Along The Way (January 12 -18, 2024)

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  • Micah 5 & 6

    Now you are walled around with a wall;

    siege is laid against us;

    with a rod they strike the ruler of Israel

    upon the cheek.

    The Ruler from Bethlehem

    But you, O Bethlehem of Ephrathah,

    who are one of the little clans of Judah,

    from you shall come forth for me

    one who is to rule in Israel,

    whose origin is from of old,

    from ancient days.

    Therefore he shall give them up until the time

    when she who is in labor has brought forth;

    then the rest of his kindred shall return

    to the people of Israel.

    And he shall stand and feed his flock in the strength of the Lord,

    in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God.

    And they shall live secure, for now he shall be great

    to the ends of the earth,

    and he shall be the one of peace.

    If the Assyrians come into our land

    and tread upon our soil,

    we will raise against them seven shepherds

    and eight rulers.

    They shall rule the land of Assyria with the sword

    and the land of Nimrod with the drawn sword;

    they shall rescue us from the Assyrians

    if they come into our land

    or tread within our border.

    The Future Role of the Remnant

    Then the remnant of Jacob,

    surrounded by many peoples,

    shall be like dew from the Lord,

    like showers on the grass,

    which do not depend upon people

    or wait for any mortal.

    And among the nations the remnant of Jacob,

    surrounded by many peoples,

    shall be like a lion among the animals of the forest,

    like a young lion among the flocks of sheep,

    which, when it goes through, treads down

    and tears in pieces, with no one to deliver.

    Your hand shall be lifted up over your adversaries,

    and all your enemies shall be cut off.

    On that day, says the Lord,

    I will cut off your horses from among you

    and will destroy your chariots;

    and I will cut off the cities of your land

    and destroy all your strongholds;

    and I will cut off sorceries from your hand,

    and you shall have no more soothsayers;

    and I will cut off your images

    and your pillars from among you,

    and you shall bow down no more

    to the work of your hands;

    and I will uproot your sacred poles from among you

    and destroy your towns.

    And in anger and wrath I will execute vengeance

    on the nations that did not obey.

    God Challenges Israel

    Hear what the Lord says:

    Rise, plead your case before the mountains,

    and let the hills hear your voice.

    Hear, you mountains, the case of the Lord,

    and you enduring foundations of the earth,

    for the Lord has a case against his people,

    and he will contend with Israel.

    “O my people, what have I done to you?

    In what have I wearied you? Answer me!

    For I brought you up from the land of Egypt

    and redeemed you from the house of slavery,

    and I sent before you Moses,

    Aaron, and Miriam.

    O my people, remember now what King Balak of Moab devised,

    what Balaam son of Beor answered him,

    and what happened from Shittim to Gilgal,

    that you may know the saving acts of the Lord.”

    What God Requires

    “With what shall I come before the Lord

    and bow myself before God on high?

    Shall I come before him with burnt offerings,

    with calves a year old?

    Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams,

    with ten thousands of rivers of oil?

    Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression,

    the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?”

    He has told you, O mortal, what is good,

    and what does the Lord require of you

    but to do justice and to love kindness

    and to walk humbly with your God?

    Cheating and Violence to Be Punished

    The voice of the Lord cries to the city

    (and he shall save those who fear his name):

    Hear, O tribe and assembly of the city!

    Can I forget the treasures of wickedness in the house of the wicked

    and the despicable false measure?

    Can I tolerate wicked scales

    and a bag of dishonest weights?

    Your wealthy are full of violence;

    your inhabitants speak lies

    with tongues of deceit in their mouths.

    Therefore I have begun to strike you down,

    making you desolate because of your sins.

    You shall eat but not be satisfied,

    and there shall be a gnawing hunger within you;

    you shall put away but not save,

    and what you save, I will hand over to the sword.

    You shall sow but not reap;

    you shall tread olives but not anoint yourselves with oil;

    you shall tread grapes but not drink wine.

    For you have kept the statutes of Omri

    and all the works of the house of Ahab,

    and you have followed their counsels.

    Therefore I will make you a desolation and your inhabitants an object of hissing, so you shall bear the scorn of my people.

  • Micah 7

    The Total Corruption of the People

    Woe is me! For I have become like one who,

    after the summer fruit has been gathered,

    after the vintage has been gleaned,

    finds no cluster to eat;

    there is no first-ripe fig for which I hunger.

