Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

²² Moses at Sinai. These are the things that the Lord proclaimed in a loud voice to your whole assembly on the mountain from the midst of the flame, out of the cloud and the deep darkness, this and nothing more. He then wrote them on two stone tablets and gave them to me. ²³ When you heard the voice coming out of the darkness, while the mountain was blazing with fire,^[a] all of the leaders of your tribes and your elders drew near to me.

²⁴ You said, “The Lord, our God, has shown us his glory and his majesty. We have heard his voice coming forth from out of the fire. Today we have seen that a man can live even if God were to speak to him. ²⁵ But now, why should we die, for this great fire will consume us if we listen anymore to the voice of the Lord, our God? We will surely die. ²⁶ For what mortal has ever heard the voice of the living God speaking out from the midst of the flames, as we have, and continued to live? ²⁷ You approach him and listen to all that the Lord, our God, will say to you. Then you can tell us all that the Lord, our God, said to you. We will listen and obey.”

²⁸ The Lord heard what you said to me, and the Lord said to me, “I have heard what this people has said to you. Everything that they said is acceptable. ²⁹ Oh, that they would have fear of me in their hearts and they would observe all of my commandments always. Then things would go well with them and their children forever. ³⁰ Go tell them, ‘Go back to your tents.’ ³¹ But you, stay here with me, so that I can pass on to you all of the commandments and statutes and decrees that you are to teach them so that they might observe them in the land that I am giving to them to possess. ³² Therefore, be careful to observe what the Lord, your God, has commanded of you. Do not turn away from it to the right nor the left. ³³ Continue in all of the ways that the Lord, your God, has commanded you. Continue in them so that you may live and prosper and that you may long dwell on the land of your inheritance.”

Chapter 4

The Sabbath Rest of God’s People.^{[a] 1} Therefore, since the promise of entering into his rest endures, we must take care that none of you be judged to have fallen short. ² For we too have received the good news just as they did, but the message they heard was of no benefit to them because those who listened did not combine it with faith. ³ For we who have faith enter into that rest, just as God has said:

Yet God’s work had been finished at the beginning of the world. ⁴ For somewhere he says in reference to the seventh day, “And God rested on the seventh day from all his works.” ⁵ And in this passage it says, “They will never enter into my rest.”

⁶ Seeing, therefore, that some will enter into that rest, and since those who first had received the good news failed to enter because of their refusal to believe, ⁷ God once more set a day—“today”—when long afterward he spoke through David, as already quoted:

⁸ Now if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken afterward of another day. ⁹ Therefore, a Sabbath rest still remains for the people of God, ¹⁰ since those who enter into God’s rest also cease from their own labors as God did from his. ¹¹ Let us then make every effort to enter into that rest, so that no one may fall by following that example of refusing to believe.