1 David assembled in Jerusalem all the officials of Israel, including the commanders of the tribes, the commanders of the army divisions that served the king, the commanders of units of a thousand and a hundred, the officials who were in charge of all the property and livestock of the king and his sons, the eunuchs, and the warriors, including the most skilled of them.
2 King David rose to his feet and said: “Listen to me, my brothers and my people. I wanted to build a temple where the ark of the Lord’s covenant could be placed as a footstool for our God. I have made the preparations for building it. 3 But God said to me, ‘You must not build a temple to honor me, for you are a warrior and have spilled blood.’ 4 The Lord God of Israel chose me out of my father’s entire family to become king over Israel and have a permanent dynasty. Indeed, he chose Judah as leader, and my father’s family within Judah, and then he picked me out from among my father’s sons and made me king over all Israel. 5 From all the many sons the Lord has given me, he chose Solomon my son to rule on his behalf over Israel. 6 He said to me, ‘Solomon your son is the one who will build my temple and my courts, for I have chosen him to become my son and I will become his father. 7 I will establish his kingdom permanently, if he remains committed to obeying my commands and regulations, as you are doing this day.’ 8 So now, in the sight of all Israel, the Lord’s assembly, and in the hearing of our God, I say this: Carefully observe all the commands of the Lord your God, so that you may possess this good land and may leave it as a permanent inheritance for your children after you.
9 “And you, Solomon my son, obey the God of your father and serve him with a submissive attitude and a willing spirit, for the Lord examines all minds and understands every motive of one’s thoughts. If you seek him, he will let you find him, but if you abandon him, he will reject you permanently. 10 Realize now that the Lord has chosen you to build a temple as his sanctuary. Be strong and do it!”
11 David gave to his son Solomon the blueprints for the temple porch, its buildings, its treasuries, its upper areas, its inner rooms, and the room for atonement. 12 He gave him the blueprints of all he envisioned for the courts of the Lord’s temple, all the surrounding rooms, the storehouses of God’s temple, and the storehouses for the holy items.
13 He gave him the regulations for the divisions of priests and Levites, for all the assigned responsibilities within the Lord’s temple, and for all the items used in the service of the Lord’s temple.
14 He gave him the prescribed weight for all the gold items to be used in various types of service in the Lord’s temple, for all the silver items to be used in various types of service, 15 for the gold lampstands and their gold lamps, including the weight of each lampstand and its lamps, for the silver lampstands, including the weight of each lampstand and its lamps, according to the prescribed use of each lampstand, 16 for the gold used in the display tables, including the amount to be used in each table, for the silver to be used in the silver tables, 17 for the pure gold used for the meat forks, bowls, and jars, for the small gold bowls, including the weight for each bowl, for the small silver bowls, including the weight for each bowl, 18 and for the refined gold of the incense altar.
He gave him the blueprint for the seat of the gold cherubim that spread their wings and provide shelter for the ark of the Lord’s covenant.
19 David said, “All this I put in writing as the Lord directed me and gave me insight regarding the details of the blueprints.”
20 David said to his son Solomon: “Be strong and brave! Do it! Don’t be afraid and don’t panic! For the Lord God, my God, is with you. He will not leave you or abandon you before all the work for the service of the Lord’s temple is finished. 21 Here are the divisions of the priests and Levites who will perform all the service of God’s temple. All the willing and skilled men are ready to assist you in all the work and perform their service. The officials and all the people are ready to follow your instructions.”
1 But false prophets arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you. These false teachers will infiltrate your midst with destructive heresies, even to the point of denying the Master who bought them. As a result, they will bring swift destruction on themselves. 2 And many will follow their debauched lifestyles. Because of these false teachers, the way of truth will be slandered. 3 And in their greed they will exploit you with deceptive words. Their condemnation pronounced long ago is not sitting idly by; their destruction is not asleep.
4 For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but threw them into hell and locked them up in chains in utter darkness, to be kept until the judgment, 5 and if he did not spare the ancient world, but did protect Noah, a herald of righteousness, along with seven others, when God brought a flood on an ungodly world, 6 and if he turned to ashes the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah when he condemned them to destruction, having appointed them to serve as an example to future generations of the ungodly, 7 and if he rescued Lot, a righteous man in anguish over the debauched lifestyle of lawless men, 8 (for while he lived among them day after day, that righteous man was tormented in his righteous soul by the lawless deeds he saw and heard) 9 —if so, then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from their trials, and to reserve the unrighteous for punishment at the day of judgment, 10 especially those who indulge their fleshly desires and who despise authority.
Brazen and insolent, they are not afraid to insult the glorious ones, 11 yet even angels, who are much more powerful, do not bring a slanderous judgment against them in the presence of the Lord. 12 But these men, like irrational animals—creatures of instinct, born to be caught and destroyed—do not understand whom they are insulting, and consequently in their destruction they will be destroyed, 13 suffering harm as the wages for their harmful ways. By considering it a pleasure to carouse in broad daylight, they are stains and blemishes, indulging in their deceitful pleasures when they feast together with you. 14 Their eyes, full of adultery, never stop sinning; they entice unstable people. They have trained their hearts for greed, these cursed children! 15 By forsaking the right path they have gone astray, because they followed the way of Balaam son of Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness, 16 yet was rebuked for his own transgression (a dumb donkey, speaking with a human voice, restrained the prophet’s madness).
