Book of Common Prayer
89 I will sing the mercies of the LORD forever. With my mouth I will declare Your truth from generation to generation.
2 For I said, “Mercy shall be set up forever. Your truth shall You establish in the very heavens.
3 “I have made a covenant with My Chosen. I have sworn to David My servant,
4 “‘Your Seed will I establish forever and set up your Throne from generation to generation.’” Selah.
5 O LORD, even the heavens shall praise Your wondrous work; indeed, Your truth, in the Congregation of the saints.
6 For who is equal to the LORD in the heaven? Who is like the LORD among the sons of the gods?
7 God is greatly to be feared in the assembly of the saints, and to be reverenced above all who are around Him.
8 O, LORD God of Hosts, Who is a mighty LORD like You? And Your truth surrounds You.
9 You rule the raging of the sea. When the waves thereof arise, You still them.
10 You have beaten down Rahab as a man slain. You have scattered Your enemies with Your mighty arm.
11 The heavens are Yours. The Earth is also Yours. You have laid the foundation of the world and all that therein is.
12 You have created the north and the south. Tabor and Hermon shall rejoice in Your Name.
13 You have a mighty arm. Your hand is strong. Your right hand is high.
14 Righteousness and equity are the establishment of Your throne. Mercy and truth go before Your face.
15 Blessed is the people who can rejoice in You. They shall walk in the light of Your countenance, O LORD.
16 They shall rejoice continually in Your Name; and in Your righteousness they shall exalt themselves.
17 For You are the glory of their strength; and by Your favor our horns shall be exalted.
18 For our shield belongs to the LORD, and our King to the Holy One of Israel.
19 You spoke, then, in a vision to Your holy one, and said, “I have laid help upon one who is mighty. I have exalted one chosen out of the people.
20 “I have found David, My servant. With My holy oil have I anointed him.
21 “Therefore, My hand shall be established with him and My arm shall strengthen him.
22 “The enemy shall not oppress him, nor shall the wicked hurt him.
23 “But I will destroy his foes before his face and plague those who hate him.
24 “My truth also, and My mercy, shall be with him; and in My Name shall his horn be exalted.
25 “I will also set his hand in the sea, and his right hand in the floods.
26 “He shall cry to me, ‘You are my Father, my God, and the Rock of my salvation.’
27 “Also, I will make him My firstborn, higher than the kings of the Earth.
28 “I will keep My mercy for him for evermore; and My Covenant shall stand fast with him.
29 “I will also make his Seed endure forever, and his Throne as the days of Heaven.
30 “If his children forsake My Law and do not walk in My Judgments,
31 “if they break my statutes and do not keep My Commandments,
32 “then I will visit their transgression with the rod, and their iniquity with strokes.
33 “Yet, I will not take My lovingkindness from him, nor will I falsify My truth.
34 “Nor will I break My Covenant, nor alter the thing that has gone out of My lips.
35 “I have sworn once, by My holiness, that I will not fail David.
36 “His Seed shall endure forever; and his Throne shall be as the Sun before Me.
37 “He shall be established forevermore as the Moon, and as a faithful witness in the heaven.” Selah.
38 But You have rejected and abhorred. You have been angry with Your anointed.
39 You have broken the Covenant of Your servant and profaned his crown, casting it on the ground.
40 You have broken down all his walls. You have laid his fortresses in ruin.
41 All who go by the way, plunder him. He is a rebuke to his neighbors.
42 You have set up the right hand of his enemies and made all his adversaries rejoice.
43 You have also turned the edge of his sword and have not made him stand in the battle.
44 You have caused his dignity to decay and cast his throne to the ground.
45 You have shortened the days of his youth and covered him with shame. Selah.
46 LORD, how long will You hide Yourself? Forever? Shall Your wrath burn like fire?
47 Remember how short my time is. Why should You create all the children of men in vain?
48 What man lives and shall not see death? Shall he deliver his soul from the hand of the grave? Selah.
49 LORD, where are Your former mercies You swore to David in Your truth?
50 Remember, O LORD, the rebuke of Your servants, which I bear in my bosom, of all the mighty people.
51 For Your enemies have reproached, O LORD, because they have reproached the footsteps of Your anointed.
52 Praise the LORD forevermore! So be it. Even so be it. A prayer of Moses, the man of God
24 And the king of Assyria brought people from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from Ava, and from Hamath, and from Sepharvaim, and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel. So, they possessed Samaria, and dwelt in its cities.
