Blessings at Gerizim
1“Now it shall be, if you diligently obey the Lord your God, being careful to do all His commandments which I command you today, the Lord your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth. 2All these blessings will come upon you and overtake you if you obey the Lord your God:
3“Blessed shall you be in the city, and blessed shall you be in the country.
4“Blessed shall be the offspring of your body and the produce of your ground and the offspring of your beasts, the increase of your herd and the young of your flock.
5“Blessed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl.
6“Blessed shall you be when you come in, and blessed shall you be when you go out.
7“The Lord shall cause your enemies who rise up against you to be defeated before you; they will come out against you one way and will flee before you seven ways. 8The Lord will command the blessing upon you in your barns and in all that you put your hand to, and He will bless you in the land which the Lord your God gives you. 9The Lord will establish you as a holy people to Himself, as He swore to you, if you keep the commandments of the Lord your God and walk in His ways. 10So all the peoples of the earth will see that you are called by the name of the Lord, and they will be afraid of you. 11The Lord will make you abound in prosperity, in the offspring of your body and in the offspring of your beast and in the produce of your ground, in the land which the Lord swore to your fathers to give you. 12The Lord will open for you His good storehouse, the heavens, to give rain to your land in its season and to bless all the work of your hand; and you shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow. 13The Lord will make you the head and not the tail, and you only will be above, and you will not be underneath, if you listen to the commandments of the Lord your God, which I charge you today, to observe them carefully, 14and do not turn aside from any of the words which I command you today, to the right or to the left, to go after other gods to serve them.
Consequences of Disobedience
15“But it shall come about, if you do not obey the Lord your God, to observe to do all His commandments and His statutes with which I charge you today, that all these curses will come upon you and overtake you:
16“Cursed shall you be in the city, and cursed shall you be in the country.
17“Cursed shall be your basket and your kneading bowl.
18“Cursed shall be the offspring of your body and the produce of your ground, the increase of your herd and the young of your flock.
19“Cursed shall you be when you come in, and cursed shall you be when you go out.
20“The Lord will send upon you curses, confusion, and rebuke, in all you undertake to do, until you are destroyed and until you perish quickly, on account of the evil of your deeds, because you have forsaken Me. 21The Lord will make the pestilence cling to you until He has consumed you from the land where you are entering to possess it. 22The Lord will smite you with consumption and with fever and with inflammation and with fiery heat and with the sword and with blight and with mildew, and they will pursue you until you perish. 23The heaven which is over your head shall be bronze, and the earth which is under you, iron. 24The Lord will make the rain of your land powder and dust; from heaven it shall come down on you until you are destroyed.
25“The Lord shall cause you to be defeated before your enemies; you will go out one way against them, but you will flee seven ways before them, and you will be an example of terror to all the kingdoms of the earth. 26Your carcasses will be food to all birds of the sky and to the beasts of the earth, and there will be no one to frighten them away.
27“The Lord will smite you with the boils of Egypt and with tumors and with the scab and with the itch, from which you cannot be healed. 28The Lord will smite you with madness and with blindness and with bewilderment of heart; 29and you will grope at noon, as the blind man gropes in darkness, and you will not prosper in your ways; but you shall only be oppressed and robbed continually, with none to save you. 30You shall betroth a wife, but another man will violate her; you shall build a house, but you will not live in it; you shall plant a vineyard, but you will not use its fruit. 31Your ox shall be slaughtered before your eyes, but you will not eat of it; your donkey shall be torn away from you, and will not be restored to you; your sheep shall be given to your enemies, and you will have none to save you. 32Your sons and your daughters shall be given to another people, while your eyes look on and yearn for them continually; but there will be nothing you can do. 33A people whom you do not know shall eat up the produce of your ground and all your labors, and you will never be anything but oppressed and crushed continually. 34You shall be driven mad by the sight of what you see. 35The Lord will strike you on the knees and legs with sore boils, from which you cannot be healed, from the sole of your foot to the crown of your head. 36The Lord will bring you and your king, whom you set over you, to a nation which neither you nor your fathers have known, and there you shall serve other gods, wood and stone. 37You shall become a horror, a proverb, and a taunt among all the people where the Lord drives you.