    The faithful have disappeared from the land,

    and there is no one left who is upright;

    they all lie in wait for blood,

    and they hunt each other with nets.

    Their hands are skilled to do evil;

    the official and the judge ask for a bribe,

    and the powerful dictate what they desire;

    thus they pervert justice.

    The best of them is like a brier,

    the most upright of them a thorn hedge.

    The day of their sentinels, of their punishment, has come;

    now their confusion is at hand.

    Put no trust in a friend;

    have no confidence in a loved one;

    guard the doors of your mouth

    from her who lies in your embrace,

    for the son treats the father with contempt,

    the daughter rises up against her mother,

    the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law;

    your enemies are members of your own household.

    But as for me, I will look to the Lord;

    I will wait for the God of my salvation;

    my God will hear me.

    Penitence and Trust in God

    Do not rejoice over me, my enemies;

    when I fall, I shall rise;

    when I sit in darkness,

    the Lord will be a light to me.

    I must bear the indignation of the Lord

    because I have sinned against him,

    until he takes my side

    and executes judgment for me.

    He will bring me out to the light;

    I shall see his vindication.

    Then my enemies will see,

    and shame will cover those who said to me,

    “Where is the Lord your God?”

    My eyes will see their downfall;

    now they will be trodden down

    like the mire of the streets.

    A Prophecy of Restoration

    A day for the building of your walls!

    On that day the boundary shall be far extended.

    On that day they will come to you

    from Assyria to Egypt

    and from Egypt to the River,

    from sea to sea and from mountain to mountain.

    But the earth will be desolate

    because of its inhabitants,

    for the fruit of their doings.

    Shepherd your people with your staff,

    the flock that belongs to you,

    which lives alone in a forest

    in the midst of a garden land;

    let them feed in Bashan and Gilead

    as in the days of old.

    As in the days when you came out of the land of Egypt,

    show us marvelous things.

    The nations shall see and be ashamed

    of all their might;

    they shall lay their hands on their mouths;

    their ears shall be deaf;

    they shall lick dust like a snake,

    like the crawling things of the earth;

    they shall come trembling out of their fortresses;

    they shall turn in dread to the Lord our God,

    and they shall stand in fear of you.

    God’s Compassion and Steadfast Love

    Who is a God like you, pardoning iniquity

    and passing over the transgression

    of the remnant of his possession?

    He does not retain his anger forever

    because he delights in showing steadfast love.

    He will again have compassion upon us;

    he will tread our iniquities under foot.

    You will cast all our sins

    into the depths of the sea.

    You will show faithfulness to Jacob

    and steadfast love to Abraham,

    as you have sworn to our ancestors

    from the days of old.

  • Nahum 1

    An oracle concerning Nineveh. The book of the vision of Nahum of Elkosh.

    The Consuming Wrath of God

    A jealous and avenging God is the Lord;

    the Lord is avenging and wrathful;

    the Lord takes vengeance on his adversaries

    and prolongs it against his enemies.

    The Lord is slow to anger but great in power,

    and the Lord will by no means clear the guilty.

    His way is in whirlwind and storm,

    and the clouds are the dust of his feet.

    He rebukes the sea and makes it dry,

    and he dries up all the rivers;

    Bashan and Carmel wither,

    and the bloom of Lebanon fades.

    The mountains quake before him,

    and the hills melt;

    the earth heaves before him,

    the world and all who live in it.

    Who can stand before his indignation?

    Who can endure the heat of his anger?

    His wrath is poured out like fire,

    and by him the rocks are broken in pieces.

    The Lord is good,

    a stronghold in a day of trouble;

    he protects those who take refuge in him,

    even in a rushing flood.

    He will make a full end of his adversaries

    and will pursue his enemies into darkness.

    Why do you plot against the Lord?

    He will make an end;

    no adversary will rise up twice.

    Like thorns they are entangled;

    like drunkards they are drunk;

    they are consumed like dry straw.

    From you one has gone out

    who plots evil against the Lord,

    one who counsels wickedness.

    Good News for Judah

    Thus says the Lord:

    Though they are at full strength and many,

    they will be cut off and pass away.