25 And at the beginning of their dwelling there, they did not fear the LORD. Therefore, the LORD sent lions among them, which killed them.
26 Therefore, they spoke to the king of Assyria, saying, “The nations which you have removed, and placed in the cities of Samaria, do not know the justice of the God of the land. Therefore, He has sent lions among them. And behold, they kill them, because they do not know the justice of the God of the land.”
27 Then the king of Assyria commanded, saying, “Take back one of the priests whom you brought from there. And let him go and dwell there and teach them the justice of the God of the country.”
28 So, one of the priests whom they had carried from Samaria came and dwelt in Bethel and taught them how they should fear the LORD.
29 Nonetheless, every nation made their own gods and put them in the houses of the high places which the Samaritans had made, every nation in every city in which they dwelt.
30 For the men of Babylon made Succoth Benoth. And the men of Cuth made Nergal. And the men of Hamath made Ashima.
31 And the Avites made Nibhaz and Tartak. And the Sepharvites burnt their children in the fire to Adrammelech and Anammelech (the gods of Sepharvaim).
32 Thus they feared the LORD and appointed priests from themselves for the high places, who prepared sacrifices for them in the houses of the high places.
33 They feared the LORD but served their own gods, after the rituals of the nations from whom they had been carried.
34 They observe these rituals to this day. They neither fear God nor obey the Ordinances nor Customs nor the Law nor the Commandment which the LORD commanded the children of Jacob, whom He named Israel,
35 and with whom the LORD had made a Covenant, and charged them, saying, “Fear no other gods, or bow yourselves to them, or serve them, or sacrifice to them.
36 “But fear the LORD Who brought you out of the land of Egypt with great power, and an outstretched arm. Fear Him and worship Him and sacrifice to Him.
37 “Also, diligently keep the Statutes and the Ordinances and the Law and the Commandment which He wrote for you, so that you do them continually. And do not fear other gods.
38 “And do not forget the Covenant that I have made with you, or fear other gods.
39 “But fear the LORD your God, and He will deliver you out of the hands of all your enemies.”
40 However, they did not obey but did after their old customs.
41 So, these nations feared the LORD and served their own images, as did their children and their children’s children. As their fathers have done, so do they, to this day.
25 Now concerning virgins, I have no Commandment of the Lord. But I give my advice, as one who has obtained mercy from the Lord to be faithful.
26 Because of this present constraint, I assume that it is good, and that it is good for anyone to be so.
27 Are you bound to a wife? Do not seek to be free. Are you free from a wife? Do not seek a wife.
28 But if you take a wife, you do not sin. And if a virgin marries, she does not sin. Nevertheless, such shall have trouble in the flesh. But I am sparing you.
29 And this I say, brothers, because the time is short: that from now on those who have wives should be as though they had none,
30 and those who weep as though they did not weep, and those who rejoice as though they did not rejoice, and those who buy as though they did not possess,
31 and those who use this world as though they do not abuse it. For the appearance of this world is passing away.
25 “Therefore I say to you, do not be careful for your life, what you shall eat, or what you shall drink; nor for your body, what you shall put on. Has not life more worth than food? And the body than clothing?
26 “Behold the birds of the heaven. For they neither sow nor reap, nor carry into the barns. Yet your Heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much better than they?
27 “Which of you by worrying is able to add one cubit to his lifespan?
28 “And why do you care for clothes? Learn how the lilies of the field grow. They neither weary nor spin.
29 “Yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.
30 “So, if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is cast into the oven, shall He not do much more to you? O you of little faith.
31 “Therefore, take no thought saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘How shall we be clothed?’
32 “For the Gentiles seek after all these things. And your Heavenly Father knows that you have need of all these things.
33 “But seek first the Kingdom of God, and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.
34 “Care not then for tomorrow. For tomorrow shall care for itself. The day has enough with its own grief.”
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