Scripture Readings

The Season After Pentecost
Proper 24 (29) in Year C
For the Sunday during 16 through 22 October

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)

     “The days are coming,” declares the LORD, “when I will plant the house of Israel and the house of Judah with the offspring of men and of animals. Just as I watched over them to uproot and tear down, and to overthrow, destroy and bring disaster, so I will watch over them to build and to plant,” declares the LORD. ”In those days people will no longer say,
‘The fathers have eaten sour grapes,
     and the children’s teeth are set on edge.’
Instead, everyone will die for his own sin; whoever eats sour grapes—his own teeth will be set on edge.
“The time is coming,” declares the LORD,
     “when I will make a new covenant
with the house of Israel
     and with the house of Judah.
It will not be like the covenant
     I made with their forefathers
when I took them by the hand
     to lead them out of Egypt,
because they broke my covenant,
     though I was a husband to them,”
     declares the LORD.
“This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel
     after that time,” declares the LORD.
“I will put my law in their minds
     and write it on their hearts.
I will be their God,
     and they will be my people.
No longer will a man teach his neighbor,
     or a man his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’
because they will all know me,
     from the least of them to the greatest,”
     declares the LORD.
“For I will forgive their wickedness
     and will remember their sins no more.”
—Jeremiah 31:27-34, NIV

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Psalm (Alternate One)

Oh, how I love your law!
     I meditate on it all day long.
Your commands make me wiser than my enemies,
     for they are ever with me.
I have more insight than all my teachers,
     for I meditate on your statutes.
I have more understanding than the elders,
     for I obey your precepts.
I have kept my feet from every evil path
     so that I might obey your word.
I have not departed from your laws,
     for you yourself have taught me.
How sweet are your words to my taste,
     sweeter than honey to my mouth!
I gain understanding from your precepts;
     therefore I hate every wrong path.
—Psalm 119:97-104, NIV

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Old Testament (Alternate Two)

     That night Jacob got up and took his two wives, his two maidservants and his eleven sons and crossed the ford of the Jabbok. After he had sent them across the stream, he sent over all his possessions. So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak. When the man saw that he could not overpower him, he touched the socket of Jacob’s hip so that his hip was wrenched as he wrestled with the man. Then the man said, “Let me go, for it is daybreak.”
     But Jacob replied, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.”
     The man asked him, “What is your name?”
     “Jacob,” he answered.
     Then the man said, “Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with men and have overcome.”
     Jacob said, “Please tell me your name.”
     But he replied, “Why do you ask my name?” Then he blessed him there.
     So Jacob called the place Peniel, saying, “It is because I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared.”
     The sun rose above him as he passed Peniel, and he was limping because of his hip.
—Genesis 32:22-31, NIV

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Psalm (Alternate Two)

I lift up my eyes to the hills—
     where does my help come from?
My help comes from the LORD,
     the Maker of heaven and earth.
He will not let your foot slip—
     he who watches over you will not slumber;
indeed, he who watches over Israel
     will neither slumber nor sleep.
The LORD watches over you—
     the LORD is your shade at your right hand;
the sun will not harm you by day,
     nor the moon by night.
The LORD will keep you from all harm—
     he will watch over your life;
the LORD will watch over your coming and going
     both now and forevermore.
—Psalm 121, NIV

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Epistle

But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, and how from infancy you have known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.
In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who will judge the living and the dead, and in view of his appearing and his kingdom, I give you this charge: Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths. But you, keep your head in all situations, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, discharge all the duties of your ministry.
—2 Timothy 3:14-4:5, NIV

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Gospel

     Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. He said: “In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared about men. And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with the plea, ‘Grant me justice against my adversary.’
     “For some time he refused. But finally he said to himself, ‘Even though I don’t fear God or care about men, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won’t eventually wear me out with her coming!’”
     And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?”
—Luke 18:1-8, NIV

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