Scripture Readings

The Season After Pentecost
Proper 7 (12) in Year C
For the Sunday during 19 through 25 June

Scripture readings are taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION® NIV® ©1973, 1978, 1984 by the International Bible Society, used by permission of Zondervan Bible Publishers. All rights reserved.

Alternate One:
Old Testament
Psalm

Alternate Two:
Old Testament
Psalm

Epistle Reading
Gospel Reading

Old Testament (Alternate One)

     Now Ahab told Jezebel everything Elijah had done and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword. So Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah to say, “May the gods deal with me, be it ever so severely, if by this time tomorrow I do not make your life like that of one of them.”
     Elijah was afraid and ran for his life. When he came to Beersheba in Judah, he left his servant there, while he himself went a day’s journey into the desert. He came to a broom tree, sat down under it and prayed that he might die. “I have had enough, LORD,” he said. “Take my life; I am no better than my ancestors.” Then he lay down under the tree and fell asleep.
     All at once an angel touched him and said, “Get up and eat.” He looked around, and there by his head was a cake of bread baked over hot coals, and a jar of water. He ate and drank and then lay down again.
     The angel of the LORD came back a second time and touched him and said, “Get up and eat, for the journey is too much for you.” So he got up and ate and drank. Strengthened by that food, he traveled forty days and forty nights until he reached Horeb, the mountain of God. There he went into a cave and spent the night.
     And the word of the LORD came to him: “What are you doing here, Elijah?”
     He replied, “I have been very zealous for the LORD God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, broken down your altars, and put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me too.”
     The LORD said, “Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the LORD, for the LORD is about to pass by.”
     Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake came a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave.
     Then a voice said to him, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”
     He replied, “I have been very zealous for the LORD God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, broken down your altars, and put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me too.”
     The LORD said to him, “Go back the way you came, and go to the Desert of Damascus.”
—1 Kings 19:1-15a, NIV

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Psalm (Alternate One)

As the deer pants for streams of water,
     so my soul pants for you, O God.
My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.
     When can I go and meet with God?
My tears have been my food
     day and night,
while men say to me all day long,
     “Where is your God?”
These things I remember
     as I pour out my soul:
how I used to go with the multitude,
     leading the procession to the house of God,
with shouts of joy and thanksgiving
     among the festive throng.
Why are you downcast, O my soul?
     Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
     for I will yet praise him,
     my Savior and my God.
My soul is downcast within me;
     therefore I will remember you
from the land of the Jordan,
     the heights of Hermon—from Mount Mizar.
Deep calls to deep
     in the roar of your waterfalls;
all your waves and breakers
     have swept over me.
By day the LORD directs his love,
     at night his song is with me—
     a prayer to the God of my life.
I say to God my Rock,
     “Why have you forgotten me?
Why must I go about mourning,
     oppressed by the enemy?”
My bones suffer mortal agony
     as my foes taunt me,
saying to me all day long,
     “Where is your God?”
Why are you downcast, O my soul?
     Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
     for I will yet praise him,
     my Savior and my God.
—Psalm 42, NIV

As the deer pants for streams of water,
     so my soul pants for you, O God.
My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.
     When can I go and meet with God?
My tears have been my food
     day and night,
while men say to me all day long,
     “Where is your God?”
These things I remember
     as I pour out my soul:
how I used to go with the multitude,
     leading the procession to the house of God,
with shouts of joy and thanksgiving
     among the festive throng.
Why are you downcast, O my soul?
     Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
     for I will yet praise him,
     my Savior and my God.
My soul is downcast within me;
     therefore I will remember you
from the land of the Jordan,
     the heights of Hermon—from Mount Mizar.
Deep calls to deep
     in the roar of your waterfalls;
all your waves and breakers
     have swept over me.
By day the LORD directs his love,
     at night his song is with me—
     a prayer to the God of my life.
I say to God my Rock,
     “Why have you forgotten me?
Why must I go about mourning,
     oppressed by the enemy?”
My bones suffer mortal agony
     as my foes taunt me,
saying to me all day long,
     “Where is your God?”
Why are you downcast, O my soul?
     Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
     for I will yet praise him,
     my Savior and my God.
—Psalm 43, NIV

