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Psalm 50

1  The Lord, the most mighty God, has spoken ♦︎
   and called the world from the rising of the sun to its setting.
2  Out of Zion, perfect in beauty, God shines forth; ♦︎
   our God comes and will not keep silence.
3  Consuming fire goes out before him ♦︎
   and a mighty tempest stirs about him.
4  He calls the heaven above, ♦︎
   and the earth, that he may judge his people:
5  ‘Gather to me my faithful, ♦︎
   who have sealed my covenant with sacrifice.’
6  Let the heavens declare his righteousness, ♦︎
   for God himself is judge.
7  Hear, O my people, and I will speak: ♦︎
   ‘I will testify against you, O Israel;
      for I am God, your God.
8  ‘I will not reprove you for your sacrifices, ♦︎
   for your burnt offerings are always before me.
23  ‘You that forget God, consider this well, ♦︎
   lest I tear you apart and there is none to deliver you.
24  ‘Whoever offers me the sacrifice of thanksgiving honours me ♦︎
   and to those who keep my way
      will I show the salvation of God.’

¹⁸ For wickedness burned like a fire,
   consuming briers and thorns;
it kindled the thickets of the forest,
   and they swirled upwards in a column of smoke.
¹⁹ Through the wrath of the Lord of hosts
   the land was burned,
and the people became like fuel for the fire;
   no one spared another.
²⁰ They gorged on the right, but still were hungry,
   and they devoured on the left, but were not satisfied;
they devoured the flesh of their own kindred;^*
21 Manasseh devoured Ephraim, and Ephraim Manasseh,
   and together they were against Judah.
For all this, his anger has not turned away;
   his hand is stretched out still.

10Ah, you who make iniquitous decrees,
   who write oppressive statutes,
² to turn aside the needy from justice
   and to rob the poor of my people of their right,
that widows may be your spoil,
   and that you may make the orphans your prey!
³ What will you do on the day of punishment,
   in the calamity that will come from far away?
To whom will you flee for help,
   and where will you leave your wealth,
⁴ so as not to crouch among the prisoners
   or fall among the slain?
For all this, his anger has not turned away;
   his hand is stretched out still.

Stephen’s Speech to the Council

7Then the high priest asked him, ‘Are these things so?’ ²And Stephen replied:

‘Brothers^* and fathers, listen to me. The God of glory appeared to our ancestor Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he lived in Haran, ³and said to him, “Leave your country and your relatives and go to the land that I will show you.” ⁴Then he left the country of the Chaldeans and settled in Haran. After his father died, God had him move from there to this country in which you are now living. ⁵He did not give him any of it as a heritage, not even a foot’s length, but promised to give it to him as his possession and to his descendants after him, even though he had no child. ⁶And God spoke in these terms, that his descendants would be resident aliens in a country belonging to others, who would enslave them and maltreat them for four hundred years. ⁷“But I will judge the nation that they serve,” said God, “and after that they shall come out and worship me in this place.” ⁸Then he gave him the covenant of circumcision. And so Abraham^* became the father of Isaac and circumcised him on the eighth day; and Isaac became the father of Jacob, and Jacob of the twelve patriarchs.