David's Charge to Israel

¹iDavid assembled at Jerusalem all the officials of Israel, the jofficials of the tribes, the officers of the divisions that served the king, the kcommanders of thousands, the commanders of hundreds, the lstewards of all the property and livestock of the king and his sons, together with the palace officials, the mmighty men and all the seasoned warriors. ²Then King David rose to his feet and said: “Hear me, my brothers and my people. nI had it in my heart to build a house of rest for the ark of the covenant of the Lord and for the ofootstool of our God, and I made preparations for building. ³But God said to me, p‘You may not build a house for my name, for you are a man of war and have shed blood.’ ⁴Yet the Lord God of Israel qchose me from all my father's house to be king over Israel rforever. sFor he chose Judah as leader, and in the house of Judah my father's thouse, and among my father's sons he took pleasure in me to make me king over all Israel. ⁵And of uall my sons (for the Lord has given me many sons) he vhas chosen Solomon my son to sit on the throne of the kingdom of the Lord over Israel. ⁶He said to me, ‘It is wSolomon your son who shall build my house and my courts, for I have chosen him to be my son, and I will be his father. ⁷I will establish his kingdom rforever xif he continues strong in keeping my commandments and my rules, as he is today.’ ⁸Now therefore in the sight of all Israel, the assembly of the Lord, and in the hearing of our God, observe and seek out all the commandments of the Lord your God, that you may possess this good land and leave it for an inheritance to your children after you forever.

David's Charge to Solomon

⁹“And you, Solomon my son, know the God of your father and serve him with a ywhole heart and with a willing mind, zfor the Lord searches all hearts and understands every plan and thought. aIf you seek him, he will be found by you, but if you forsake him, he will cast you off forever. ¹⁰Be careful now, for the Lord has chosen you to build a house for the sanctuary; bbe strong and do it.”

¹¹Then David gave Solomon his son the cplan of the dvestibule of the temple,1 and of its houses, its treasuries, its upper rooms, and its inner chambers, and of the room for the emercy seat; ¹²and the plan of all that he had in mind for the courts of the house of the Lord, all the surrounding chambers, fthe treasuries of the house of God, and the treasuries for dedicated gifts; ¹³for the gdivisions of the priests and of the hLevites, and all the work of the service in the house of the Lord; for all the vessels for the service in the house of the Lord, ¹⁴the weight of gold for all golden vessels for each service, the weight of silver vessels for each service, ¹⁵the weight of the golden ilampstands and their lamps, the weight of gold for each lampstand and its lamps, the weight of silver for a lampstand and its lamps, according to the use of each lampstand in the service, ¹⁶the weight of gold for each table for the showbread, the silver for the silver tables, ¹⁷and pure gold for the forks, the basins and the cups; for the golden bowls and the weight of each; for the silver bowls and the weight of each; ¹⁸for the jaltar of incense made of refined gold, and its weight; also his plan for the golden chariot of the kcherubim that spread their wings and covered the ark of the covenant of the Lord. ¹⁹“All this he made clear to me in writing from the hand of the Lord, lall the work to be done according to the plan.”

²⁰Then David said to Solomon his son, m“Be strong and courageous and do it. Do not be afraid and do not be dismayed, for the Lord God, even my God, is with you. He will not leave you or forsake you, until all the work for the service of the house of the Lord is finished. ²¹And behold the ndivisions of the priests and the Levites for all the service of the house of God; and with you in all the work will be oevery willing man who has skill for any kind of service; also the officers and all the people will be wholly at your command.”

False Prophets and Teachers

¹But mfalse prophets also arose among the people, njust as there will be false teachers among you, who will osecretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Master pwho bought them, bringing upon themselves swift destruction. ²And many will follow their sensuality, and because of them the way of truth qwill be blasphemed. ³And rin their greed they will exploit you swith false words. tTheir condemnation from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep.

⁴For if God did not spare uangels when they sinned, but vcast them into hell1 and committed them to chains2 of gloomy darkness wto be kept until the judgment; ⁵if he did not spare the ancient world, but xpreserved Noah, a herald of righteousness, with seven others, when he brought ya flood upon the world of the ungodly; ⁶if by zturning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to ashes he condemned them to extinction, amaking them an example of bwhat is going to happen to the ungodly;3 ⁷and cif he rescued righteous Lot, greatly distressed by the sensual conduct of the wicked ⁸(for as that righteous man lived among them day after day, dhe was tormenting his righteous soul over their lawless deeds that he saw and heard); ⁹then ethe Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials,4 and to keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment, ¹⁰and especially fthose who indulge5 in the lust of defiling passion and gdespise authority.

Bold and willful, they do not tremble gas they blaspheme the glorious ones, ¹¹hwhereas angels, though greater in might and power, do not pronounce a blasphemous judgment against them before the Lord. ¹²iBut these, like irrational animals, jcreatures of instinct, born to be caught and destroyed, blaspheming about matters of which they are ignorant, will also be destroyed in their destruction, ¹³suffering wrong as kthe wage for their wrongdoing. They count it pleasure lto revel in the daytime. They are blots and blemishes, reveling in their deceptions,6 while mthey feast with you. ¹⁴They have eyes full of adultery,7 ninsatiable for sin. They entice unsteady souls. They have hearts otrained in greed. pAccursed children! ¹⁵Forsaking the right way, qthey have gone astray. They have followed rthe way of Balaam, the son of Beor, who loved sgain from wrongdoing, ¹⁶but was rebuked for his own transgression; ta speechless donkey spoke with human voice and restrained the prophet's madness.