38“You shall bring out much seed to the field but you will gather in little, for the locust will consume it. 39You shall plant and cultivate vineyards, but you will neither drink of the wine nor gather the grapes, for the worm will devour them. 40You shall have olive trees throughout your territory but you will not anoint yourself with the oil, for your olives will drop off. 41You shall have sons and daughters but they will not be yours, for they will go into captivity. 42The cricket shall possess all your trees and the produce of your ground. 43The alien who is among you shall rise above you higher and higher, but you will go down lower and lower. 44He shall lend to you, but you will not lend to him; he shall be the head, and you will be the tail.
45“So all these curses shall come on you and pursue you and overtake you until you are destroyed, because you would not obey the Lord your God by keeping His commandments and His statutes which He commanded you. 46They shall become a sign and a wonder on you and your descendants forever.
47“Because you did not serve the Lord your God with joy and a glad heart, for the abundance of all things; 48therefore you shall serve your enemies whom the Lord will send against you, in hunger, in thirst, in nakedness, and in the lack of all things; and He will put an iron yoke on your neck until He has destroyed you.
49“The Lord will bring a nation against you from afar, from the end of the earth, as the eagle swoops down, a nation whose language you shall not understand, 50a nation of fierce countenance who will have no respect for the old, nor show favor to the young. 51Moreover, it shall eat the offspring of your herd and the produce of your ground until you are destroyed, who also leaves you no grain, new wine, or oil, nor the increase of your herd or the young of your flock until they have caused you to perish. 52It shall besiege you in all your towns until your high and fortified walls in which you trusted come down throughout your land, and it shall besiege you in all your towns throughout your land which the Lord your God has given you. 53Then you shall eat the offspring of your own body, the flesh of your sons and of your daughters whom the Lord your God has given you, during the siege and the distress by which your enemy will oppress you. 54The man who is refined and very delicate among you shall be hostile toward his brother and toward the wife he cherishes and toward the rest of his children who remain, 55so that he will not give even one of them any of the flesh of his children which he will eat, since he has nothing else left, during the siege and the distress by which your enemy will oppress you in all your towns. 56The refined and delicate woman among you, who would not venture to set the sole of her foot on the ground for delicateness and refinement, shall be hostile toward the husband she cherishes and toward her son and daughter, 57and toward her afterbirth which issues from between her legs and toward her children whom she bears; for she will eat them secretly for lack of anything else, during the siege and the distress by which your enemy will oppress you in your towns.
58“If you are not careful to observe all the words of this law which are written in this book, to fear this honored and awesome name, the Lord your God, 59then the Lord will bring extraordinary plagues on you and your descendants, even severe and lasting plagues, and miserable and chronic sicknesses. 60He will bring back on you all the diseases of Egypt of which you were afraid, and they will cling to you. 61Also every sickness and every plague which, not written in the book of this law, the Lord will bring on you until you are destroyed. 62Then you shall be left few in number, whereas you were as numerous as the stars of heaven, because you did not obey the Lord your God. 63It shall come about that as the Lord delighted over you to prosper you, and multiply you, so the Lord will delight over you to make you perish and destroy you; and you will be torn from the land where you are entering to possess it. 64Moreover, the Lord will scatter you among all peoples, from one end of the earth to the other end of the earth; and there you shall serve other gods, wood and stone, which you or your fathers have not known. 65Among those nations you shall find no rest, and there will be no resting place for the sole of your foot; but there the Lord will give you a trembling heart, failing of eyes, and despair of soul. 66So your life shall hang in doubt before you; and you will be in dread night and day, and shall have no assurance of your life. 67In the morning you shall say, ‘Would that it were evening!’ And at evening you shall say, ‘Would that it were morning!’ because of the dread of your heart which you dread, and for the sight of your eyes which you will see. 68The Lord will bring you back to Egypt in ships, by the way about which I spoke to you, ‘You will never see it again!’ And there you will offer yourselves for sale to your enemies as male and female slaves, but there will be no buyer.”
