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Psalm 15

1  Lord, who may dwell in your tabernacle? ♦︎
   Who may rest upon your holy hill?
2  Whoever leads an uncorrupt life ♦︎
   and does the thing that is right;
3  Who speaks the truth from the heart ♦︎
   and bears no deceit on the tongue;
4  Who does no evil to a friend ♦︎
   and pours no scorn on a neighbour;
5  In whose sight the wicked are not esteemed, ♦︎
   but who honours those who fear the Lord.
6  Whoever has sworn to a neighbour ♦︎
   and never goes back on that word;
7  Who does not lend money in hope of gain, ♦︎
   nor takes a bribe against the innocent;
8  Whoever does these things ♦︎
   shall never fall.

15 Then Moses turned and went down from the mountain, carrying the two tablets of the covenant^* in his hands, tablets that were written on both sides, written on the front and on the back. ¹⁶The tablets were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, engraved upon the tablets. ¹⁷When Joshua heard the noise of the people as they shouted, he said to Moses, ‘There is a noise of war in the camp.’ ¹⁸But he said,
‘It is not the sound made by victors,
or the sound made by losers;
it is the sound of revellers that I hear.’
¹⁹As soon as he came near the camp and saw the calf and the dancing, Moses’ anger burned hot, and he threw the tablets from his hands and broke them at the foot of the mountain. ²⁰He took the calf that they had made, burned it with fire, ground it to powder, scattered it on the water, and made the Israelites drink it.

21 Moses said to Aaron, ‘What did this people do to you that you have brought so great a sin upon them?’ ²²And Aaron said, ‘Do not let the anger of my lord burn hot; you know the people, that they are bent on evil. ²³They said to me, “Make us gods, who shall go before us; as for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.” ²⁴So I said to them, “Whoever has gold, take it off ”; so they gave it to me, and I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf!’

25 When Moses saw that the people were running wild (for Aaron had let them run wild, to the derision of their enemies), ²⁶then Moses stood in the gate of the camp, and said, ‘Who is on the Lord’s side? Come to me!’ And all the sons of Levi gathered around him. ²⁷He said to them, ‘Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, “Put your sword on your side, each of you! Go back and forth from gate to gate throughout the camp, and each of you kill your brother, your friend, and your neighbour.” ’ ²⁸The sons of Levi did as Moses commanded, and about three thousand of the people fell on that day. ²⁹Moses said, ‘Today you have ordained yourselves^* for the service of the Lord, each one at the cost of a son or a brother, and so have brought a blessing on yourselves this day.’

30 On the next day Moses said to the people, ‘You have sinned a great sin. But now I will go up to the Lord; perhaps I can make atonement for your sin.’ ³¹So Moses returned to the Lord and said, ‘Alas, this people has sinned a great sin; they have made for themselves gods of gold. ³²But now, if you will only forgive their sin—but if not, blot me out of the book that you have written.’ ³³But the Lord said to Moses, ‘Whoever has sinned against me I will blot out of my book. ³⁴But now go, lead the people to the place about which I have spoken to you; see, my angel shall go in front of you. Nevertheless, when the day comes for punishment, I will punish them for their sin.’

35 Then the Lord sent a plague on the people, because they made the calf—the one that Aaron made.

Poverty and Riches

9 Let the believer^* who is lowly boast in being raised up, ¹⁰and the rich in being brought low, because the rich will disappear like a flower in the field. ¹¹For the sun rises with its scorching heat and withers the field; its flower falls, and its beauty perishes. It is the same with the rich; in the midst of a busy life, they will wither away.

Trial and Temptation

12 Blessed is anyone who endures temptation. Such a one has stood the test and will receive the crown of life that the Lord^* has promised to those who love him. ¹³No one, when tempted, should say, ‘I am being tempted by God’; for God cannot be tempted by evil and he himself tempts no one. ¹⁴But one is tempted by one’s own desire, being lured and enticed by it; ¹⁵then, when that desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and that sin, when it is fully grown, gives birth to death. ¹⁶Do not be deceived, my beloved.^*