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Nahum 3

Ruin Imminent and Inevitable

3Ah! City of bloodshed,
   utterly deceitful, full of booty—
   no end to the plunder!
2 The crack of whip and rumble of wheel,
   galloping horse and bounding chariot!
3 Horsemen charging,
   flashing sword and glittering spear,
piles of dead,
   heaps of corpses,
dead bodies without end—
   they stumble over the bodies!
4 Because of the countless debaucheries of the prostitute,
   gracefully alluring, mistress of sorcery,
who enslaves* nations through her debaucheries,
   and peoples through her sorcery,
5 I am against you,
   says the Lord of hosts,
   and will lift up your skirts over your face;
and I will let nations look on your nakedness
   and kingdoms on your shame.
6 I will throw filth at you
   and treat you with contempt,
   and make you a spectacle.
7 Then all who see you will shrink from you and say,
‘Nineveh is devastated; who will bemoan her?’
   Where shall I seek comforters for you?


8 Are you better than Thebes*
   that sat by the Nile,
with water around her,
   her rampart a sea,
   water her wall?
9 Ethiopia* was her strength,
   Egypt too, and that without limit;
   Put and the Libyans were her* helpers.


10 Yet she became an exile,
   she went into captivity;
even her infants were dashed in pieces
   at the head of every street;
lots were cast for her nobles,
   all her dignitaries were bound in fetters.
11 You also will be drunken,
   you will go into hiding;*
you will seek
   a refuge from the enemy.
12 All your fortresses are like fig trees
   with first-ripe figs—
if shaken they fall
   into the mouth of the eater.
13 Look at your troops:
   they are women in your midst.
The gates of your land
   are wide open to your foes;
   fire has devoured the bars of your gates.


14 Draw water for the siege,
   strengthen your forts;
trample the clay,
   tread the mortar,
   take hold of the brick-mould!
15 There the fire will devour you,
   the sword will cut you off.
   It will devour you like the locust.


Multiply yourselves like the locust,
   multiply like the grasshopper!
16 You increased your merchants
   more than the stars of the heavens.
   The locust sheds its skin and flies away.
17 Your guards are like grasshoppers,
   your scribes like swarms* of locusts
settling on the fences
   on a cold day—
when the sun rises, they fly away;
   no one knows where they have gone.


18 Your shepherds are asleep,
   O king of Assyria;
   your nobles slumber.
Your people are scattered on the mountains
   with no one to gather them.
19 There is no assuaging your hurt,
   your wound is mortal.
All who hear the news about you
   clap their hands over you.
For who has ever escaped
   your endless cruelty?

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Psalm 126

A Harvest of Joy

A Song of Ascents.
1 When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion,*
   we were like those who dream.
2 Then our mouth was filled with laughter,
   and our tongue with shouts of joy;
then it was said among the nations,
   ‘The Lord has done great things for them.’
3 The Lord has done great things for us,
   and we rejoiced.


4 Restore our fortunes, O Lord,
   like the watercourses in the Negeb.
5 May those who sow in tears
   reap with shouts of joy.
6 Those who go out weeping,
   bearing the seed for sowing,
shall come home with shouts of joy,
   carrying their sheaves.

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Mark 4

The Parable of the Sower

4Again he began to teach beside the lake. Such a very large crowd gathered around him that he got into a boat on the lake and sat there, while the whole crowd was beside the lake on the land. 2He began to teach them many things in parables, and in his teaching he said to them: 3‘Listen! A sower went out to sow. 4And as he sowed, some seed fell on the path, and the birds came and ate it up. 5Other seed fell on rocky ground, where it did not have much soil, and it sprang up quickly, since it had no depth of soil. 6And when the sun rose, it was scorched; and since it had no root, it withered away. 7Other seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it yielded no grain. 8Other seed fell into good soil and brought forth grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirty and sixty and a hundredfold.’ 9And he said, ‘Let anyone with ears to hear listen!’

The Purpose of the Parables

10 When he was alone, those who were around him along with the twelve asked him about the parables. 11And he said to them, ‘To you has been given the secret* of the kingdom of God, but for those outside, everything comes in parables; 12in order that
“they may indeed look, but not perceive,
   and may indeed listen, but not understand;
so that they may not turn again and be forgiven.”

13 And he said to them, ‘Do you not understand this parable? Then how will you understand all the parables? 14The sower sows the word. 15These are the ones on the path where the word is sown: when they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown in them. 16And these are the ones sown on rocky ground: when they hear the word, they immediately receive it with joy. 17But they have no root, and endure only for a while; then, when trouble or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately they fall away.* 18And others are those sown among the thorns: these are the ones who hear the word, 19but the cares of the world, and the lure of wealth, and the desire for other things come in and choke the word, and it yields nothing. 20And these are the ones sown on the good soil: they hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirty and sixty and a hundredfold.’

A Lamp under a Bushel Basket

21 He said to them, ‘Is a lamp brought in to be put under the bushel basket, or under the bed, and not on the lampstand? 22For there is nothing hidden, except to be disclosed; nor is anything secret, except to come to light. 23Let anyone with ears to hear listen!’ 24And he said to them, ‘Pay attention to what you hear; the measure you give will be the measure you get, and still more will be given you. 25For to those who have, more will be given; and from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away.’

The Parable of the Growing Seed

26 He also said, ‘The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, 27and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how. 28The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head. 29But when the grain is ripe, at once he goes in with his sickle, because the harvest has come.’

The Parable of the Mustard Seed

30 He also said, ‘With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable will we use for it? 31It is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth; 32yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes the greatest of all shrubs, and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.’

The Use of Parables

33 With many such parables he spoke the word to them, as they were able to hear it; 34he did not speak to them except in parables, but he explained everything in private to his disciples.

Jesus Stills a Storm

35 On that day, when evening had come, he said to them, ‘Let us go across to the other side.’ 36And leaving the crowd behind, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. Other boats were with him. 37A great gale arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat was already being swamped. 38But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke him up and said to him, ‘Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?’ 39He woke up and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!’ Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm. 40He said to them, ‘Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?’ 41And they were filled with great awe and said to one another, ‘Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?’

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30 June 2021

From the oremus Bible Browser https://bible.oremus.org v2.9.2 30 June 2021.