    Though I have afflicted you,

    I will afflict you no more.

    And now I will break off his yoke from you

    and snap the bonds that bind you.

    The Lord has commanded concerning you:

    Your name shall be perpetuated no longer;

    from the house of your gods I will cut off

    the carved image and the cast image.

    I will prepare your grave, for you are worthless.

    Look! On the mountains the feet of one

    who brings good tidings,

    who proclaims peace!

    Celebrate your festivals, O Judah;

    fulfill your vows,

    for never again shall the wicked invade you

  • Nahum 2 - 3

    The Destruction of the Wicked City

    A scatterer has come up against you.

    Guard the ramparts;

    watch the road;

    gird your loins;

    collect all your strength.

    (For the Lord is restoring the majesty of Jacob,

    as well as the majesty of Israel,

    though ravagers have ravaged them

    and ruined their branches.)

    The shields of his warriors are red;

    his soldiers are clothed in crimson.

    The metal on the chariots flashes

    on the day when he musters them;

    the chargers prance.

    The chariots race madly through the streets;

    they rush to and fro through the squares;

    their appearance is like torches;

    they dart like lightning.

    He calls his officers;

    they stumble as they come forward;

    they hasten to the wall,

    and the screen is set up.

    The river gates are opened;

    the palace trembles.

    It is decreed that the city be exiled,

    its slave women led away,

    moaning like doves

    and beating their breasts.

    Nineveh is like a pool

    whose waters run away.

    “Halt! Halt!” —

    but no one turns back.

    “Plunder the silver;

    plunder the gold!

    There is no end of treasure!

    An abundance of every precious thing!”

    Devastation, desolation, and destruction!

    Hearts faint and knees tremble;

    all loins quake;

    all faces grow pale!

    What became of the lions’ den,

    the cave of the young lions,

    where the lion goes,

    and the lion’s cubs, with no one to disturb them?

    The lion has torn enough for his whelps

    and strangled prey for his lionesses;

    he has filled his caves with prey

    and his dens with torn flesh.

    See, I am against you, says the Lord of hosts, and I will burn your chariots in smoke, and the sword shall devour your young lions; I will cut off your prey from the earth, and the voice of your messengers shall be heard no more.

    Ruin Imminent and Inevitable

    Woe, city of bloodshed,

    utterly deceitful, full of plunder —

    no end to the prey!

    The crack of whip and rumble of wheel,

    galloping horse and bounding chariot!

    Horsemen charging,

    flashing sword and glittering spear,

    piles of dead,

    heaps of corpses,

    dead bodies without end —

    they stumble over the bodies!

    Because of the countless debaucheries of the prostitute,

    gracefully alluring, mistress of sorcery,

    who enslaves nations through her debaucheries

    and peoples through her sorcery,

    I am against you,

    says the Lord of hosts,

    and will lift up your skirts over your face,

    and I will let nations look on your nakedness

    and kingdoms on your shame.

    I will throw filth at you

    and treat you with contempt

    and make you a spectacle.

    Then all who see you will shrink from you and say,

    “Nineveh is devastated; who will bemoan her?”

    Where shall I seek comforters for you?

    Are you better than Thebes

    that sat by the Nile,

    with water around her,

    her rampart a sea,

    water her wall?

    Cush was her strength,

    Egypt, too, and that without limit;

    Put and the Libyans were her helpers.

    Yet she became an exile;

    she went into captivity;

    even her infants were dashed in pieces

    at the head of every street;

    lots were cast for her nobles;

    all her dignitaries were bound in fetters.

    You also will be drunken;

    you will go into hiding;

    you will seek

    a refuge from the enemy.

    All your fortresses are like fig trees

    with first-ripe figs —

    if shaken they fall

    into the mouth of the eater.

    Look at your troops:

    they are women in your midst.

    The gates of your land

    are wide open to your foes;

    fire has devoured the bars of your gates.

    Draw water for the siege;

    strengthen your forts;

    trample the clay;

    tread the mortar;

    take hold of the brick mold!

    There the fire will devour you;

    the sword will cut you off.

    It will devour you like the locust.

    Multiply yourselves like the locust;

    multiply like the grasshopper!

    You increased your merchants

    more than the stars of the heavens.

    The locust sheds its skin and flies away.