17 These men are waterless springs and mists driven by a storm, for whom the utter depths of darkness have been reserved. 18 For by speaking high-sounding but empty words they are able to entice, with fleshly desires and with debauchery, people who have just escaped from those who reside in error. 19 Although these false teachers promise such people freedom, they themselves are enslaved to immorality. For whatever a person succumbs to, to that he is enslaved. 20 For if after they have escaped the filthy things of the world through the rich knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they again get entangled in them and succumb to them, their last state has become worse for them than their first. 21 For it would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than, having known it, to turn back from the holy commandment that had been delivered to them. 22 They are illustrations of this true proverb: “A dog returns to its own vomit,” and “A sow, after washing herself, wallows in the mire.”
1 (4:14) But now slash yourself, daughter surrounded by soldiers!
We are besieged!
With a scepter they strike Israel’s ruler
on the side of his face.
2 (5:1) As for you, Bethlehem Ephrathah,
seemingly insignificant among the clans of Judah—
from you a king will emerge who will rule over Israel on my behalf,
one whose origins are in the distant past.
3 So the Lord will hand the people of Israel over to their enemies
until the time when the woman in labor gives birth.
Then the rest of the king’s countrymen will return
to be reunited with the people of Israel.
4 He will assume his post and shepherd the people by the Lord’s strength,
by the sovereign authority of the Lord his God.
They will live securely, for at that time he will be honored
even in the distant regions of the earth.
5 He will give us peace.
Should the Assyrians try to invade our land
and attempt to set foot in our fortresses,
we will send against them seven shepherd-rulers,
make that eight commanders.
6 They will rule the land of Assyria with the sword,
the land of Nimrod with a drawn sword.
Our king will rescue us from the Assyrians
should they attempt to invade our land
and try to set foot in our territory.
7 Those survivors from Jacob will live
in the midst of many nations.
They will be like the dew the Lord sends,
like the rain on the grass,
that does not hope for men to come
or wait around for humans to arrive.
8 Those survivors from Jacob will live among the nations,
in the midst of many peoples.
They will be like a lion among the animals of the forest,
like a young lion among the flocks of sheep,
which attacks when it passes through.
It rips its prey and there is no one to stop it.
9 Lift your hand triumphantly against your adversaries;
may all your enemies be destroyed!
10 “In that day,” says the Lord,
“I will destroy your horses from your midst
and smash your chariots.
11 I will destroy the cities of your land
and tear down all your fortresses.
12 I will remove the sorcery that you practice,
and you will no longer have omen readers living among you.
13 I will remove your idols and sacred pillars from your midst;
you will no longer worship what your own hands made.
14 I will uproot your images of Asherah from your midst
and destroy your idols.
15 With furious anger I will carry out vengeance
on the nations that do not obey me.”
1 Now one Sabbath when Jesus went to dine at the house of a leader of the Pharisees, they were watching him closely. 2 There right in front of him was a man whose body was swollen with fluid. 3 So Jesus asked the experts in religious law and the Pharisees, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath or not?” 4 But they remained silent. So Jesus took hold of the man, healed him, and sent him away. 5 Then he said to them, “Which of you, if you have a son or an ox that has fallen into a well on a Sabbath day, will not immediately pull him out?” 6 But they could not reply to this.
7 Then when Jesus noticed how the guests chose the places of honor, he told them a parable. He said to them, 8 “When you are invited by someone to a wedding feast, do not take the place of honor, because a person more distinguished than you may have been invited by your host. 9 So the host who invited both of you will come and say to you, ‘Give this man your place.’ Then, ashamed, you will begin to move to the least important place. 10 But when you are invited, go and take the least important place, so that when your host approaches he will say to you, ‘Friend, move up here to a better place.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all who share the meal with you. 11 For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”
12 He said also to the man who had invited him, “When you host a dinner or a banquet, don’t invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors so you can be invited by them in return and get repaid. 13 But when you host an elaborate meal, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. 14 Then you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”
15 When one of those at the meal with Jesus heard this, he said to him, “Blessed is everyone who will feast in the kingdom of God!” 16 But Jesus said to him, “A man once gave a great banquet and invited many guests. 17 At the time for the banquet he sent his slave to tell those who had been invited, ‘Come, because everything is now ready.’ 18 But one after another they all began to make excuses. The first said to him, ‘I have bought a field, and I must go out and see it. Please excuse me.’ 19 Another said, ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I am going out to examine them. Please excuse me.’ 20 Another said, ‘I just got married, and I cannot come.’ 21 So the slave came back and reported this to his master. Then the master of the household was furious and said to his slave, ‘Go out quickly to the streets and alleys of the city, and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame.’ 22 Then the slave said, ‘Sir, what you instructed has been done, and there is still room.’ 23 So the master said to his slave, ‘Go out to the highways and country roads and urge people to come in, so that my house will be filled. 24 For I tell you, not one of those individuals who were invited will taste my banquet!’”
25 Now large crowds were accompanying Jesus, and turning to them he said, 26 “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother, and wife and children, and brothers and sisters, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. 27 Whoever does not carry his own cross and follow me cannot be my disciple. 28 For which of you, wanting to build a tower, doesn’t sit down first and compute the cost to see if he has enough money to complete it? 29 Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish the tower, all who see it will begin to make fun of him. 30 They will say, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish!’ 31 Or what king, going out to confront another king in battle, will not sit down first and determine whether he is able with 10,000 to oppose the one coming against him with 20,000? 32 If he cannot succeed, he will send a representative while the other is still a long way off and ask for terms of peace. 33 In the same way therefore not one of you can be my disciple if he does not renounce all his own possessions.
34 “Salt is good, but if salt loses its flavor, how can its flavor be restored? 35 It is of no value for the soil or for the manure pile; it is to be thrown out. The one who has ears to hear had better listen!”