Book of Common Prayer
To the Director: A Davidic Psalm.
Prayer and Thanksgiving
31 In you, Lord, I have taken refuge.
Let me never be ashamed.
Because you are righteous, deliver me!
2 Listen to me,
and deliver me quickly.
Become a rock of safety for me,
a fortified citadel to deliver me;
3 For you are my rock and my fortress;
for the sake of your name guide me and lead me.
4 Rescue me from the net that they concealed to trap me;
for you are my strength.
5 Into your hands I commit my spirit;
for you have redeemed me,
Lord God of truth.
6 I despise those who trust vain idols;
but I have trusted in the Lord.
7 I will rejoice and be glad in your gracious love,
for you see my affliction
and take note that my soul is distressed.
8 You have not delivered me into the hand of the enemy,
but you have set my feet in a sturdy[a] place.
9 Be gracious to me, Lord,
for I am in distress.
My eyes have been consumed by my grief
along with my soul and my body.
10 My life is consumed by sorrow,
my years with groaning.
My strength has faltered because of my iniquity;[b]
my bones have been consumed.
11 I have become an object of reproach to all my enemies,
especially to my neighbors.
I have become an object of fear to my friends,
and whoever sees me outside runs away from me.
12 Like a dead man, I am forgotten in their thoughts[c]—
like broken pottery.
13 I have heard the slander of many;
it is like terror all around me,
as they conspire together and plot to take my life.
14 But I trust in you, Lord.
I say, “You are my God.”
15 My times are in your hands.
Deliver me from the hands of my enemies
and from those who pursue me.
16 May your face shine on your servant;
in your gracious love, deliver me.
17 Let me not be ashamed, Lord,
for I have called upon you.
Let the wicked be put to shame,
let them be silent in the next life.[d]
18 Let the lying lips be made still,
especially those who speak arrogantly
against the righteous with pride and contempt.
19 How great is your goodness
that you have reserved for those who fear you,
that you have set in place for those who take refuge in you,
in the presence of the children of men.
20 You will hide them in the secret place of your presence,
away from the conspiracies of men.
You will hide them in your tent,
away from their contentious tongues.
21 Blessed be the Lord!
In a marvelous way he demonstrated his gracious love to me,
when I was in a city under siege.
22 When I said in my panic,
“I have been cut off in your sight,”
then you surely heard the voice of my prayer
in my plea to you for help.
23 Love the Lord, all his godly ones!
The Lord preserves the faithful
and repays those who act with proud motives.
24 Be strong,
and let your heart be courageous,
all you who put your hope in the Lord.
Davidic
A Prayer for Deliverance
35 Argue my case,[a] Lord,
against those who argue against me.
Fight against those who fight against me.
2 Take up the buckler[b] and the shield,
and rise up to help me.
3 Take out the spear and the ax to confront the one who pursues me;
say to me, “I am your deliverer!”
4 Let those who seek my life be ashamed and disgraced;
let those who plot evil against me be driven back and confounded.
5 Make them like the chaff before the wind,
as the messenger of the Lord pushes them aside.
6 May their path be dark and slippery,
as the messenger of the Lord tracks them down.
7 Without justification they laid a snare for me;
without justification they dug a pit to trap me.
8 Let destruction come upon them[c] unawares,
and let the net that he hid catch him;
let him fall into destruction.
9 My soul will rejoice in the Lord
and be glad in his deliverance.
10 All my bones will say,
“Lord, who is like you?
Who delivers the weak from the one who is stronger than he,
and the weak and the needy from the one who wants to rob him?”
11 False witnesses stepped forward
and questioned me concerning things
about which I knew nothing.
12 They paid me back evil for good;
my soul mourns.
13 But when they were sick,
I wore sackcloth, humbled myself with fasting,
and prayed from my heart repeatedly for them.[d]
14 I paced about as for my friend or my brother,
and fell down mourning as one weeps for one’s mother.
15 But when I stumbled,
they rejoiced and gathered together.
They gathered together against me—
attackers whom I did not know.
They tore me apart and would not stop.
16 Malicious mockers[e]—
they gnashed[f] their teeth against me.
17 Lord, how long will you just watch?
Rescue me from their destruction,
my precious life from these young lions.
18 Then I will give you thanks in front of the great congregation;
in the midst of the mighty throng I will praise you.
19 Do not let my deceitful enemies gloat over me,
nor let those who hate me without justification mock me with their eyes.
20 For they do not speak peace;
they devise clever lies against the peaceful people of the land.
21 They open their mouth wide against me,
claiming, “Yes! Yes! We saw him do[g] it with our own eyes!”
22 You see this, Lord,
so do not be silent.
Lord, do not be far from me!
23 Wake up! Arouse yourself to vindicate me
and argue my case, my God and my Lord.
24 Judge me according to your righteousness, Lord my God!
But do not let them gloat over me.
25 Don’t let them say in their hearts,
“Yes! We got what we wanted.”
Don’t let them say,
“We have swallowed him up.”
26 Instead, let those who gloat over the evil directed against me
be ashamed and confounded together;
Let those who exalt themselves over me
be clothed with shame and dishonor.
27 Let those who delight in my vindication
shout for joy and rejoice!
Let them continuously say,
“Magnify the Lord, who delights in giving peace to[h] his servant.”
28 My tongue will declare your righteousness
and praise you all day long.