    Your guards are like grasshoppers,

    your scribes like swarms of locusts

    settling on the fences

    on a cold day —

    when the sun rises, they fly away;

    no one knows where they have gone.

    Your shepherds are asleep,

    O king of Assyria;

    your nobles slumber.

    Your people are scattered on the mountains

    with no one to gather them.

    There is no assuaging your hurt;

    your wound is mortal.

    All who hear the news about you

    clap their hands over you.

    For who has ever escaped

    your endless cruelty?

  • Habakkuk 1 - 2

    The oracle that the prophet Habakkuk saw.

    The Prophet’s Complaint

    O Lord, how long shall I cry for help,

    and you will not listen?

    Or cry to you “Violence!”

    and you will not save?

    Why do you make me see wrongdoing

    and look at trouble?

    Destruction and violence are before me;

    strife and contention arise.

    So the law becomes slack,

    and justice never prevails.

    The wicked surround the righteous;

    therefore judgment comes forth perverted.

    Look at the nations and see!

    Be astonished! Be astounded!

    For a work is being done in your days

    that you would not believe if you were told.

    For I am rousing the Chaldeans,

    that fierce and impetuous nation,

    who march through the breadth of the earth

    to seize dwellings not their own.

    Dread and fearsome are they;

    their justice and dignity proceed from themselves.

    Their horses are swifter than leopards,

    more menacing than wolves at dusk;

    their horses charge.

    Their horsemen come from far away;

    they fly like an eagle swift to devour.

    They all come for violence,

    with faces pressing forward;

    they gather captives like sand.

    At kings they scoff,

    and of rulers they make sport.

    They laugh at every fortress

    and heap up earth to take it.

    Then they sweep by like the wind;

    they transgress and become guilty;

    their own might is their god!

    Are you not from of old,

    O Lord my God, my Holy One?

    You shall not die.

    O Lord, you have marked them for judgment,

    and you, O Rock, have established them for punishment.

    Your eyes are too pure to behold evil,

    and you cannot look on wrongdoing;

    why do you look on the treacherous

    and are silent when the wicked swallow

    those more righteous than they?

    You have made people like the fish of the sea,

    like crawling things that have no ruler.

    He brings all of them up with a hook;

    he drags them out with his net;

    he gathers them in his seine,

    so he rejoices and exults.

    Therefore he sacrifices to his net

    and makes offerings to his seine,

    for by them his portion is lavish,

    and his food is rich.

    Is he then to keep on emptying his net

    and destroying nations without mercy?

    God’s Reply to the Prophet’s Complaint

    I will stand at my watchpost

    and station myself on the rampart;

    I will keep watch to see what he will say to me

    and what he will answer concerning my complaint.

    Then the Lord answered me and said:

    Write the vision;

    make it plain on tablets,

    so that a runner may read it.

    For there is still a vision for the appointed time;

    it speaks of the end and does not lie.

    If it seems to tarry, wait for it;

    it will surely come; it will not delay.

    Look at the proud!

    Their spirit is not right in them,

    but the righteous live by their faithfulness.

    Moreover, wealth is treacherous;

    the arrogant do not endure.

    They open their throats wide as Sheol;

    like Death they never have enough.

    They gather all nations for themselves

    and collect all peoples as their own.

    The Woes of the Wicked

    Shall not everyone taunt such people and, with mocking riddles, say about them,

    “Alas for you who heap up what is not your own!”

    How long will you load yourselves with goods taken in pledge?

    Will not your own creditors suddenly rise

    and those who make you tremble wake up?

    Then you will be plunder for them.

    Because you have plundered many nations,

    all who survive of the peoples shall plunder you —

    because of human bloodshed and violence to the earth,

    to cities and all who live in them.

    “Alas for you who get evil gain for your house,

    setting your nest on high

    to be safe from the reach of harm!”

    You have devised shame for your house

    by cutting off many peoples;

    you have forfeited your life.

    The very stones will cry out from the wall,

    and the rafter will respond from the woodwork.

    “Alas for you who build a town by bloodshed

    and found a city on iniquity!”

    Is it not from the Lord of hosts

    that peoples labor only to feed the flames

    and nations weary themselves for nothing?

    But the earth will be filled

    with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord,

    as the waters cover the sea.