¹⁷uThese are waterless springs and mists driven by a storm. vFor them the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved. ¹⁸For, wspeaking loud boasts of folly, they entice by sensual passions of the flesh those who are barely xescaping from those who live in error. ¹⁹They promise them yfreedom, zbut they themselves are slaves8 of corruption. For whatever overcomes a person, to that he is enslaved. ²⁰For if, aafter they have escaped the defilements of the world bthrough the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, cthe last state has become worse for them than the first. ²¹For dit would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than after knowing it to turn back from ethe holy commandment delivered to them. ²²What the true proverb says has happened to them: “The fdog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire.”

The Ruler to Be Born in Bethlehem

¹1 Now muster your troops, O daughter2 of troops;

siege is laid against us;

with a rod pthey strike the judge of Israel

on the cheek.

²3 qBut you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah,

who are too little to be among the clans of rJudah,

from you shall come forth for me

one who is to be sruler in Israel,

twhose coming forth is ufrom of old,

from ancient days.

³Therefore he shall give them up vuntil the time

when she who is in labor has given birth;

then wthe rest of his brothers shall return

to the people of Israel.

⁴And he shall stand xand shepherd his flock yin the strength of the Lord,

in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God.

And they shall dwell secure, for now zhe shall be great

to the ends of the earth.

⁵And he shall be atheir peace.

bWhen the Assyrian comes into our land

and treads in our palaces,

then we will raise against him seven cshepherds

and eight princes of men;

⁶they shall shepherd the land of Assyria with the sword,

and the land of dNimrod at its entrances;

and he shall deliver us from the Assyrian

bwhen he comes into our land

and treads within our border.

A Remnant Shall Be Delivered

⁷Then wthe remnant of Jacob shall be

in the midst of many peoples

like dew from the Lord,

like showers on the grass,

which delay not for a man

nor wait for the children of man.

⁸And wthe remnant of Jacob shall be among the nations,

in the midst of many peoples,

like a lion among the beasts of the forest,

like a young lion among the flocks of sheep,

ewhich, when it goes through, treads down

and tears in pieces, and there is none to deliver.

⁹Your hand shall fbe lifted up over your adversaries,

and all your enemies shall be cut off.

¹⁰And gin that day, declares the Lord,

hI will cut off your horses from among you

and will destroy your chariots;

¹¹iand I will cut off the cities of your land

and throw down all your strongholds;

¹²and I will cut off jsorceries from your hand,

and kyou shall have no more tellers of fortunes;

¹³and lI will cut off your carved images

and myour pillars from among you,

nand you shall bow down no more

to the work of your hands;

¹⁴and I will root out your oAsherah images from among you

iand destroy your cities.

¹⁵And in anger and wrath pI will execute vengeance

on the nations that did not obey.

Healing of a Man on the Sabbath

¹One Sabbath, pwhen he went to dine at the house of a ruler of the Pharisees, they were qwatching him carefully. ²And behold, there was a man before him who had dropsy. ³And Jesus responded to rthe lawyers and Pharisees, saying, s“Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath, or not?” ⁴But they remained silent. Then he took him and healed him and sent him away. ⁵And he said to them, t“Which of you, having a son1 or an ox that has fallen into a well on a Sabbath day, will not immediately pull him out?” ⁶uAnd they could not reply to these things.

The Parable of the Wedding Feast

⁷Now he told a parable to those who were invited, when he noticed vhow they chose the places of honor, saying to them, ⁸“When you are invited by someone to a wedding feast, do not sit down in a place of honor, lest someone more distinguished than you be invited by him, ⁹and he who invited you both will come and say to you, ‘Give your place to this person,’ and then you will begin with shame to take the lowest place. ¹⁰But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, wso that when your host comes he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at table with you. ¹¹For xeveryone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”

The Parable of the Great Banquet

¹²He said also to the man who had invited him, “When you give ya dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers2 or your relatives or rich neighbors, zlest they also invite you in return and you be repaid. ¹³But when you give a feast, ainvite bthe poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, ¹⁴and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. For you will be repaid cat dthe resurrection of the just.”

¹⁵When one of those who reclined at table with him heard these things, he said to him, e“Blessed is everyone who will feat bread in the kingdom of God!” ¹⁶But he said to him, g“A man once hgave a great banquet and invited many. ¹⁷And at the time for the banquet he isent his servant3 to say to those who had been invited, ‘Come, for everything is now ready.’ ¹⁸But they all alike began to make excuses. The first said to him, ‘I have bought a field, and I must go out and see it. Please have me excused.’ ¹⁹And another said, ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I go to examine them. Please have me excused.’ ²⁰And another said, j‘I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come.’ ²¹So the servant came and reported these things to his master. Then the master of the house became angry and said to his servant, ‘Go out quickly to the streets and lanes of the city, and bring in kthe poor and crippled and blind and lame.’ ²²And the servant said, ‘Sir, what you commanded has been done, and still there is room.’ ²³And the master said to the servant, ‘Go out to the highways and hedges and compel people to come in, that my house may be filled. ²⁴For I tell you,4 mnone of those men who were invited shall taste my banquet.’”

The Cost of Discipleship

²⁵Now great crowds accompanied him, and he turned and said to them, ²⁶n“If anyone comes to me and odoes not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, pyes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. ²⁷qWhoever does not rbear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. ²⁸For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not sfirst sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it? ²⁹Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, ³⁰saying, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish.’ ³¹Or what king, going out to encounter another king in war, will not tsit down first and deliberate whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand? ³²And if not, while the other is yet a great way off, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace. ³³uSo therefore, any one of you who vdoes not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.

Salt Without Taste Is Worthless

³⁴w“Salt is good, xbut if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? ³⁵It is of no use either for the soil or for the manure pile. It is thrown away. yHe who has ears to hear, let him hear.”