is better to take refuge in the LORD
    than to trust in man.
9   It is better to take refuge in the LORD
    than to trust in princes.
10   All nations surrounded me;
    in the name of the LORD I cut them off!
11   They surrounded me, surrounded me on every side;
    in the name of the LORD I cut them off!
12   They surrounded me like bees;
    they went out like a fire among thorns;
    in the name of the LORD I cut them off!
13   I was pushed hard,¹ so that I was falling,
    but the LORD helped me.
14   The LORD is my strength and my song;
    he has become my salvation.
15   Glad songs of salvation
    are in the tents of the righteous:
  “The right hand of the LORD does valiantly,
16     the right hand of the LORD exalts,
    the right hand of the LORD does valiantly!”
17   I shall not die, but I shall live,
    and recount the deeds of the LORD.
18   The LORD has disciplined me severely,
    but he has not given me over to death.
19   Open to me the gates of righteousness,
    that I may enter through them
    and give thanks to the LORD.
20   This is the gate of the LORD;
    the righteous shall enter through it.
21   I thank you that you have answered me
    and have become my salvation.
22   The stone that the builders rejected
    has become the cornerstone.²
23   This is the LORD’s doing;
    it is marvelous in our eyes.
24   This is the day that the LORD has made;
    let us rejoice and be glad in it.
25   Save us, we pray, O LORD!
    O LORD, we pray, give us success!
26   Blessed is he who comes in the name of the LORD!
    We bless you from the house of the LORD.
27   The LORD is God,
    and he has made his light to shine upon us.
  Bind the festal sacrifice with cords,
    up to the horns of the altar!
28   You are my God, and I will give thanks to you;
    you are my God; I will extol you.
29   Oh give thanks to the LORD, for he is good;
    for his steadfast love endures forever!

(ESV)

Leviticus 24 (Listen)

The Lamps

24 The LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 2 “Command the people of Israel to bring you pure oil from beaten olives for the lamp, that a light may be kept burning regularly. 3 Outside the veil of the testimony, in the tent of meeting, Aaron shall arrange it from evening to morning before the LORD regularly. It shall be a statute forever throughout your generations. 4 He shall arrange the lamps on the lampstand of pure gold¹ before the LORD regularly.

Bread for the Tabernacle

5 “You shall take fine flour and bake twelve loaves from it; two tenths of an ephah² shall be in each loaf. 6 And you shall set them in two piles, six in a pile, on the table of pure gold³ before the LORD. 7 And you shall put pure frankincense on each pile, that it may go with the bread as a memorial portion as a food offering to the LORD. 8 Every Sabbath day Aaron shall arrange it before the LORD regularly; it is from the people of Israel as a covenant forever. 9 And it shall be for Aaron and his sons, and they shall eat it in a holy place, since it is for him a most holy portion out of the LORD’s food offerings, a perpetual due.”

Punishment for Blasphemy

10 Now an Israelite woman’s son, whose father was an Egyptian, went out among the people of Israel. And the Israelite woman’s son and a man of Israel fought in the camp, 11 and the Israelite woman’s son blasphemed the Name, and cursed. Then they brought him to Moses. His mother’s name was Shelomith, the daughter of Dibri, of the tribe of Dan. 12 And they put him in custody, till the will of the LORD should be clear to them.

13 Then the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 14 “Bring out of the camp the one who cursed, and let all who heard him lay their hands on his head, and let all the congregation stone him. 15 And speak to the people of Israel, saying, Whoever curses his God shall bear his sin. 16 Whoever blasphemes the name of the LORD shall surely be put to death. All the congregation shall stone him. The sojourner as well as the native, when he blasphemes the Name, shall be put to death.

An Eye for an Eye

17 “Whoever takes a human life shall surely be put to death. 18 Whoever takes an animal’s life shall make it good, life for life. 19 If anyone injures his neighbor, as he has done it shall be done to him, 20 fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth; whatever injury he has given a person shall be given to him. 21 Whoever kills an animal shall make it good, and whoever kills a person shall be put to death. 22 You shall have the same rule for the sojourner and for the native, for I am the LORD your God.” 23 So Moses spoke to the people of Israel, and they brought out of the camp the one who had cursed and stoned him with stones. Thus the people of Israel did as the LORD commanded Moses.

(ESV)

Isaiah 30:18–32:20 (Listen)

The Lord Will Be Gracious

18   Therefore the LORD waits to be gracious to you,
    and therefore he exalts himself to show mercy to you.
  For the LORD is a God of justice;
    blessed are all those who wait for him.

19 For a people shall dwell in Zion, in Jerusalem; you shall weep no more. He will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry. As soon as he hears it, he answers you. 20 And though the Lord give you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, yet your Teacher will not hide himself anymore, but your eyes shall see your Teacher. 21 And your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, “This is the way, walk in it,” when you turn to the right or when you turn to the left. 22 Then you will defile your carved idols overlaid with silver and your gold-plated metal images. You will scatter them as unclean things. You will say to them, “Be gone!”

23 And he will give rain for the seed with which you sow the ground, and bread, the produce of the ground, which will be rich and plenteous. In that day your livestock will graze in large pastures, 24 and the oxen and the donkeys that work the ground will eat seasoned fodder, which has been winnowed with shovel and fork. 25 And on every lofty mountain and every high hill there will be brooks running with water, in the day of the great slaughter, when the towers fall. 26 Moreover, the light of the moon will be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun will be sevenfold, as the light of seven days, in the day when the LORD binds up the brokenness of his people, and heals the wounds inflicted by his blow.

27   Behold, the name of the LORD comes from afar,
    burning with his anger, and in thick rising smoke;¹
  his lips are full of fury,
    and his tongue is like a devouring fire;
28   his breath is like an overflowing stream
    that reaches up to the neck;
  to sift the nations with the sieve of destruction,
    and to place on the jaws of the peoples a bridle that leads astray.