    “Alas for you who make your neighbors drink,

    pouring out your wrath until they are drunk,

    in order to gaze on their nakedness!”

    You will be sated with contempt instead of glory.

    Drink, you yourself, and stagger!

    The cup in the Lord’s right hand

    will come around to you,

    and shame will come upon your glory!

    For the violence done to Lebanon will overwhelm you;

    the destruction of the animals will terrify you —

    because of human bloodshed and violence to the earth,

    to cities and all who live in them.

    What use is an idol

    once its maker has shaped it —

    a cast image, a teacher of lies?

    For its maker trusts in what has been made,

    though the product is only an idol that cannot speak!

    Alas for you who say to the wood, “Wake up!”

    to silent stone, “Rouse yourself!”

    Can it teach?

    See, it is gold and silver plated,

    and there is no breath in it at all.

    But the Lord is in his holy temple;

    let all the earth keep silence before him!

  • Habakkuk 3

    A prayer of the prophet Habakkuk according to Shigionoth.

    The Prophet’s Prayer

    O Lord, I have heard of your renown,

    and I stand in awe, O Lord, of your work.

    In our own time revive it;

    in our own time make it known;

    in wrath may you remember mercy.

    God came from Teman,

    the Holy One from Mount Paran. Selah

    His glory covered the heavens,

    and the earth was full of his praise.

    The brightness was like the sun;

    rays came forth from his hand,

    where his power lay hidden.

    Before him went pestilence,

    and plague followed close behind.

    He stopped and shook the earth;

    he looked and made the nations tremble.

    The eternal mountains were shattered;

    along his ancient pathways

    the everlasting hills sank low.

    I saw the tents of Cushan under affliction;

    the tent curtains of the land of Midian trembled.

    Was your wrath against the rivers, O Lord,

    or your anger against the rivers

    or your rage against the sea,

    when you drove your horses,

    your chariots to victory?

    You brandished your naked bow;

    sated were the arrows at your command. Selah

    You split the earth with rivers.

    The mountains saw you and writhed;

    a torrent of water swept by;

    the deep gave forth its voice.

    The sun raised high its hands;

    the moon stood still in its exalted place,

    at the light of your arrows speeding by,

    at the gleam of your flashing spear.

    In fury you marched on the earth;

    in anger you trampled nations.

    You came forth to save your people,

    to save your anointed.

    You crushed the head of the wicked house,

    laying it bare from foundation to roof. Selah

    You pierced with their own arrows the head of his warriors,

    who came like a whirlwind to scatter us,

    gloating as if ready to devour the poor who were in hiding.

    You trampled the sea with your horses,

    churning the mighty waters.

    I hear, and I tremble within;

    my lips quiver at the sound.

    Rottenness enters into my bones,

    and my steps tremble beneath me.

    I wait quietly for the day of calamity

    to come upon the people who attack us.

    Trust and Joy in the Midst of Trouble

    Though the fig tree does not blossom

    and no fruit is on the vines;

    though the produce of the olive fails

    and the fields yield no food;

    though the flock is cut off from the fold

    and there is no herd in the stalls,

    yet I will rejoice in the Lord;

    I will exult in the God of my salvation.

    God, the Lord, is my strength;

    he makes my feet like the feet of a deer

    and makes me tread upon the heights.

    To the leader: with stringed instruments.

  • Zephaniah 1 - 2

    The word of the Lord that came to Zephaniah son of Cushi son of Gedaliah son of Amariah son of Hezekiah, in the days of King Josiah son of Amon of Judah.

    The Coming Judgment on Judah

    I will utterly sweep away everything

    from the face of the earth, says the Lord.

    I will sweep away humans and animals;

    I will sweep away the birds of the air

    and the fish of the sea.

    I will make the wicked stumble.

    I will cut off humanity

    from the face of the earth, says the Lord.

    I will stretch out my hand against Judah

    and against all the inhabitants of Jerusalem,

    and I will cut off from this place every remnant of Baal

    and the name of the idolatrous priests,

    those who bow down on the roofs

    to the host of the heavens,

    those who bow down and swear to the Lord

    but also swear by Milcom,

    those who have turned back from following the Lord,

    who have not sought the Lord or inquired of him.

    Be silent before the Lord God,

    for the day of the Lord is at hand!

    The Lord has prepared a sacrifice;

    he has consecrated his guests.

    And on the day of the Lord’s sacrifice

    I will punish the officials and the king’s sons

    and all who dress themselves in foreign attire.

    On that day I will punish

    all who leap over the threshold,

    who fill their master’s house

    with violence and fraud.

    On that day, says the Lord,

    a cry will be heard from the Fish Gate,

    a wail from the Second Quarter,

    a loud crash from the hills.

    The inhabitants of the Mortar wail,

    for all the traders have perished;

    all who weigh out silver are cut off.

    At that time I will search Jerusalem with lamps,

    and I will punish the people

    who settle like dregs in wine,

    those who say in their hearts,

    “The Lord will not do good,

    nor will he do harm.”

    Their wealth shall be plundered

    and their houses laid waste.

    Though they build houses,

    they shall not inhabit them;

    though they plant vineyards,

    they shall not drink wine from them.

    The Great Day of the Lord

    The great day of the Lord is near,

    near and hastening fast;

    the sound of the day of the Lord is bitter;

    the warrior cries aloud there.

    That day will be a day of wrath,

    a day of distress and anguish,

    a day of ruin and devastation,

    a day of darkness and gloom,

    a day of clouds and thick darkness,

    a day of trumpet blast and battle cry

    against the fortified cities

    and against the lofty battlements.

    I will bring such distress upon people

    that they shall walk like the blind;

    because they have sinned against the Lord,

    their blood shall be poured out like dust

    and their flesh like dung.

    Neither their silver nor their gold

    will be able to save them

    on the day of the Lord’s wrath;

    in the fire of his passion

    the whole earth shall be consumed,

    for a full, a terrible end

    he will make of all the inhabitants of the earth.

    Judgment on Israel’s Enemies

    Gather together, gather,

    O shameless nation,

    before you are driven away

    like the drifting chaff,

    before there comes upon you

    the fierce anger of the Lord,

    before there comes upon you

    the day of the Lord’s wrath.

    Seek the Lord, all you humble of the land

    who do his commands;

    seek righteousness, seek humility;

    perhaps you may be hidden

    on the day of the Lord’s wrath.

    For Gaza shall be deserted,

    and Ashkelon shall become a desolation;

    Ashdod’s people shall be driven out at noon,

    and Ekron shall be uprooted.

    Woe, inhabitants of the seacoast,

    you nation of the Cherethites!

    The word of the Lord is against you,

    O Canaan, land of the Philistines,

    and I will destroy you until no inhabitant is left.

    And you, O seacoast, shall be pastures,

    meadows for shepherds,

    and folds for flocks.

    The seacoast shall become the possession

    of the remnant of the house of Judah,

    on which they shall pasture,

    and in the houses of Ashkelon

    they shall lie down at evening.

    For the Lord their God will be mindful of them

    and restore their fortunes.

    I have heard the taunts of Moab

    and the revilings of the Ammonites,

    how they have taunted my people

    and made boasts against their territory.

    Therefore, as I live, says the Lord of hosts,

    the God of Israel,

    Moab shall become like Sodom

    and the Ammonites like Gomorrah,

    a land possessed by nettles and salt pits

    and a waste forever.

    The remnant of my people shall plunder them,

    and the survivors of my nation shall possess them.

    This shall be their lot in return for their pride,

    because they scoffed and boasted

    against the people of the Lord of hosts.

    The Lord will be terrible against them;

    he will shrivel all the gods of the earth,

    and to him shall bow down

    each in its place,

    all the coasts and islands of the nations.

    You also, O Cushites,

    shall be killed by my sword.

    And he will stretch out his hand against the north

    and destroy Assyria,

    and he will make Nineveh a desolation,

    a dry waste like the desert.

    Herds shall lie down in it,

    every wild animal of the earth;

    the desert owl and the screech owl

    shall lodge on its capitals;

    the owl shall hoot at the window,

    the raven croak on the threshold,

    for its cedar work will be laid bare.

    Is this the exultant city

    that lived secure,

    that said to itself,

    “I am, and there is no one else”?

    What a desolation it has become,

    a lair for wild animals!

    Everyone who passes by it

    hisses and shakes the fist.

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Weekly Greeting - January 12, 2024

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Bethlehem News - January 12th, 2024