Laws for Purification

1 Now the Lord spoke to Moses and to Aaron, saying, 2 “This is the statute of the law that the Lord has commanded: Tell the people of Israel to bring you a red heifer without defect, in which there is no blemish, ^mand on which a yoke has never come. 3 And you shall give it to Eleazar the priest, and ⁿit shall be taken outside the camp and slaughtered before him. 4 And Eleazar the priest shall take some of its blood with his finger, and ^osprinkle some of its blood toward the front of the tent of meeting seven times. 5 And the heifer shall be burned in his sight. ^pIts skin, its flesh, and its blood, with its dung, shall be burned. 6 And the priest shall take ^qcedarwood and hyssop and scarlet yarn, and throw them into the fire burning the heifer. 7 Then the priest ^rshall wash his clothes and bathe his body in water, and afterward he may come into the camp. But the priest shall be unclean until evening. 8 ^sThe one who burns the heifer ^rshall wash his clothes in water and bathe his body in water and shall be unclean until evening. 9 And a man who is clean shall gather up ^tthe ashes of the heifer and deposit them outside the camp in a ^uclean place. And they shall be kept for the water for ^vimpurity for the congregation of the people of Israel; it is a sin offering. 10 And the one who gathers the ashes of the heifer ^rshall wash his clothes and be unclean until evening. And this shall be a perpetual statute for the people of Israel, and for the stranger who sojourns among them.

11 ^w“Whoever touches the dead body of any person shall be unclean seven days. 12 He ^xshall cleanse himself with the water on the third day and on the seventh day, and so be clean. But if he does not cleanse himself on the third day and on the seventh day, he will not become clean. 13 Whoever touches a dead person, the body of anyone who has died, and does not cleanse himself, ^ydefiles the tabernacle of the Lord, ^zand that person shall be cut off from Israel; because the water for impurity was not thrown on him, he shall be unclean. His uncleanness is still on him.

14 “This is the law when someone dies in a tent: everyone who comes into the tent and everyone who is in the tent shall be unclean seven days. 15 And every ^aopen vessel that has no cover fastened on it is unclean. 16 ^bWhoever in the open field touches someone who was killed with a sword or who died naturally, or touches a human bone or a ^cgrave, shall be unclean seven days. 17 For the unclean they shall take ^dsome ashes of the burnt sin offering, and fresh¹ water shall be added in a vessel. 18 Then a clean person shall take ^ehyssop and dip it in the water and sprinkle it on the tent and on all the furnishings and on the persons who were there and on whoever touched the bone, or the slain or the dead or the grave. 19 And the clean person shall sprinkle it on the unclean ^fon the third day and on the seventh day. ^gThus on the seventh day he shall cleanse him, and he shall ^hwash his clothes and bathe himself in water, and at evening he shall be clean.

20 “If the man who is unclean does not cleanse himself, ⁱthat person shall be cut off from the midst of the assembly, since he has defiled the sanctuary of the Lord. Because the water for impurity has not been thrown on him, he is unclean. 21 And it shall be a statute forever for them. The one who sprinkles the water for impurity shall wash his clothes, and the one who touches the water for impurity shall be unclean until evening. 22 And ^jwhatever the unclean person touches shall be unclean, and anyone who touches it shall be unclean until evening.”

In God I Trust

To the choirmaster: according to The Dove on Far-off Terebinths. A ^pMiktam¹ of David, when the ^qPhilistines seized him in Gath.

Let Your Glory Be over All the Earth

To the choirmaster: according to ⁱDo Not Destroy. A ^jMiktam⁵ of David, when he fled from Saul, in ^kthe cave.

The Coming Assyrian Invasion

1 Then the Lord said to me, “Take a large tablet ^wand write on it in common characters,¹ ‘Belonging to Maher-shalal-hash-baz.’² 2 And ^xI will get reliable witnesses, ^yUriah the priest and Zechariah the son of Jeberechiah, to attest for me.”

3 And I went to the prophetess, and she conceived and bore a son. Then the Lord said to me, ^z“Call his name Maher-shalal-hash-baz; 4 ^afor before the boy knows how to cry ‘My father’ or ‘My mother,’ the ^awealth of ^bDamascus and the spoil of ^bSamaria will be carried away before the king of Assyria.”

