Book of Common Prayer
To the Director: A special Davidic psalm[a] to the tune of[b] “A Silent Dove Far Away,” when the Philistines seized him in Gath.
A Prayer about Trust in God
56 Have mercy on me, God,
because men have harassed me.
Those who oppress me have fought against me all day long.
2 Those who watch me all day have harassed me,
for there are many who fight against me out of conceit.
3 On days when I am afraid,
I put my trust in you.
4 In God, whose word I praise,
in God I put my trust.
I will not fear what mortal man[c] can do to me.
5 All day long people[d] distort what I say;
all their schemes against me are for evil purposes.
6 They gather together
and hide in ambush.
They watch my every step
as they lie in wait for my life.
7 Cast them away because of their wickedness.
In wrath, God, cast down these[e] people!
8 You have kept count of my wanderings.
Put my tears in your bottle—
have not you recorded them in your book?
9 My enemies will retreat when I call on you.[f]
This has been my experience,
because God is with me.
10 In God, whose word I praise,
in the Lord, whose word I praise,
11 in God I will put my trust.
I will not fear what mortal man can do to me.
12 God, I have taken vows before you;[g]
therefore I will offer thanksgiving sacrifices to you.
13 For you have delivered me[h] from death
and my feet from stumbling,
so that I may walk before God in the light of the living!
To the Director: A special Davidic psalm[i] to the tune of[j] “Do Not Destroy,” when he fled from Saul into a cave.
A Prayer for Deliverance
57 Have mercy on me, God, have mercy,
for in you I[k] have placed my trust.
Even in the shadow of your wings
will I find my refuge until this calamity passes.
2 I call upon the God Most High;
to the God who completes what he began[l] in me.
3 He will send help from heaven to deliver me
from those who harass and despise me.
God will send his gracious love and truth.
4 I am[m] surrounded by lions.
I lie down with those who burn with fire—
that is, with people whose teeth are like spears and arrows—
whose tongues are like sharp swords.
5 Be exalted above the heavens, God!
May your glory cover the earth!
6 They have set a snare for my feet,
which makes me[n] depressed.
They dug a pit in front of me,
but they are the ones who fell into it!
7 My heart is committed, God,
my heart is committed,
so I will sing and play music.
8 Wake up, my soul,[o]
wake up, lyre and harp!
I will awaken at dawn.
9 I will exalt you among the peoples, Lord.
I will play music among the nations.
10 For your gracious love is great,
extending even to the heavens,
and your truth even to the skies.
11 Be exalted above the heavens, God!
May your glory cover the earth!
To the Director: A special Davidic psalm[p] to the tune of[q] “Do Not Destroy”.
A Prayer for Justice
58 How is it that by remaining silent you can speak righteously?
How can you judge people fairly?
2 As a matter of fact, in your heart you plan iniquities!
In the land your hands are violent!
3 The wicked go astray from the womb;
they go astray, telling lies even from birth.
4 Their venom is like a poisonous snake;
even like a deaf serpent that shuts its ears,
5 refusing to hear the voice of the snake charmer,
the cunning enchanter.
6 God, shatter their teeth in their mouths;
Lord, break the fangs of the young lions!
7 May they flow away like rain water that runs off,
may they become like someone who shoots broken arrows.
8 May they be like a snail that dries up as it crawls;
like a woman’s stillborn baby, who never saw the sun.
9 Before your clay pots are placed on a fire of burning[r] thorns—
whether green or ablaze—
wrath will sweep them away like a storm.
10 The righteous person will rejoice when he sees your[s] vengeance;
when he washes his feet in the blood of the wicked.
11 A person will say,
“Certainly, the righteous are rewarded;
certainly there is a God who judges the earth.”
To the Director: A Davidic Psalm.
A Prayer for Protection
64 Hear, God, as I express my concern;
protect me[a] from fear of the enemy.
2 Hide me from the secret plots of the wicked,
from the mob of those who practice evil,
3 who sharpen their tongues like swords,
and aim their bitter words like arrows,
4 shooting at the innocent from concealment.
Suddenly they shoot, fearing nothing.
5 They concoct an evil scheme for themselves;
they enumerate their hidden snares;
they say, “Who will see them?”[b]
6 They devise wicked schemes, saying,
“We have completed our plans,
hiding them deep in our hearts.”
7 But God shot an arrow at them,
and they were wounded immediately.
8 They tripped over their own tongues,
and everyone who was watching ran away.
9 Everyone was gripped with fear
and acknowledged God’s deeds,
understanding what he had done.
10 The righteous rejoiced in the Lord,
because they had fled to him for refuge.
Let all the upright in heart exult.
To the Director: A song. Lyrics[c] by David.
A Song of Praise to God
65 In Zion, God, praise silently awaits you,
and vows will be paid to you.
2 Since you hear prayer,
everybody will come to you.
3 My acts of iniquity—they overwhelm me!
Our transgressions—you blot them out!
4 How blessed is the one you choose,
the one you cause to live in your courts.
We will be satisfied with the goodness of your house,
yes, even with the holiness of your Temple.
5 With awesome deeds of justice[d]
you will answer us, God our Deliverer;
you are[e] the confidence for everyone at the ends of the earth,
even for those far away overseas.
6 The One who established the mountains by his strength
is clothed with omnipotence.
7 He calmed the roar of seas,
the roaring of the waves,
and the turmoil of the peoples.
8 Those living at the furthest ends of the earth[f] are seized by fear because of your miraculous deeds.
You make the going forth of the morning and the evening shout for joy.
9 You take care of the earth,
you water it,
and you enrich it greatly with the river of God that overflows with water.
You provide grain for them,
for you have ordained it this way.
10 You fill the furrows of the field with water
so that their ridges overflow.
You soften them with rain showers;
their sprouts you have blessed.
11 You crown the year with your goodness;
your footsteps drop prosperity behind them.
12 The wilderness pastures drip with dew,[g]
and the hills wrap themselves with joy.
13 The meadows are clothed with flocks of sheep,
and the valleys are covered with grain.
They shout for joy;
yes, they burst out in song!
Joseph Begins Gathering Grain
46 Joseph was 30 years old when he began to serve Pharaoh, king of Egypt, by traveling throughout the land of Egypt, independent from Pharaoh’s oversight.[a] 47 While bumper crops grew during the seven abundant years, 48 Joseph[b] collected the surplus food throughout the land of Egypt, storing food in cities; that is, he gathered the food from fields that surrounded every city and stored it there. 49 Joseph stored up so much grain—like sand on the seashore in so much abundance!—that he stopped keeping records because it was proving to be impossible to measure how much they were gathering.
Joseph’s Children are Born
50 Before the years of famine arrived, Joseph fathered two sons with Asenath, the daughter of Potiphera, the priest of On. 51 Joseph named his firstborn son[c] Manasseh because, he said, “God has made me forget all of my hard life and my father’s house.” 52 He named his second son Ephraim because, he said, “God has made me fruitful in the land of my troubles.”
The Famine Begins
53 As soon as the seven years of abundance throughout the land of Egypt ended, 54 the seven years of famine started, just as Joseph had predicted.[d] It was an international famine, but there was food everywhere throughout the land of Egypt. 55 Eventually, the land of Egypt began to feel the effects of the famine, so the people[e] cried out to Pharaoh for food. “Go see Joseph,” Pharaoh announced to all the Egyptians, “and do whatever he tells you to do.”
56 Joseph opened all of the storehouses and sold grain to the Egyptians, because the famine was beginning to be severe throughout the land of Egypt. 57 In addition, all of the surrounding nations[f] came to Joseph to buy grain from Egypt, because the famine had become severe throughout the world.
8 You already have all you want! You have already become rich! You have become kings without us! I wish you really were kings so that we could be kings with you! 9 For it seems to me that God has put us apostles on display in last place, like men condemned to death. We have become a spectacle for the world, for angels, and for people to stare at. 10 We are fools for the Messiah’s[a] sake, but you are wise in the Messiah.[b] We are weak, but you are strong. You are honored, but we are dishonored. 11 We are hungry, thirsty, dressed in rags, brutally treated, and homeless, right up to the present. 12 We wear ourselves out from working with our own hands. When insulted, we bless. When persecuted, we endure. 13 When slandered, we answer with kind words. Even now we have become the filth of the world, the scum of the universe.
Fatherly Advice
14 I’m not writing this to make you feel ashamed, but to warn you as my dear children. 15 You may have 10,000 mentors who work for the Messiah,[c] but not many fathers. For in the Messiah[d] Jesus I became your father through the gospel. 16 So I urge you to imitate me. 17 That’s why I sent Timothy to you. He is my dear and dependable son in the Lord and will help you remember how I live for the Messiah[e] Jesus as I teach everywhere in every church.
18 Some of you have become arrogant, as though I were not coming to evaluate[f] you. 19 But I will come to you soon if it’s the Lord’s will. Then I’ll discover not only what these arrogant people are saying but also what power they have, 20 for the kingdom of God isn’t just talk, but also power. 21 Which do you prefer? Should I come to you with a stick, or with love and a gentle spirit?
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.
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