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Psalm 37

1  Fret not because of evildoers; ♦︎
   be not jealous of those who do wrong.
2  For they shall soon wither like grass ♦︎
   and like the green herb fade away.
3  Trust in the Lord and be doing good; ♦︎
   dwell in the land and be nourished with truth.
4  Let your delight be in the Lord ♦︎
   and he will give you your heart’s desire.
5  Commit your way to the Lord and put your trust in him, ♦︎
   and he will bring it to pass.
6  He will make your righteousness as clear as the light ♦︎
   and your just dealing as the noonday.
7  Be still before the Lord and wait for him; ♦︎
   do not fret over those that prosper
      as they follow their evil schemes.
8  Refrain from anger and abandon wrath; ♦︎
   do not fret, lest you be moved to do evil.
9  For evildoers shall be cut off, ♦︎
   but those who wait upon the Lord shall possess the land.
10  Yet a little while and the wicked shall be no more; ♦︎
   you will search for their place and find them gone.
11  But the lowly shall possess the land ♦︎
   and shall delight in abundance of peace.
12  The wicked plot against the righteous ♦︎
   and gnash at them with their teeth.
13  The Lord shall laugh at the wicked, ♦︎
   for he sees that their day is coming.
14  The wicked draw their sword and bend their bow
      to strike down the poor and needy, ♦︎
   to slaughter those who walk in truth.
15  Their sword shall go through their own heart ♦︎
   and their bows shall be broken.
16  The little that the righteous have ♦︎
   is better than great riches of the wicked.
17  For the arms of the wicked shall be broken, ♦︎
   but the Lord upholds the righteous.

Spies Sent into Canaan

13The Lord said to Moses, ²‘Send men to spy out the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the Israelites; from each of their ancestral tribes you shall send a man, every one a leader among them.’ ³So Moses sent them from the wilderness of Paran, according to the command of the Lord, all of them leading men among the Israelites.

21 So they went up and spied out the land from the wilderness of Zin to Rehob, near Lebo-hamath. ²²They went up into the Negeb, and came to Hebron; and Ahiman, Sheshai, and Talmai, the Anakites, were there. (Hebron was built seven years before Zoan in Egypt.) ²³And they came to the Wadi Eshcol, and cut down from there a branch with a single cluster of grapes, and they carried it on a pole between two of them. They also brought some pomegranates and figs. ²⁴That place was called the Wadi Eshcol,^* because of the cluster that the Israelites cut down from there.

The Report of the Spies

25 At the end of forty days they returned from spying out the land. ²⁶And they came to Moses and Aaron and to all the congregation of the Israelites in the wilderness of Paran, at Kadesh; they brought back word to them and to all the congregation, and showed them the fruit of the land. ²⁷And they told him, ‘We came to the land to which you sent us; it flows with milk and honey, and this is its fruit. ²⁸Yet the people who live in the land are strong, and the towns are fortified and very large; and besides, we saw the descendants of Anak there. ²⁹The Amalekites live in the land of the Negeb; the Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites live in the hill country; and the Canaanites live by the sea, and along the Jordan.’

30 But Caleb quieted the people before Moses, and said, ‘Let us go up at once and occupy it, for we are well able to overcome it.’ ³¹Then the men who had gone up with him said, ‘We are not able to go up against this people, for they are stronger than we are.’ ³²So they brought to the Israelites an unfavourable report of the land that they had spied out, saying, ‘The land that we have gone through as spies is a land that devours its inhabitants; and all the people that we saw in it are of great size. ³³There we saw the Nephilim (the Anakites come from the Nephilim); and to ourselves we seemed like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.’

The People Rebel

14Then all the congregation raised a loud cry, and the people wept that night. ²And all the Israelites complained against Moses and Aaron; the whole congregation said to them, ‘Would that we had died in the land of Egypt! Or would that we had died in this wilderness! ³Why is the Lord bringing us into this land to fall by the sword? Our wives and our little ones will become booty; would it not be better for us to go back to Egypt?’ ⁴So they said to one another, ‘Let us choose a captain, and go back to Egypt.’

5 Then Moses and Aaron fell on their faces before all the assembly of the congregation of the Israelites. ⁶And Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Jephunneh, who were among those who had spied out the land, tore their clothes ⁷and said to all the congregation of the Israelites, ‘The land that we went through as spies is an exceedingly good land. ⁸If the Lord is pleased with us, he will bring us into this land and give it to us, a land that flows with milk and honey. ⁹Only, do not rebel against the Lord; and do not fear the people of the land, for they are no more than bread for us; their protection is removed from them, and the Lord is with us; do not fear them.’ ¹⁰But the whole congregation threatened to stone them.

Then the glory of the Lord appeared at the tent of meeting to all the Israelites.

25 Circumcision indeed is of value if you obey the law; but if you break the law, your circumcision has become uncircumcision. ²⁶So, if those who are uncircumcised keep the requirements of the law, will not their uncircumcision be regarded as circumcision? ²⁷Then those who are physically uncircumcised but keep the law will condemn you that have the written code and circumcision but break the law. ²⁸For a person is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is true circumcision something external and physical. ²⁹Rather, a person is a Jew who is one inwardly, and real circumcision is a matter of the heart—it is spiritual and not literal. Such a person receives praise not from others but from God.

3Then what advantage has the Jew? Or what is the value of circumcision? ²Much, in every way. For in the first place the Jews^* were entrusted with the oracles of God. ³What if some were unfaithful? Will their faithlessness nullify the faithfulness of God? ⁴By no means! Although everyone is a liar, let God be proved true, as it is written,
‘So that you may be justified in your words,
   and prevail in your judging.’^*
5But if our injustice serves to confirm the justice of God, what should we say? That God is unjust to inflict wrath on us? (I speak in a human way.) ⁶By no means! For then how could God judge the world? ⁷But if through my falsehood God’s truthfulness abounds to his glory, why am I still being condemned as a sinner? ⁸And why not say (as some people slander us by saying that we say), ‘Let us do evil so that good may come’? Their condemnation is deserved!