Seventh Sunday after the Epiphany, Year B

¹⁸ “Don’t remember the former things, and don’t consider the things of old. ¹⁹ Behold, I will do a new thing. It springs out now. Don’t you know it? I will even make a way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert. ²⁰ The animals of the field, the jackals and the ostriches, shall honor me, because I give water in the wilderness and rivers in the desert, to give drink to my people, my chosen, ²¹ the people which I formed for myself, that they might declare my praise. ²² Yet you have not called on me, Jacob; but you have been weary of me, Israel. ²³ You have not brought me any of your sheep for burnt offerings, neither have you honored me with your sacrifices. I have not burdened you with offerings, nor wearied you with frankincense. ²⁴ You have bought me no sweet cane with money, nor have you filled me with the fat of your sacrifices, but you have burdened me with your sins. You have wearied me with your iniquities. ²⁵ I, even I, am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake; and I will not remember your sins.

¹ Blessed is he who considers the poor. The LORD will deliver him in the day of evil. ² The LORD will preserve him, and keep him alive. He shall be blessed on the earth, and he will not surrender him to the will of his enemies. ³ The LORD will sustain him on his sickbed, and restore him from his bed of illness. ⁴ I said, “O LORD, have mercy on me! Heal me, for I have sinned against you.” ⁵ My enemies speak evil against me: “When will he die, and his name perish?” ⁶ If he comes to see me, he speaks falsehood. His heart gathers iniquity to itself. When he goes abroad, he tells it. ⁷ All who hate me whisper together against me. They imagine the worst for me. ⁸ “An evil disease”, they say, “has afflicted him. Now that he lies he shall rise up no more.” ⁹ Yes, my own familiar friend, in whom I trusted, who ate bread with me, has lifted up his heel against me. ¹⁰ But you, O LORD, have mercy on me, and raise me up, that I may repay them. ¹¹ By this I know that you delight in me, because my enemy doesn’t triumph over me. ¹² As for me, you uphold me in my integrity, and set me in your presence forever. ¹³ Blessed be the LORD, the God of Israel, from everlasting and to everlasting! Amen and amen.

¹⁸ But as God is faithful, our word toward you was not “Yes and no.” ¹⁹ For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, who was preached among you by us, by me, Silvanus, and Timothy, was not “Yes and no,” but in him is “Yes.” ²⁰ For however many are the promises of God, in him is the “Yes.” Therefore also through him is the “Amen”, to the glory of God through us. ²¹ Now he who establishes us with you in Christ and anointed us is God, ²² who also sealed us, and gave us the down payment of the Spirit in our hearts.