5 The Lord spoke to me again: 6 “Because this people has refused the waters of ^cShiloah that flow gently, and rejoice over ^dRezin and the son of Remaliah, 7 therefore, behold, the Lord is bringing up against them ^ethe waters of ^fthe River,³ mighty and many, the king of Assyria and all his glory. And it ^gwill rise over all its channels and go over all its banks, 8 and it will sweep on into Judah, it will overflow and pass on, ^hreaching even to the neck, and its ⁱoutspread wings will fill the breadth of your land, ^jO Immanuel.”

Fear God, Wait for the Lord

11 For the Lord spoke thus to me with his strong hand upon me, and ⁿwarned me not to walk in the way of this people, saying: 12 “Do not call ^oconspiracy all that this people calls conspiracy, and ^pdo not fear what they fear, nor be in dread. 13 But the Lord of hosts, ^qhim you shall honor as holy. Let him be your fear, and let him be your dread. 14 And he will become a ^rsanctuary and ^sa stone of offense and a rock of stumbling to both houses of Israel, a trap and a snare to the inhabitants of Jerusalem. 15 And many ^tshall stumble on it. They shall fall and be broken; they shall be snared and taken.”

16 Bind up ^uthe testimony; ^vseal the teaching⁷ among my disciples. 17 I will ^wwait for the Lord, who is ^xhiding his face from the house of Jacob, and I will hope in him. 18 ^yBehold, I and ^zthe children whom the Lord has given me are signs and portents in Israel from the Lord of hosts, who dwells on Mount Zion. 19 And when they say to you, “Inquire of the ^amediums and the necromancers who chirp and mutter,” should not a people inquire of their God? Should they inquire of ^bthe dead on behalf of the living? 20 ^cTo the teaching and to the testimony! If they will not speak according to this word, it is because they have no ^ddawn. 21 They will pass through the land,⁸ greatly distressed and hungry. And when they are hungry, they will be enraged and will speak contemptuously against⁹ their king and their God, and turn their faces upward. 22 ^eAnd they will look to the earth, but behold, distress and darkness, the gloom of anguish. And they will be thrust into ^fthick darkness.

For to Us a Child Is Born

1 ¹⁰ But there will be no ^ggloom for her who was in anguish. In the former time he ^hbrought into contempt the land of ⁱZebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the latter time he ^jhas made glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations.¹¹

The Sin of Partiality

1 My brothers,^{1 w}show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, ^xthe Lord of glory. 2 For if a man wearing a gold ring and fine clothing comes into your assembly, and a poor man in shabby clothing also comes in, 3 and if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine clothing and say, “You sit here in a good place,” ^ywhile you say to the poor man, “You stand over there,” or, “Sit down at my feet,” 4 have you not then made distinctions among yourselves and become ^zjudges with evil thoughts? 5 Listen, my beloved brothers, ^ahas not God chosen those who are poor in the world to be ^brich in faith and heirs of ^cthe kingdom, ^dwhich he has promised to those who love him? 6 But you ^ehave dishonored the poor man. Are not the rich the ones who oppress you, and the ones who ^fdrag you ^ginto court? 7 Are they not the ones who blaspheme the honorable ^hname by which you were called?

8 If you really fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture, ⁱ“You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing well. 9 But if you ^jshow partiality, you are committing sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors. 10 For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point ^khas become guilty of all of it. 11 For he who said, ^l“Do not commit adultery,” also said, ^l“Do not murder.” If you do not commit adultery but do murder, you have become a transgressor of the law. 12 So speak and so act as those who are to be judged under ^mthe law of liberty. 13 For ⁿjudgment is without mercy to one who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment.

Faith Without Works Is Dead

14 What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith ^obut does not have works? Can that faith save him? 15 ^pIf a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, 16 ^qand one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good² is that? 17 So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.

18 But someone will say, “You have faith and I have works.” Show me your faith ^rapart from your works, and I will show you my faith ^sby my works. 19 ^tYou believe that God is one; you do well. Even ^uthe demons believe—and shudder! 20 Do you want to be shown, you foolish person, that faith apart from works is useless? 21 ^vWas not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered up his son Isaac on the altar? 22 You see that ^wfaith was active along with his works, and faith was completed ^xby his works; 23 and the Scripture was fulfilled that says, ^y“Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness”—and he was called a ^zfriend of God. 24 You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone. 25 And in the same way was not also ^aRahab the prostitute justified by works ^bwhen she received the messengers and sent them out by another way? 26 For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, so also faith apart from works is dead.