Pharisees’ Blasphemy
14And He was casting out a demon, and it was mute; when the demon had gone out, the mute man spoke; and the crowds were amazed. 15But some of them said, “He casts out demons by Beelzebul, the ruler of the demons.” 16Others, to test Him, were demanding of Him a sign from heaven. 17But He knew their thoughts and said to them, “Any kingdom divided against itself is laid waste; and a house divided against itself falls. 18If Satan also is divided against himself, how will his kingdom stand? For you say that I cast out demons by Beelzebul. 19And if I by Beelzebul cast out demons, by whom do your sons cast them out? So they will be your judges. 20But if I cast out demons by the finger of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. 21When a strong man, fully armed, guards his own house, his possessions are undisturbed. 22But when someone stronger than he attacks him and overpowers him, he takes away from him all his armor on which he had relied and distributes his plunder. 23He who is not with Me is against Me; and he who does not gather with Me, scatters.
24“When the unclean spirit goes out of a man, it passes through waterless places seeking rest, and not finding any, it says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ 25And when it comes, it finds it swept and put in order. 26Then it goes and takes along seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they go in and live there; and the last state of that man becomes worse than the first.”
27While Jesus was saying these things, one of the women in the crowd raised her voice and said to Him, “Blessed is the womb that bore You and the breasts at which You nursed.” 28But He said, “On the contrary, blessed are those who hear the word of God and observe it.”
The Sign of Jonah
29As the crowds were increasing, He began to say, “This generation is a wicked generation; it seeks for a sign, and yet no sign will be given to it but the sign of Jonah. 30For just as Jonah became a sign to the Ninevites, so will the Son of Man be to this generation. 31The Queen of the South will rise up with the men of this generation at the judgment and condemn them, because she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and behold, something greater than Solomon is here. 32The men of Nineveh will stand up with this generation at the judgment and condemn it, because they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and behold, something greater than Jonah is here.
33“No one, after lighting a lamp, puts it away in a cellar nor under a basket, but on the lampstand, so that those who enter may see the light. 34The eye is the lamp of your body; when your eye is clear, your whole body also is full of light; but when it is bad, your body also is full of darkness. 35Then watch out that the light in you is not darkness. 36If therefore your whole body is full of light, with no dark part in it, it will be wholly illumined, as when the lamp illumines you with its rays.”
PSALM 77
Comfort in Trouble from Recalling God’s Mighty Deeds.
For the choir director; according to Jeduthun. A Psalm of Asaph.
1My voice rises to God, and I will cry aloud;
My voice rises to God, and He will hear me.
2In the day of my trouble I sought the Lord;
In the night my hand was stretched out without weariness;
My soul refused to be comforted.
3When I remember God, then I am disturbed;
When I sigh, then my spirit grows faint. Selah.
4You have held my eyelids open;
I am so troubled that I cannot speak.
5I have considered the days of old,
The years of long ago.
6I will remember my song in the night;
I will meditate with my heart,
And my spirit ponders:
7Will the Lord reject forever?
And will He never be favorable again?
8Has His lovingkindness ceased forever?
Has His promise come to an end forever?
9Has God forgotten to be gracious,
Or has He in anger withdrawn His compassion? Selah.
10Then I said, “It is my grief,
That the right hand of the Most High has changed.”
11I shall remember the deeds of the Lord;
Surely I will remember Your wonders of old.
12I will meditate on all Your work
And muse on Your deeds.
13Your way, O God, is holy;
What god is great like our God?
14You are the God who works wonders;
You have made known Your strength among the peoples.
15You have by Your power redeemed Your people,
The sons of Jacob and Joseph. Selah.
16The waters saw You, O God;
The waters saw You, they were in anguish;
The deeps also trembled.
17The clouds poured out water;
The skies gave forth a sound;
Your arrows flashed here and there.
18The sound of Your thunder was in the whirlwind;
The lightnings lit up the world;
The earth trembled and shook.
19Your way was in the sea
And Your paths in the mighty waters,
And Your footprints may not be known.
20You led Your people like a flock
By the hand of Moses and Aaron.
18There is one who speaks rashly like the thrusts of a sword,
But the tongue of the wise brings healing.