The Prophet’s Prayer

Psalm 44

National Lament and Prayer for Help

To the leader. Of the Korahites. A Maskil.

¹⁵ Now if you kill this people as one, then the nations who have heard about you will say, ¹⁶ ‘It is because the Lord was not able to bring this people into the land he swore to give them that he has slaughtered them in the wilderness.’^{(A) 17} And now, therefore, let the power of the Lord be great in the way that you promised when you spoke, saying,

¹⁹ “Forgive the iniquity of this people according to the greatness of your steadfast love, just as you have pardoned this people, from Egypt even until now.”^(C)

²⁰ Then the Lord said, “I do forgive, just as you have asked;^{(D) 21} nevertheless, as I live and as all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord,^{(E) 22} none of the people who have seen my glory and the signs that I did in Egypt and in the wilderness and yet have tested me these ten times and have not obeyed my voice ²³ shall see the land that I swore to give to their ancestors; none of those who despised me shall see it. ²⁴ But my servant Caleb, because he has a different spirit and has followed me wholeheartedly, I will bring into the land into which he went, and his descendants shall possess it.^(F)

¹⁴ “And now I am about to go the way of all the earth, and you know in your hearts and souls, all of you, that not one thing has failed of all the good things that the Lord your God promised concerning you; all have come to pass for you; not one of them has failed.^(A)

²² then you shall let your children know, ‘Israel crossed over the Jordan here on dry ground.’^{(A) 23} For the Lord your God dried up the waters of the Jordan for you until you crossed over, as the Lord your God did to the Red Sea,^[a] which he dried up for us until we crossed over,^{(B) 24} so that all the peoples of the earth may know that the hand of the Lord is mighty and so that you may fear the Lord your God forever.”^(C)