David Flees to Nob
21 [a]David came to Nob to Ahimelech the priest, and Ahimelech was trembling as he came[b] to meet David. Ahimelech[c] told him, “Why are you alone, and no one with you?”
2 David told Ahimelech the priest, “The king commanded me about a matter, saying to me, ‘Don’t let anyone know anything about the matter I’m sending you to do[d] and about which I’ve commanded you. I’ve directed the young men to a certain place.’ 3 Now, what do you have available?[e] Give me five loaves of bread or whatever you have.”[f]
4 The priest answered David: “There is no ordinary bread available;[g] only consecrated bread, provided that the young men have kept themselves from women.”
5 David answered the priest, saying to him, “Indeed, women were kept from us as is usual[h] whenever I go out on a mission,[i] and the equipment[j] of the young men is consecrated even when it’s an ordinary journey, so how much more is their equipment[k] consecrated today?” 6 So the priest gave him consecrated bread because no bread was there except the Bread of the Presence that had been removed from the Lord’s presence and replaced with hot bread on the day it was taken away.
7 Now, Doeg the Edomite, one of Saul’s officials,[l] was there that day, detained in the Lord’s presence. He was the chief of Saul’s shepherds.
David Takes Goliath’s Sword
8 David told Ahimelech, “Is there no spear or sword available[m] here? I took neither my sword nor my weapons with me, because the king’s mission is urgent.”
9 The priest said, “The sword of Goliath the Philistine, whom you struck down in the Valley of Elah is wrapped up in a cloth behind the ephod.[n] If you want it, take it because there is no other except it here.”
So David said, “There is none like it. Give it to me.”
David Flees to Gath
10 David got up that day and fled from Saul, and he went to King Achish of Gath. 11 The officials[o] of Achish told him, “Isn’t this David, king of the land? Isn’t this the one about whom they sang as they danced,
‘Saul has struck down his thousands,
but David his ten thousands’?”
12 David took these words seriously,[p] and he was very frightened of King Achish of Gath. 13 So David changed his behavior before them and acted like he was crazy in their presence. He scribbled on the doors of the gate, and let his saliva run down his beard. 14 Achish told his officials,[q] “Look, you see a person acting like a madman. Why’d you bring him to me? 15 Am I lacking madmen that you bring me this one to act like a madman around me? Shall this one come into my house?”
Paul and Barnabas Go to Antioch in Pisidia
13 Then Paul and his men set sail from Paphos and arrived in Perga in Pamphylia, where John left them and went back to Jerusalem. 14 They left Perga and arrived in Antioch in Pisidia. On the Sabbath day, they went into the synagogue and sat down. 15 After the reading of the Law and the Prophets, the synagogue leaders asked them,[a] “Brothers, if you have any message of encouragement[b] for the people, you may speak.”
16 Then Paul stood up, motioned with his hand, and said:
“Men of Israel and you who fear God, listen! 17 The God of this people Israel chose our ancestors and made them a great people during their stay in the land of Egypt, and with a public display of power[c] he led them out of there. 18 After he had put up with[d] them for 40 years in the wilderness, 19 he destroyed seven nations in the land of Canaan. Then God gave their land to the Israelis[e] as an inheritance 20 for about 450 years.
“After that, he gave them judges until the time of the prophet Samuel. 21 When they demanded a king, God gave them Kish’s son Saul, from the tribe of Benjamin, for 40 years. 22 Then God[f] removed Saul[g] and made David their king, about whom he testified, ‘I have found that David, the son of Jesse, is a man after my own heart, who will carry out all my wishes.’[h] 23 It was from this man’s descendants that God, as he promised, brought to Israel a Savior, who is Jesus. 24 Before Jesus’ appearance, John had already preached a baptism of repentance to all the people in Israel. 25 When John was finishing his work, he said, ‘Who do you think I am? I’m not the Messiah.[i] No, but he is coming after me, and I’m not worthy to untie the sandals on his feet.’
Jesus Encounters a Large Crowd
7 So Jesus withdrew with his disciples to the sea. A large crowd from Galilee, Judea, 8 Jerusalem, Idumea, from across the Jordan, and from the region around Tyre and Sidon followed him. They came to him because they kept hearing about everything he was doing. 9 Jesus[a] told his disciples to have a boat ready for him so that the crowd wouldn’t crush him, 10 because he had healed so many people that everyone who had diseases kept crowding up against him in order to touch him. 11 Whenever the unclean spirits saw him, they would fall down in front of him and scream, “You are the Son of God!” 12 But he sternly ordered them again and again not to tell people who he was.
Jesus Appoints Twelve Apostles(A)
13 Then Jesus[b] went up on a hillside and called to himself those whom he had decided on, and they approached him. 14 He appointed the Twelve,[c] whom he called apostles, to accompany him, to be sent out to preach, 15 and to have the authority to drive out demons. 16 He appointed the Twelve:[d] Simon (whom he named Peter), 17 Zebedee’s sons James and his brother John (whom he named Boanerges, that is, Sons of Thunder), 18 Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James son of Alphaeus, Thaddeus,[e] Simon the Cananaean,[f] 19 and Judas Iscariot, who also betrayed him.
Copyright © 1995-2014 by ISV Foundation. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED INTERNATIONALLY. Used by permission of Davidson Press, LLC.