Book of Common Prayer
His Chesed Endures Forever
Psalm 118
1 Praise[a] Adonai, for He is good.
For His lovingkindness endures forever.
2 O let Israel say:
For His lovingkindness endures forever.
3 O let the house of Aaron say:
For His lovingkindness endures forever.
4 O let those who fear Adonai say:
For His lovingkindness endures forever.
5 Out of a tight place I called on Adonai—
Adonai answered me with a spacious place.
6 Adonai is for me—I will not fear!
What can man do to me?
7 Adonai is for me, as my helper.
I will see the downfall of those who hate me.
8 It is better to take refuge in Adonai
than to trust in man.
9 It is better to take refuge in Adonai
than to trust in princes.
10 All nations surrounded me—
in the Name of Adonai I cut them off.
11 They surrounded me, yes, all around me—
in the Name of Adonai I cut them off.
12 They swarmed around me like bees—
they were extinguished like burning thorns—
in the Name of Adonai I cut them off.
13 You pushed me hard to make me fall,
but Adonai helped me.
14 Adonai is my strength and song,
and He has become my salvation.[b]
15 Shouts of joy and victory
are in the tents of the righteous:
“Adonai’s right hand is mighty![c]
16 Adonai’s right hand is lifted high!
Adonai’s right hand is mighty!”
17 I will not die, but live,
and proclaim what Adonai has done!
18 Adonai has chastened me hard,
but has not given me over to death.
19 Open to me the gates of righteousness,
that I may enter through them and praise Adonai.
20 This is the gate of Adonai—
the righteous will enter through it.[d]
21 I give You thanks, because You have answered me
and have become my salvation.
22 The stone the builders rejected
has become the capstone.[e]
23 It is from Adonai:
it is marvelous in our eyes!
24 This is the day that Adonai has made!
Let us rejoice and be glad in it!
25 Hoshia-na! Please, Adonai, save now!
We beseech You, Adonai, prosper us!
26 Baruch haba b’Shem Adonai—
Blessed is He who comes in the Name of Adonai.[f]
We bless you from the House of Adonai.
27 Adonai is God, and He has given us light.
Join the festival with branches, up to the horns of the altar.[g]
28 You are my God, and I praise You.
You are my God—I exalt You!
29 Praise Adonai, for He is good,
for His lovingkindness endures forever.
Glory of the Kingdom
Psalm 145
1 A psalm of praise. Of David.
I will exalt You, my God, the King,
and I will bless Your Name forever and ever.
2 Every day I will bless You,
and praise Your Name forever and ever!
3 Great is Adonai, and greatly to be praised
—His greatness is unsearchable.
4 One generation will praise Your works
to another and declare Your mighty acts.
5 I will meditate on the glorious splendor
of Your majesty and Your wonders.
6 They will speak of the might of Your awesome deeds,
and I will proclaim Your greatness.
7 They will pour out the renown of Your great goodness,
and sing joyfully of Your righteousness.
8 Adonai is gracious and compassionate,
slow to anger and great in lovingkindness.
9 Adonai is good to all.
He has compassion on all His creatures.
10 All Your works praise You, Adonai,
and Your kedoshim bless You.
11 They declare the glory of Your kingdom
and speak of Your might,
12 to make known to the sons of men His mighty acts
and the glory of the majesty of His kingdom.
13 Your kingdom is a kingdom for all ages,
and Your dominion endures from generation to generation.
14 Adonai upholds all who fall
and raises up all who are bowed down.
15 The eyes of all look to You
and You give them their food on time.
16 You open Your hand
and satisfy every living thing with favor.
17 Adonai is righteous in all His ways
and kind in all His deeds.
18 Adonai is near to all who call on Him,
to all who call on Him in truth.
19 He will fulfill the desire of those who fear Him.
He will hear their cry and save them.
20 Adonai watches over all who love Him,
but all the wicked He will destroy.
21 My mouth declares the praise of Adonai.
Let all flesh bless His holy Name forever and ever!
4 They travelled from Mount Hor along the route to the Sea of Reeds in order to go around the land of Edom. The spirit of the people became impatient along the way.
5 The people spoke against God and Moses: “Why have you brought us from Egypt to die in the wilderness, because there is no bread, no water, and our very spirits detest the despicable food? 6 So Adonai sent poisonous serpents among the people,[a] and they bit the people and many of the people of Israel died.
7 The people came to Moses and said, “We sinned when we spoke against Adonai and you! Pray to Adonai for us, that He may take away the snakes!” So Moses prayed for the people.
8 Adonai said to Moses, “Make yourself a fiery snake and put it on a pole. Whenever anyone who has been bitten will look at it, he will live.”[b]
9 So Moses made a bronze snake and put it on a pole, and it happened that whenever a snake bit anyone and he looked at the bronze snake, he lived.
Defeat of Sihon and Og
21 Israel sent messengers to King Sihon of the Amorites saying, 22 “Permit us to pass through your land. We will not turn aside into field or vineyard nor drink water from the wells. We will travel on the king’s highway until we will have passed through your territory.”
