Lectionary 12, Year A

⁷ O LORD, you have persuaded me, and I was persuaded. You are stronger than I, and have prevailed. I have become a laughingstock all day. Everyone mocks me. ⁸ For as often as I speak, I cry out; I cry, “Violence and destruction!” because the LORD’s word has been made a reproach to me, and a derision, all day. ⁹ If I say, I will not make mention of him, or speak any more in his name, then there is in my heart as it were a burning fire shut up in my bones. I am weary with holding it in. I can’t. ¹⁰ For I have heard the defaming of many, “Terror on every side! Denounce, and we will denounce him!” say all my familiar friends, those who watch for my fall. “Perhaps he will be persuaded, and we will prevail against him, and we will take our revenge on him.” ¹¹ But the LORD is with me as an awesome mighty one. Therefore my persecutors will stumble, and they won’t prevail. They will be utterly disappointed, because they have not dealt wisely, even with an everlasting dishonor which will never be forgotten. ¹² But the LORD of Armies, who tests the righteous, who sees the heart and the mind, let me see your vengeance on them, for I have revealed my cause to you. ¹³ Sing to the LORD! Praise the LORD, for he has delivered the soul of the needy from the hand of evildoers.

⁷ Because for your sake, I have borne reproach. Shame has covered my face. ⁸ I have become a stranger to my brothers, an alien to my mother’s children. ⁹ For the zeal of your house consumes me. The reproaches of those who reproach you have fallen on me. ¹⁰ When I wept and I fasted, that was to my reproach. ¹¹ When I made sackcloth my clothing, I became a byword to them. ¹² Those who sit in the gate talk about me. I am the song of the drunkards. ¹³ But as for me, my prayer is to you, O LORD, in an acceptable time. God, in the abundance of your loving kindness, answer me in the truth of your salvation. ¹⁴ Deliver me out of the mire, and don’t let me sink. Let me be delivered from those who hate me, and out of the deep waters. ¹⁵ Don’t let the flood waters overwhelm me, neither let the deep swallow me up. Don’t let the pit shut its mouth on me. ¹⁶ Answer me, O LORD, for your loving kindness is good. According to the multitude of your tender mercies, turn to me. ¹⁷ Don’t hide your face from your servant, for I am in distress. Answer me speedily! ¹⁸ Draw near to my soul and redeem it. Ransom me because of my enemies.

¹ What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? ² May it never be! We who died to sin, how could we live in it any longer? ³ Or don’t you know that all we who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? ⁴ We were buried therefore with him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we also might walk in newness of life. ⁵ For if we have become united with him in the likeness of his death, we will also be part of his resurrection; ⁶ knowing this, that our old man was crucified with him, that the body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be in bondage to sin. ⁷ For he who has died has been freed from sin. ⁸ But if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him; ⁹ knowing that Christ, being raised from the dead, dies no more. Death no longer has dominion over him! ¹⁰ For the death that he died, he died to sin one time; but the life that he lives, he lives to God. ¹¹ Thus consider yourselves also to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord.