Book of Common Prayer
A Song About God’s Loyalty
A maskil of Ethan the Ezrahite.
89 I will always sing about the Lord’s love.
I will tell of his loyalty from now on.
2 I will say, “Your love continues forever.
Your loyalty goes on and on like the sky.”
3 You said, “I made an agreement with the man of my choice.
I made a promise to my servant David.
4 I told him, ‘I will make your family continue forever.
Your kingdom will continue from now on.’” Selah
5 Lord, the heavens praise you for your miracles
and for your loyalty in the meeting of your holy ones.
6 Who in heaven is equal to the Lord?
None of the angels is like the Lord.
7 When the holy ones meet, it is God they fear.
He is more frightening than all who surround him.
8 Lord God of heaven’s armies, who is like you?
Lord, you are powerful and completely to be trusted.
9 You rule the mighty sea.
You calm the stormy waves.
10 You crushed the sea monster Rahab.
By your power you scattered your enemies.
11 The skies and the earth belong to you.
You made the world and everything in it.
12 You created the north and the south.
Mount Tabor and Mount Hermon sing for joy at your name.
13 Your arm has great power.
Your hand is strong. Your right hand is lifted up.
14 Your kingdom is built on what is right and fair.
Love and truth are in all you do.
15 Happy are the people who know how to praise you.
Lord, let them live in the light of your presence.
16 In your name they rejoice all the time.
They praise your goodness.
17 You are their glorious strength.
In your kindness you honor our king.
18 Our king, our shield, belongs to the Lord.
Our king belongs to the Holy One of Israel.
19 Once, in a vision, you spoke
to those who worship you.
You said, “I have given strength to a warrior.
I have selected a young man from my people.
20 I have found my servant David.
I appointed him by pouring holy oil on him.
21 I will steady him with my hand.
I will strengthen him with my arm.
22 No enemy will make him give forced payments.
Wicked people will not defeat him.
23 I will crush his enemies in front of him.
I will defeat those who hate him.
24 My loyalty and love will be with him.
Through me he will be strong.
25 I will give him power over the sea
and control over the rivers.
26 He will say to me, ‘You are my father,
my God, the Rock, the one who saves me.’
27 I will make him my firstborn son.
He will be the greatest king on earth.
28 My love will watch over him forever.
My agreement with him will never end.
29 I will make his family continue.
His kingdom will last as long as the skies.
30 “But his descendants might reject my teachings
and not follow my rules.
31 They might break my laws
and disobey my commands.
32 Then I will punish their sins with a rod
and their wrongs with a whip.
33 But I will not hold back my love from David.
I will not stop being loyal.
34 I will not break my agreement.
I will not change what I have said.
35 It is certain that I am a holy God.
So it is certain I will not lie to David.
36 His family will continue forever.
His kingdom will continue before me like the sun.
37 It will last forever, like the moon,
like a lasting witness in the sky.” Selah
38 But now, you have rejected your appointed king.
You have been angry with him.
39 You have broken the agreement with your servant.
You threw his crown to the ground.
40 You have torn down all the city walls.
You have turned his strong, walled cities into ruins.
41 Everyone who passes by steals from him.
His neighbors insult him.
42 You have given strength to his enemies.
You have made them all happy.
43 You have made his sword useless.
You did not help him stand in battle.
44 You have kept him from winning.
You threw his throne to the ground.
45 You have cut his life short.
You have covered him with shame. Selah
46 Lord, how long will this go on?
Will you ignore us forever?
How long will your anger burn like a fire?
47 Remember how short my life is.
Why did you create us anyway?
48 What man alive will not die?
Can he escape the grave? Selah
49 Lord, where is your love from times past?
With loyalty you promised it to David.
50 Lord, remember how they insulted your servant.
Remember how I have suffered the insults of the nations.
51 Lord, remember how your enemies insulted you.
Remember how they insulted your appointed king wherever he went.
52 Praise the Lord forever!
Amen and amen.
30 Rachel saw that she was not giving birth to children for Jacob. So she envied her sister Leah. Rachel said to Jacob, “Give me children, or I’ll die!”
2 Jacob became angry with her. He said, “Can I do what only God can do? He is the one who has kept you from having children.”
3 Then Rachel said, “Here is my slave girl Bilhah. Have physical relations with her so she can give birth to a child for me. Then I can have my own family through her.”
4 So Rachel gave Bilhah, her slave girl, to Jacob as a wife. And he had physical relations with her. 5 She became pregnant and gave Jacob a son. 6 Rachel said, “God has declared me innocent. He has listened to my prayer and has given me a son.” So Rachel named this son Dan.[a]
7 Bilhah became pregnant again and gave Jacob a second son. 8 Rachel said, “I have struggled hard with my sister. And I have won.” So she named that son Naphtali.[b]
9 Leah saw that she had stopped having children. So she gave her slave girl Zilpah to Jacob as a wife. 10 Then Zilpah had a son. 11 Leah said, “I am lucky.” So she named her son Gad.[c] 12 Zilpah gave birth to another son. 13 Leah said, “I am very happy! Now women will call me happy.” So she named that son Asher.[d]
14 During the wheat harvest Reuben went into the field and found some mandrake[e] plants. He brought them to his mother Leah. But Rachel said to Leah, “Please give me some of your son’s mandrakes.”
15 Leah answered, “You have already taken away my husband. Now you are trying to take away my son’s mandrakes.”
But Rachel answered, “If you will give me your son’s mandrakes, you may sleep with Jacob tonight.”
16 When Jacob came in from the field that night, Leah went out to meet him. She said, “You will have intimate relations with me tonight. I have paid for you with my son’s mandrakes.” So Jacob slept with her that night.
17 Then God answered Leah’s prayer, and she became pregnant again. She gave birth to a fifth son. 18 Leah said, “God has given me what I paid for, because I gave my slave girl to my husband.” So Leah named her son Issachar.[f]
19 Leah became pregnant again and gave birth to a sixth son. 20 She said, “God has given me a fine gift. Now surely Jacob will honor me, because I have given him six sons.” So Leah named the son Zebulun.[g]
21 Later Leah gave birth to a daughter. She named her Dinah.
22 Then God remembered Rachel and answered her prayer. God made it possible for her to have children. 23 She became pregnant and gave birth to a son. She said, “God has taken away my shame.” 24 She named him Joseph.[h] Rachel said, “I wish the Lord would give me another son.”
God Forgives Our Sins
1 We write you now about something that has always existed.
We have heard.
We have seen with our own eyes.
We have watched,
and we have touched with our hands.
We write to you about the Word[a] that gives life. 2 He who gives life was shown to us. We saw him, and we can give proof about it. And now we tell you that he has life that continues forever. The one who gives this life was with God the Father. God showed him to us. 3 Now we tell you what we have seen and heard because we want you to have fellowship with us. The fellowship we share together is with God the Father and his Son, Jesus Christ. 4 We write this to you so that we may be full of joy.[b]
5 Here is the message we have heard from God and now tell to you: God is light,[c] and in him there is no darkness at all. 6 So if we say that we have fellowship with God, but we continue living in darkness, then we are liars. We do not follow the truth. 7 God is in the light. We should live in the light, too. If we live in the light, we share fellowship with each other. And when we live in the light, the blood of the death of Jesus, God’s Son, is making us clean from every sin.
8 If we say that we have no sin, we are fooling ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 But if we confess our sins, he will forgive our sins. We can trust God. He does what is right. He will make us clean from all the wrongs we have done. 10 If we say that we have not sinned, then we make God a liar. We do not accept God’s true teaching.
Jesus Heals a Man Born Blind
9 As Jesus was walking along, he saw a man who had been born blind. 2 His followers asked him, “Teacher, whose sin caused this man to be born blind—his own sin or his parents’ sin?”
3 Jesus answered, “It is not this man’s sin or his parents’ sin that made him blind. This man was born blind so that God’s power could be shown in him. 4 While it is daytime, we must continue doing the work of the One who sent me. The night is coming. And no one can work at night. 5 While I am in the world, I am the light of the world.”
6 After Jesus said this, he spit on the ground and made some mud with it. He put the mud on the man’s eyes. 7 Then he told the man, “Go and wash in the Pool of Siloam.” (Siloam means Sent.) So the man went to the pool. He washed and came back. And he was able to see.
8 Some people had seen this man begging before. They and the man’s neighbors said, “Look! Is this the same man who always sits and begs?”
9 Some said, “Yes! He is the one.” But others said, “No, he’s not the same man. He only looks like him.”
So the man himself said, “I am the man.”
10 They asked, “What happened? How did you get your sight?”
11 He answered, “The man named Jesus made some mud and put it on my eyes. Then he told me to go to Siloam and wash. So I went and washed and came back seeing.”
12 They asked him, “Where is this man?”
The man answered, “I don’t know.”
Pharisees Question the Healing
13 Then the people took to the Pharisees the man who had been blind. 14 The day Jesus had made mud and healed his eyes was a Sabbath day. 15 So now the Pharisees asked the man, “How did you get your sight?”
He answered, “He put mud on my eyes. I washed, and now I can see.”
16 Some of the Pharisees were saying, “This man does not keep the Sabbath day. He is not from God!”
Others said, “But a man who is a sinner can’t do miracles like these.” So they could not agree with each other.
17 They asked the man again, “What do you say about him? It was your eyes he opened.”
The man answered, “He is a prophet.”
The Holy Bible, International Children’s Bible® Copyright© 1986, 1988, 1999, 2015 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission.