Psalm 51-55

Common English Bible

⁷ Purify me with hyssop and I will be clean;
    wash me and I will be whiter than snow.
⁸ Let me hear joy and celebration again;
    let the bones you crushed rejoice once more.
⁹ Hide your face from my sins;
    wipe away all my guilty deeds!
¹⁰ Create a clean heart for me, God;
    put a new, faithful spirit deep inside me!
¹¹ Please don’t throw me out of your presence;
    please don’t take your holy spirit away from me.
¹² Return the joy of your salvation to me
    and sustain me with a willing spirit.
¹³ Then I will teach wrongdoers your ways,
    and sinners will come back to you.

¹⁴ Deliver me from violence, God, God of my salvation,
    so that my tongue can sing of your righteousness.
¹⁵ Lord, open my lips,
    and my mouth will proclaim your praise.
¹⁶ You don’t want sacrifices.
    If I gave an entirely burned offering,
    you wouldn’t be pleased.
¹⁷ A broken spirit is my sacrifice, God.^[b]
    You won’t despise a heart, God, that is broken and crushed.
¹⁸ Do good things for Zion by your favor.
    Rebuild Jerusalem’s walls.
¹⁹ Then you will again want sacrifices of righteousness—
    entirely burned offerings and complete offerings.
        Then bulls will again be sacrificed on your altar.

⁵ But God will take you down permanently;
    he will snatch you up,
    tear you out of your tent,
    and uproot you from the land of the living! Selah
⁶ The righteous will see and be in awe;
    they will laugh at those people:
⁷ “Look at them! They didn’t make God their refuge.
    Instead, they trusted in their own great wealth.
        They sought refuge in it—to their own destruction!”

⁸ But I am like a green olive tree in God’s house;
    I trust in God’s faithful love forever and always.
⁹ I will give thanks to you, God, forever,
    because you have acted.
In the presence of your faithful people,
    I will hope in your name because it’s so good.

² God looks down from heaven on humans
    to see if anyone is wise,
    to see if anyone seeks God.
³ But all have turned away.
    Everyone is corrupt.
    No one does good—
    not even one person!

⁴ Are they dumb—these evildoers—
        devouring my people like they are eating bread
        but never calling on God?

⁵ There, where there was nothing to fear,
    they will be in utter panic
    because God will scatter the bones
        of those who attacked you.
You will put them to shame
    because God has rejected them.

⁶ Let Israel’s salvation come out of Zion!
    When God changes
    his people’s circumstances for the better,
        Jacob will rejoice;
        Israel will celebrate!

³ The proud have come up against me;
    violent people want me dead.
    They pay no attention to God. Selah

⁴ But look here: God is my helper;
    my Lord sustains my life.
⁵ He will bring disaster on my opponents.
    By your faithfulness, God, destroy them!

⁶ I will sacrifice to you freely;
    I will give thanks to your name, Lord,
        because it’s so good,
⁷         and because God has delivered me
        from every distress.
    My eyes have seen my enemies’ defeat.^[f]

⁴ My heart pounds in my chest
    because death’s terrors have reached me.
⁵ Fear and trembling have come upon me;
    I’m shaking all over.
⁶ I say to myself,
    I wish I had wings like a dove!
    I’d fly away and rest.
⁷     I’d run so far away!
    I’d live in the desert. Selah
⁸     I’d hurry to my hideout,
    far from the rushing wind and storm.

⁹ Baffle them, my Lord!
    Confuse their language
    because I see violence and conflict in the city.
¹⁰ Day and night they make their rounds on its walls,
    and evil and misery live inside it.
¹¹ Disaster lives inside it;
    oppression and fraud never leave the town square.

¹² It’s not an enemy that is insulting me—
    I could handle that.
It’s not someone who hates me
    who is exalted over me—
    I could hide from them.
¹³ No. It’s you, my equal,
    my close companion, my good friend!
¹⁴ It was so pleasant when
    together we entered God’s house with the crowd.

¹⁵ Let death devastate my enemies;
    let them go to the grave^[h] alive
        because evil lives with them—
        even inside them!
¹⁶ But I call out to God,
    and the Lord will rescue me.
¹⁷ At evening, morning, and midday
    I complain and moan
    so that God will hear my voice.
¹⁸ He saves me,^[i] unharmed, from my struggle,
    though there are many who are out to get me.
¹⁹ God, who is enthroned from ancient days,
    will hear and humble them Selah
        because they don’t change
        and they don’t worship God.

²⁰ My friend attacked his allies,
    breaking his covenant.
²¹ Though his talk is smoother than butter,
        war is in his heart;
    though his words are more silky than oil,
        they are really drawn swords:
²² “Cast your burden on the Lord—
    he will support you!
    God will never let the righteous be shaken!”

²³ But you, God, bring the wicked
    down to the deepest pit.
    Let bloodthirsty and treacherous people
    not live out even half their days.
        But me? I trust in you!