Thursday in Season after Pentecost

1Verse 1. This is Solomon’s Song of Songs. 2Verse 2. Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth! For your love is more delightful than wine. 3Verse 3. The fragrance of your perfume is pleasing; your name is like perfume poured out. No wonder the maidens adore you. 4Verse 4. Take me away with you— let us hurry! May the king bring me to his chambers. We will rejoice and delight in you; we will praise your love more than wine. It is only right that they adore you. 5Verse 5. I am dark, yet lovely, O daughters of Jerusalem, like the tents of Kedar, like the curtains of Solomon. 6Verse 6. Do not stare because I am dark, for the sun has gazed upon me. My mother’s sons were angry with me; they made me a keeper of the vineyards, but my own vineyard I have neglected. 7Verse 7. Tell me, O one I love, where do you pasture your sheep? Where do you rest them at midday? Why should I be like a veiled woman beside the flocks of your companions? 8Verse 8. If you do not know, O fairest of women, follow the tracks of the flock, and graze your young goats near the tents of the shepherds. 9Verse 9. I compare you, my darling, to a mare among Pharaoh’s chariots. 10Verse 10. Your cheeks are beautiful with ornaments, your neck with strings of jewels. 11Verse 11. We will make you ornaments of gold, studded with beads of silver. 12Verse 12. While the king was at his table, my perfume spread its fragrance. 13Verse 13. My beloved is to me a sachet of myrrh resting between my breasts. 14Verse 14. My beloved is to me a cluster of henna blossoms in the vineyards of En-gedi. 15Verse 15. How beautiful you are, my darling! Oh, how very beautiful! Your eyes are like doves. 16Verse 16. How handsome you are, my beloved! Oh, how delightful! The soft grass is our bed. 17Verse 17. The beams of our house are cedars; our rafters are fragrant firs.

1Verse 1. Now when the people saw that Moses was delayed in coming down from the mountain, they gathered around Aaron and said, “Come, make us gods who will go before us. As for this Moses who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has happened to him!” 2Verse 2. So Aaron told them, “Take off the gold earrings that are on your wives and sons and daughters, and bring them to me.” 3Verse 3. Then all the people took off their gold earrings and brought them to Aaron. 4Verse 4. He took the gold from their hands, and with an engraving tool he fashioned it into a molten calf. And they said, “These, O Israel, are your gods, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!” 5Verse 5. When Aaron saw this, he built an altar before the calf and proclaimed: “Tomorrow shall be a feast to the LORD.” 6Verse 6. So the next day they arose, offered burnt offerings, and presented peace offerings. And the people sat down to eat and drink and got up to indulge in revelry. 7Verse 7. Then the LORD said to Moses, “Go down at once, for your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves. 8Verse 8. How quickly they have turned aside from the way that I commanded them! They have made for themselves a molten calf and have bowed down to it. They have sacrificed to it and said, ‘These, O Israel, are your gods, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt.’” 9Verse 9. The LORD also said to Moses, “I have seen this people, and they are indeed a stiff-necked people. 10Verse 10. Now leave Me alone, so that My anger may burn against them and consume them. Then I will make you into a great nation.” 11Verse 11. But Moses sought the favor of the LORD his God, saying, “O LORD, why does Your anger burn against Your people, whom You brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and a mighty hand? 12Verse 12. Why should the Egyptians declare, ‘He brought them out with evil intent, to kill them in the mountains and wipe them from the face of the earth’? Turn from Your fierce anger and relent from doing harm to Your people. 13Verse 13. Remember Your servants Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, to whom You swore by Your very self when You declared, ‘I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky, and I will give your descendants all this land that I have promised, and it shall be their inheritance forever.’” 14Verse 14. So the LORD relented from the calamity He had threatened to bring on His people.