Scripture Reading for the
Common Calendar Year
(beginning January 1st)

March 26

Text taken from the
Third Millennium Bible^® (TMB^®)
(New Authorized Version^TM NAV^TM)

The Lectionary According to the Common Calendar

Psalm 78:1-16 

1 Give ear, O my people, to my law;
incline your ears to the words of my mouth. 
2 I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter dark sayings of old, 
3 which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us. 
4 We will not hide them from their children, showing to the generation to come 
the praises of the LORD and His strength, and His wonderful works that He hath done. 
5 For He established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel,
 which He commanded to our fathers, that they should make them known to their children; 
6 that the generation to come might know them,
even the children who should be born, who should arise and declare them to their children, 
7 that they might set their hope in God 
and not forget the works of God, but keep His commandments; 
8 and so might not be as their fathers,
a stubborn and rebellious generation, 
a generation that set not their heart aright, 
and whose spirit was not steadfast with God. 

9 The children of Ephraim, being armed and carrying bows, 
turned back in the day of battle. 
10 They kept not the covenant of God, 
and refused to walk in His law; 
11 they forgot His works 
and His wonders that He had shown them. 
12 Marvelous things did He in the sight of their fathers, 
in the land of Egypt, in the field of Zoan. 
13 He divided the sea and caused them to pass through; 
and He made the waters to stand as a heap. 
14 In the daytime also He led them with a cloud, 
and all the night with a light of fire. 
15 He cleaved the rocks in the wilderness, 
and gave them drink as out of the great depths. 
16 He brought streams also out of the rock, 
and caused waters to run down like rivers. 

Matthew 24:42-51

42 "Watch therefore, for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come. 43 But know this, that if the master of the house had known in what watch the thief would come, he would have watched and would not have suffered his house to be broken into. 44 Therefore be ye also ready, for in such an hour as ye think not, the Son of Man cometh.

45 "Who then is a faithful and wise servant, whom his lord hath made ruler over his household, to give them meat in due season? 46 Blessed is that servant whom his lord, when he cometh, shall find so doing. 47 Verily I say unto you, that he shall make him ruler over all his goods. 48 But if that evil servant shall say in his heart, `My lord delayeth his coming,' 49 and shall begin to smite his fellow servants and to eat and drink with the drunken, 50 the lord of that servant shall come in a day when he looketh not for him, and in an hour that he is not aware of, 51 and shall cut him asunder and appoint him his portion with the hypocrites: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Romans 13:8-14

8 Owe no man anything, but to love one another, for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law. 9 For this, "Thou shalt not commit adultery," "Thou shalt not kill," "Thou shalt not steal," "Thou shalt not bear false witness," "Thou shalt not covet," and if there be any other commandment, all are briefly comprehended in this saying, namely: "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." 10 Love worketh no ill to his neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law. 11 And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awaken out of sleep; for now is our salvation nearer than when we first believed. 12 The night is far spent; the day is at hand. Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armor of light. 13 Let us walk honestly as in the day, not in rioting and drunkenness, not in lewdness and wantonness, not in strife and envying. 14 But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh to fulfill the lusts thereof.

Deuteronomy 11:13-28

13 "And it shall come to pass, if ye shall hearken diligently unto my commandments which I command you this day, to love the LORD your God and to serve Him with all your heart and with all your soul, 14 that `I will give you the rain of your land in his due season, the first rain and the latter rain, that thou mayest gather in thy corn and thy wine and thine oil. 15 And I will send grass in thy fields for thy cattle, that thou mayest eat and be full.' 16 Take heed to yourselves, that your heart be not deceived, and ye turn aside and serve other gods and worship them; 17 and then the LORD'S wrath be kindled against you, and He shut up the heaven, that there be no rain and that the land yield not her fruit, and lest ye perish quickly from off the good land which the LORD giveth you.

18 "Therefore shall ye lay up these my words in your heart and in your soul, and bind them for a sign upon your hand, that they may be as frontlets between your eyes. 19 And ye shall teach them to your children, speaking of them when thou sittest in thine house and when thou walkest by the way, when thou liest down and when thou risest up. 20 And thou shalt write them upon the doorposts of thine house and upon thy gates, 21 that your days may be multiplied, and the days of your children, in the land which the LORD swore unto your fathers to give them, as the days of heaven upon the earth. 22 For if ye shall diligently keep all these commandments which I command you to do them -- to love the LORD your God, to walk in all His ways, and to cleave unto Him-- 23 then will the LORD drive out all these nations from before you, and ye shall possess greater nations and mightier than yourselves. 24 Every place whereon the soles of your feet shall tread shall be yours: from the wilderness and Lebanon, from the river, the River Euphrates, even unto the uttermost sea shall your borders be. 25 There shall no man be able to stand before you; for the LORD your God shall lay the fear of you and the dread of you upon all the land that ye shall tread upon, as He hath said unto you.

26 "Behold, I set before you this day a blessing and a curse: 27 a blessing, if ye obey the commandments of the LORD your God which I command you this day; 28 and a curse, if ye will not obey the commandments of the LORD your God, but turn aside out of the way which I command you this day, to go after other gods which ye have not known.

Words of Wisdom - Proverbs 11:19 

As righteousness tendeth to life, 
so he that pursueth evil pursueth it to his own death.