23 But Sihon would not let Israel pass through his territory. Instead, Sihon called out his entire army and marched out into the desert to oppose Israel. When he came to Jahaz, he fought against Israel. 24 But Israel struck him by the sword’s edge and conquered his land from Arnon to Jabbok as far as the Ammonites, because the border of the sons of Ammon was fortified.
25 Israel conquered all these cities and occupied all the Amorite cities, Heshbon and all its towns. 26 Heshbon was the city of King Sihon of the Amorites, who had fought with the former king of Moab and had taken from his control all the land as far as the Arnon. 27 Therefore the poets say,
“Come to Heshbon! Let her be rebuilt!
Let the city of Sihon be restored!
28 For fire went out from Heshbon,
a blaze from the city of Sihon!
It consumed Ar of Moab,
the masters of Arnon’s heights!
29 Woe to you, O Moab!
You have been destroyed, people of Chemosh!
He has given up his sons as refugees
and his daughters as captives
to Sihon, king of the Amorites.
30 But we overthrew them!
Heshbon as far as Dibon is destroyed!
We have demolished them
as far as Nophah up to Medeba.”
31 So Israel was living in the land of the Amorites. 32 After Moses sent spies to Jazer, they captured her towns and drove out the Amorites who were there.
33 Then they turned and went up the road to the Bashan. Og, king of the Bashan, went out to confront them, he and all his people, in battle at Edrei.
34 Adonai said to Moses, “Do not fear him. I have given him with all his people and his land into your hand. You are to do to him just as you did to Sihon, the Amorite king who was living in Heshbon.”
35 So they struck him and his sons and his entire army until no survivor was left to him, and they possessed his land.
12 Therefore many of them believed, as well as quite a few prominent Greek women and men.
13 But when the Jewish people of Thessalonica learned that the word of God had been proclaimed by Paul in Berea, they came there too, agitating and inciting the people. 14 Then the brothers immediately sent Paul away to the sea, but Silas and Timothy remained there. 15 Those escorting Paul brought him as far as Athens. After receiving an order for Silas and Timothy to come to him as soon as possible, they left.
An Unknown God in Athens
16 Now while Paul was waiting for them in Athens, his spirit was aroused within him when he saw that the city was full of idols. 17 So he was debating in the synagogue with the Jewish people and the God-fearers, as well as in the marketplace every day with all who happened to be there. 18 Also some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers were conversing with him. Some were saying, “What’s this babbler trying to say?” while others, “He seems to be a proclaimer of foreign deities”—because he was proclaiming the Good News of Yeshua and the resurrection. 19 So they took Paul to the Aereopagus, saying, “May we know what this new teaching is that you are talking about? 20 For you are bringing some strange things to our ears, so we want to know what these things mean.” 21 Now all the Athenians and foreigners visiting there used to pass their time doing nothing but telling or hearing something new.
22 So Paul stood in the middle of the Aereopagus and said, “Men of Athens, I see that in all ways you are very religious. 23 For while I was passing through and observing the objects of your worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: ‘To an Unknown God.’ Therefore what you worship without knowing, this I proclaim to you. 24 The God who made the world and all things in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth,[a] does not live in temples made by hands. [b] 25 Nor is He served by human hands, as if He needed anything,[c] since He Himself gives to everyone life and breath and all things. [d] 26 From one He made every nation of men to live on the face of the earth, having set appointed times and the boundaries of their territory. [e] 27 They were to search for Him, and perhaps grope around for Him and find Him. Yet He is not far from each one of us, [f] 28 for ‘In Him we live and move and have our being.’
As some of your own poets have said, ‘For we also are His offspring.’ [g] 29 Since we are His offspring, we ought not to suppose the Deity is like gold or silver or stone, an engraved image of human art and imagination. [h] 30 Although God overlooked the periods of ignorance, now He commands everyone everywhere to repent. 31 For He has set a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness, through a Man whom He has appointed.[i] He has brought forth evidence of this to all men, by raising Him from the dead.” 32 Now when they heard about the resurrection of the dead, some began scoffing. But others said, “We will hear from you again about this.” 33 So Paul left from their midst. 34 But some men joined with him and believed—among them Dionysius (a member of the council of the Aereopagus), a woman named Damaris, and others with them.
Teaching by Example at the Synagogue
10 Now Yeshua was teaching in one of the synagogues on Shabbat. 11 And behold, there was a woman with a disabling spirit for eighteen years, bent over and completely unable to stand up straight. 12 When Yeshua saw her, He called out to her and said, “Woman, you are set free from your disability.” 13 Then He laid hands on her, and instantly she stood up straight and began praising God.
14 But the synagogue leader, indignant that Yeshua had healed on Shabbat, started telling the crowd, “There are six days in which work should be done[a]—so come to be healed on those days and not on Yom Shabbat!”
15 But the Lord answered him and said, “Hypocrites! On Shabbat doesn’t each of you untie his ox or donkey from the stall and lead it away to give it drink? 16 So this one, a daughter of Abraham incapacitated by satan for eighteen years, shouldn’t she be set free from this imprisonment on Yom Shabbat?” 17 When Yeshua said these things, all His opponents were put to shame; but the whole crowd was rejoicing at all the glorious things done by Him.[b]
Tree of Life (TLV) Translation of the Bible. Copyright © 2015 by The Messianic Jewish Family Bible Society.