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Old Testament (Alternate Two)

“I revealed myself to those who did not ask for me;
     I was found by those who did not seek me.
To a nation that did not call on my name,
     I said, ‘Here am I, here am I.’
All day long I have held out my hands
     to an obstinate people,
who walk in ways not good,
     pursuing their own imaginations—
a people who continually provoke me
     to my very face,
offering sacrifices in gardens
     and burning incense on altars of brick;
who sit among the graves
     and spend their nights keeping secret vigil;
who eat the flesh of pigs,
     and whose pots hold broth of unclean meat;
who say, ‘Keep away; don’t come near me,
     for I am too sacred for you!’
Such people are smoke in my nostrils,
     a fire that keeps burning all day.
“See, it stands written before me:
     I will not keep silent but will pay back in full;
     I will pay it back into their laps—
both your sins and the sins of your fathers,”
     says the LORD.
“Because they burned sacrifices on the mountains
     and defied me on the hills,
I will measure into their laps
     the full payment for their former deeds.”
     This is what the LORD says:
“As when juice is still found in a cluster of grapes
     and men say, ‘Don’t destroy it,
     there is yet some good in it,’
so will I do in behalf of my servants;
     I will not destroy them all.
I will bring forth descendants from Jacob,
     and from Judah those who will possess my mountains;
my chosen people will inherit them,
     and there will my servants live.
—Isaiah 65:1-9, NIV

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Psalm (Alternate Two)

But you, O LORD, be not far off;
     O my Strength, come quickly to help me.
Deliver my life from the sword,
     my precious life from the power of the dogs.
Rescue me from the mouth of the lions;
     save me from the horns of the wild oxen.
I will declare your name to my brothers;
     in the congregation I will praise you.
You who fear the LORD, praise him!
     All you descendants of Jacob, honor him!
     Revere him, all you descendants of Israel!
For he has not despised or disdained
     the suffering of the afflicted one;
he has not hidden his face from him
     but has listened to his cry for help.
From you comes the theme of my praise in the great assembly;
     before those who fear you will I fulfill my vows.
The poor will eat and be satisfied;
     they who seek the LORD will praise him—
     may your hearts live forever!
All the ends of the earth
     will remember and turn to the LORD,
and all the families of the nations
     will bow down before him,
for dominion belongs to the LORD
     and he rules over the nations.
—Psalm 22:19-28, NIV

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Epistle

Before this faith came, we were held prisoners by the law, locked up until faith should be revealed. So the law was put in charge to lead us to Christ that we might be justified by faith. Now that faith has come, we are no longer under the supervision of the law.
You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.
—Galatians 3:23-29, NIV

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Gospel

     They sailed to the region of the Gerasenes, which is across the lake from Galilee. When Jesus stepped ashore, he was met by a demon-possessed man from the town. For a long time this man had not worn clothes or lived in a house, but had lived in the tombs. When he saw Jesus, he cried out and fell at his feet, shouting at the top of his voice, “What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, don’t torture me!” For Jesus had commanded the evil spirit to come out of the man. Many times it had seized him, and though he was chained hand and foot and kept under guard, he had broken his chains and had been driven by the demon into solitary places.
     Jesus asked him, “What is your name?”
     “Legion,” he replied, because many demons had gone into him. And they begged him repeatedly not to order them to go into the Abyss.
     A large herd of pigs was feeding there on the hillside. The demons begged Jesus to let them go into them, and he gave them permission. When the demons came out of the man, they went into the pigs, and the herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and was drowned.
     When those tending the pigs saw what had happened, they ran off and reported this in the town and countryside, and the people went out to see what had happened. When they came to Jesus, they found the man from whom the demons had gone out, sitting at Jesus’ feet, dressed and in his right mind; and they were afraid. Those who had seen it told the people how the demon-possessed man had been cured. Then all the people of the region of the Gerasenes asked Jesus to leave them, because they were overcome with fear. So he got into the boat and left.
     The man from whom the demons had gone out begged to go with him, but Jesus sent him away, saying, “Return home and tell how much God has done for you.” So the man went away and told all over town how much Jesus had done for him.
—Luke 8:26-39, NIV

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