Moses, 1515, Michelangelo Buonarroti, marble at San Pietro in Vincoli, Rome

Prime Timers

The Prime Timers were a Bible study group at St. Martin's for eight years. One of the goals of our founder, Jackie Rose, was to have a weekly web page for the group and all the pages are still online here. The group disbanded but the readings below follow the Revised Common Lectionary as adapted for use in Episcopal worship.

Lectionary readings

The Readings for Sunday, September 1 -- Fifteenth Sunday After Pentecost: Track 1: Song of Solomon 2:8-13; Psalm 45:1-2, 7-10 Track 2: Deuteronomy 4:1-2, 6-9; Psalm 15 for both: James 1:17-27 and Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23. The text is from the Bible Study Tools - New Revised Standard Version.

Track 1

Song of Solomon 2:8-13

⁸ The voice of my beloved!
     Look, he comes,

leaping upon the mountains,
     bounding over the hills.

⁹ My beloved is like a gazelle
     or a young stag.

Look, there he stands
     behind our wall,

gazing in at the windows,
     looking through the lattice.

¹⁰ My beloved speaks and says to me:
"Arise, my love, my fair one,
     and come away;

¹¹ for now the winter is past,
     the rain is over and gone.

¹² The flowers appear on the earth;
     the time of singing has come,

and the voice of the turtledove
     is heard in our land.

¹³ The fig tree puts forth its figs,
     and the vines are in blossom;
     they give forth fragrance.

Arise, my love, my fair one,
     and come away.

Psalm 45:1-2, 7-10

¹ My heart overflows with a goodly theme;
     I address my verses to the king;
     my tongue is like the pen of a ready scribe.

² You are the most handsome of men;
     grace is poured upon your lips;
     therefore God has blessed you forever.

⁶ Your throne, O God, endures forever and ever.
     Your royal scepter is a scepter of equity;
  ⁷ you love righteousness and hate wickedness.

Therefore God, your God, has anointed you
     with the oil of gladness beyond your companions;

⁸ your robes are all fragrant with myrrh and aloes and cassia.
     From ivory palaces stringed instruments make you glad;

⁹ daughters of kings are among your ladies of honor;
     at your right hand stands the queen in gold of Ophir.

Track 2

Deuteronomy 4:1-2, 6-9

Moses said: ¹ So now, Israel, give heed to the statutes and ordinances that I am teaching you to observe, so that you may live to enter and occupy the land that the Lord, the God of your ancestors, is giving you. ² You must neither add anything to what I command you nor take away anything from it, but keep the commandments of the Lord your God with which I am charging you.

⁶ You must observe them diligently, for this will show your wisdom and discernment to the peoples, who, when they hear all these statutes, will say, "Surely this great nation is a wise and discerning people!" ⁷ For what other great nation has a god so near to it as the Lord our God is whenever we call to him? ⁸ And what other great nation has statutes and ordinances as just as this entire law that I am setting before you today?

⁹ But take care and watch yourselves closely, so as neither to forget the things that your eyes have seen nor to let them slip from your mind all the days of your life; make them known to your children and your children's children—

Psalm 15

¹ O Lord, who may abide in your tent?
     Who may dwell on your holy hill?

² Those who walk blamelessly, and do what is right,
     and speak the truth from their heart;

³ who do not slander with their tongue,
     and do no evil to their friends,
     nor take up a reproach against their neighbors;

⁴ in whose eyes the wicked are despised,
     but who honor those who fear the Lord;

who stand by their oath
     even to their hurt;

⁵ who do not lend money at interest,
     and do not take a bribe against the innocent.

Those who do these things
     shall never be moved.

for both

James 1:17-27

¹⁷ Every generous act of giving, with every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. ¹⁸ In fulfillment of his own purpose he gave us birth by the word of truth, so that we would become a kind of first fruits of his creatures.

¹⁹ You must understand this, my beloved: let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger; 20p for your anger does not produce God's righteousness. ²¹ Therefore rid yourselves of all sordidness and rank growth of wickedness, and welcome with meekness the implanted word that has the power to save your souls.

²² But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves. ²³ For if any are hearers of the word and not doers, they are like those who look at themselves in a mirror; ²⁴ for they look at themselves and, on going away, immediately forget what they were like. ²⁵ But those who look into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and persevere, being not hearers who forget but doers who act—they will be blessed in their doing.

²⁶ If any think they are religious, and do not bridle their tongues but deceive their hearts, their religion is worthless. ²⁷ Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.

Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23

¹ Now when the Pharisees and some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem gathered around him, ² they noticed that some of his disciples were eating with defiled hands, that is, without washing them. ³ (For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, do not eat unless they thoroughly wash their hands, thus observing the tradition of the elders; ⁴ and they do not eat anything from the market unless they wash it; and there are also many other traditions that they observe, the washing of cups, pots, and bronze kettles. ) ⁵ So the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, "Why do your disciples not live according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?" ⁶ He said to them, "Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites, as it is written,

    "This people honors me with their lips,
         but their hearts are far from me;
   ⁷ in vain do they worship me,
         teaching human precepts as doctrines.'
⁸ You abandon the commandment of God and hold to human tradition."

¹⁴ Then he called the crowd again and said to them, "Listen to me, all of you, and understand: ¹⁵ there is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile." ²¹ For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder, ²² adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly. ²³ All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person."

Thanks to Bible Study Tools for today's text.