29 You shall have a song as in the night when a holy feast is kept, and gladness of heart, as when one sets out to the sound of the flute to go to the mountain of the LORD, to the Rock of Israel. 30 And the LORD will cause his majestic voice to be heard and the descending blow of his arm to be seen, in furious anger and a flame of devouring fire, with a cloudburst and storm and hailstones. 31 The Assyrians will be terror-stricken at the voice of the LORD, when he strikes with his rod. 32 And every stroke of the appointed staff that the LORD lays on them will be to the sound of tambourines and lyres. Battling with brandished arm, he will fight with them. 33 For a burning place² has long been prepared; indeed, for the king it is made ready, its pyre made deep and wide, with fire and wood in abundance; the breath of the LORD, like a stream of sulfur, kindles it.

Woe to Those Who Go Down to Egypt

31   Woe³ to those who go down to Egypt for help
    and rely on horses,
  who trust in chariots because they are many
    and in horsemen because they are very strong,
  but do not look to the Holy One of Israel
    or consult the LORD!
2   And yet he is wise and brings disaster;
    he does not call back his words,
  but will arise against the house of the evildoers
    and against the helpers of those who work iniquity.
3   The Egyptians are man, and not God,
    and their horses are flesh, and not spirit.
  When the LORD stretches out his hand,
    the helper will stumble, and he who is helped will fall,
    and they will all perish together.
4   For thus the LORD said to me,
  “As a lion or a young lion growls over his prey,
    and when a band of shepherds is called out against him
  he is not terrified by their shouting
    or daunted at their noise,
  so the LORD of hosts will come down
    to fight⁴ on Mount Zion and on its hill.
5   Like birds hovering, so the LORD of hosts
    will protect Jerusalem;
  he will protect and deliver it;
    he will spare and rescue it.”

6 Turn to him from whom people⁵ have deeply revolted, O children of Israel. 7 For in that day everyone shall cast away his idols of silver and his idols of gold, which your hands have sinfully made for you.

8   “And the Assyrian shall fall by a sword, not of man;
    and a sword, not of man, shall devour him;
  and he shall flee from the sword,
    and his young men shall be put to forced labor.
9   His rock shall pass away in terror,
    and his officers desert the standard in panic,”
  declares the LORD, whose fire is in Zion,
    and whose furnace is in Jerusalem.

A King Will Reign in Righteousness

32   Behold, a king will reign in righteousness,
    and princes will rule in justice.
2   Each will be like a hiding place from the wind,
    a shelter from the storm,
  like streams of water in a dry place,
    like the shade of a great rock in a weary land.
3   Then the eyes of those who see will not be closed,
    and the ears of those who hear will give attention.
4   The heart of the hasty will understand and know,
    and the tongue of the stammerers will hasten to speak distinctly.
5   The fool will no more be called noble,
    nor the scoundrel said to be honorable.
6   For the fool speaks folly,
    and his heart is busy with iniquity,
  to practice ungodliness,
    to utter error concerning the LORD,
  to leave the craving of the hungry unsatisfied,
    and to deprive the thirsty of drink.
7   As for the scoundrel—his devices are evil;
    he plans wicked schemes
  to ruin the poor with lying words,
    even when the plea of the needy is right.
8   But he who is noble plans noble things,
    and on noble things he stands.

Complacent Women Warned of Disaster

9   Rise up, you women who are at ease, hear my voice;
    you complacent daughters, give ear to my speech.
10   In little more than a year
    you will shudder, you complacent women;
  for the grape harvest fails,
    the fruit harvest will not come.
11   Tremble, you women who are at ease,
    shudder, you complacent ones;
  strip, and make yourselves bare,
    and tie sackcloth around your waist.
12   Beat your breasts for the pleasant fields,
    for the fruitful vine,
13   for the soil of my people
    growing up in thorns and briers,
  yes, for all the joyous houses
    in the exultant city.
14   For the palace is forsaken,
    the populous city deserted;
  the hill and the watchtower
    will become dens forever,
  a joy of wild donkeys,
    a pasture of flocks;
15   until the Spirit is poured upon us from on high,
    and the wilderness becomes a fruitful field,
    and the fruitful field is deemed a forest.
16   Then justice will dwell in the wilderness,
    and righteousness abide in the fruitful field.
17   And the effect of righteousness will be peace,
    and the result of righteousness, quietness and trust⁶ forever.
18   My people will abide in a peaceful habitation,
    in secure dwellings, and in quiet resting places.
19   And it will hail when the forest falls down,
    and the city will be utterly laid low.
20   Happy are you who sow beside all waters,
    who let the feet of the ox and the donkey range free.

(ESV)

Ephesians 3 (Listen)

The Mystery of the Gospel Revealed

3 For this reason I, Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus on behalf of you Gentiles—2 assuming that you have heard of the stewardship of God’s grace that was given to me for you, 3 how the mystery was made known to me by revelation, as I have written briefly. 4 When you read this, you can perceive my insight into the mystery of Christ, 5 which was not made known to the sons of men in other generations as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit. 6 This mystery is¹ that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body, and partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel.

7 Of this gospel I was made a minister according to the gift of God’s grace, which was given me by the working of his power. 8 To me, though I am the very least of all the saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, 9 and to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in² God, who created all things, 10 so that through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places. 11 This was according to the eternal purpose that he has realized in Christ Jesus our Lord, 12 in whom we have boldness and access with confidence through our faith in him. 13 So I ask you not to lose heart over what I am suffering for you, which is your glory.

Prayer for Spiritual Strength

14 For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, 15 from whom every family³ in heaven and on earth is named, 16 that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18 may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, 19 and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

20 Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

(ESV)