Book of Common Prayer
Yahweh’s Glorious Reign
97 Yahweh is king! Let the earth rejoice;
let many coastlands be glad.
2 Cloud and thick darkness are surrounding him;
righteousness and justice are the foundation of his throne.
3 Fire goes before him,
and devours his enemies round about.
4 His lightnings light the world;
the earth sees and trembles.
5 The mountains melt like wax at the presence of Yahweh,
at the presence of the Lord of all the earth.
6 The heavens declare his righteousness,
and all the peoples see his glory.
7 Let all who serve an image be ashamed,
those who boast about idols.[a]
Worship him, all you gods.
8 Zion hears and is glad,
and the daughters of Judah rejoice
because of your judgments, O Yahweh.
9 For you, O Yahweh, are most high over all the earth.
You are highly[b] exalted above all gods.
10 You who love Yahweh, hate evil.
He protects the lives of his faithful;
he delivers them from the hand of the wicked.
11 Light is sown for the righteous,
and joy for the upright in heart.
12 Be glad in Yahweh, you righteous,
and give thanks to his holy name.[c]
Yahweh Is a Holy King
99 Yahweh is king; let the peoples tremble.
He sits enthroned[a] between the cherubim. Let the earth shake.
2 Yahweh is great in Zion,
and he is exalted over all the peoples.
3 Let them praise your great and fearful name.
He is holy.
4 And the strength of the king loves justice.[b]
You have established equity;
you have executed justice and righteousness in Jacob.
5 Exalt Yahweh our God,
and worship at his footstool.
He is holy.
6 Moses and Aaron were among his priests;
Samuel also was among those who called on his name.
They called to Yahweh, and he answered them.
7 He spoke to them in the pillar of cloud.
They kept his testimonies and the statute he gave to them.
8 O Yahweh our God, you answered them.
You were a forgiving God to them,
but an avenger of their wrong deeds.
9 Exalt Yahweh our God,
and worship at his holy mountain,
for Yahweh our God is holy.
Worship God with Joy
A psalm of thanksgiving.[c]
100 Shout in triumph to Yahweh, all the earth.
2 Serve[d] Yahweh with joy;
come into his presence with exultation.
3 Know that Yahweh, he is God;
he made us and we are his.[e]
We are his people and the sheep of his pasture.
4 Enter his gates with thanksgiving,
his courts with praise.
Give thanks to him; bless his name.
5 For Yahweh is good; his loyal love is forever,
and his faithfulness is from generation to generation.[f]
A Prayer for Retribution against Oppressors
94 O Yahweh, God of vengeance,
God of vengeance, shine forth.
2 Rise up, O Judge of the earth.
Repay upon the proud what is their rightful due.
3 How long will the wicked, O Yahweh,
how long will the wicked exult?
4 They gush words[a] unrestrained.
All the evildoers boast.
5 They crush your people, O Yahweh;
they oppress your inheritance.
6 They kill widow and stranger,
and they murder orphans,
7 while[b] they say, “Yah[c] does not see,”
and “The God of Jacob does not pay attention.”
8 You pay attention, O brutes among the people.
And you fools, when you will show insight?
9 Will the one who planted the ear not hear?
Will the one who formed the eye not see?
10 Will the one who instructs nations not rebuke,
the one who teaches humankind knowledge?
11 Yahweh knows the thoughts of humankind,
that they are to no purpose.[d]
12 Blessed is the man, O Yah, whom you instruct
and teach from your law,
13 to give him rest from days of trouble,
until a pit is dug for the wicked.
14 For Yahweh will not abandon his people,
nor forsake his inheritance.
15 For judgment will return to righteousness,[e]
and all the upright in heart will follow after it.
16 Who rose up for me against the wicked?
Who stood up for me against the workers of iniquity?
17 If Yahweh had not been my help,
my soul would soon have dwelt in silence.
18 When I thought,[f] “My foot is slipping,”
your loyal love, O Yahweh, supported me.
19 When my troubled thoughts were many within me,[g]
your consolations cheered my soul.
20 Can there be allied with you a throne of destruction,
one that forms trouble based on statute?
21 They band together against the life of the righteous,
and declare the blameless guilty of blood.[h]
22 But Yahweh has become my high stronghold,
and my God has become my rock of refuge.
23 And he will repay on them their iniquity,
and by[i] their evil he will destroy them.
Yahweh our God will destroy them.
A Call to Worship and Obey
95 Come, let us sing for joy to Yahweh;
let us shout joyfully to the rock of our salvation.
2 Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving;
with songs let us shout joyfully to him.
3 For Yahweh is the[j] great God,
and the great king over all gods,
4 in whose hand are the unexplored places[k] of the earth,
and the heights of the mountains are his,
5 to whom belongs the sea that he made, [l]
and the dry land that his hands formed.
6 Come in, let us worship and bow down;
let us kneel before Yahweh, our maker.
7 For he is our God,
and we are the people of his pasture
and the sheep of his hand.
Today[m] if you will hear his voice:[n]
8 “Do not harden your heart as at Meribah,
as in the day of Massah in the wilderness,
9 when your ancestors[o] tried me.
They put me to the test,
even though they had seen my work.
10 For forty years I loathed that generation,
and said, ‘They are a people whose heart wanders.
And my ways they do not know.’
11 Therefore I swore in my anger,
‘They shall surely not enter into my rest.’”
The Reign of Hezekiah
29 Hezekiah became king when he was twenty-five years old, and he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem. And the name of his mother was Abijah the daughter of Zechariah. 2 And he did that which was right in the eyes of Yahweh, according to all that David his father had done.
3 In the first year of his kingship, in the first month, he opened the doors of the house of Yahweh and strengthened them.
Hezekiah Celebrates Passover
30 Then Hezekiah sent to all Israel and Judah, and he also wrote letters to Ephraim and Manasseh, to come to the house of Yahweh in Jerusalem to make a Passover feast to Yahweh the God of Israel. 2 Now the king and his princes, and all the assembly in Jerusalem had taken counsel to make the Passover feast in the second month— 3 but they were not able to make it at that time, for the priests had not consecrated themselves in sufficient numbers,[a] and the people had not been assembled in Jerusalem— 4 and the plan seemed right in the eyes of the king and in the eyes of all the assembly. 5 So they let the decree stand, to make a proclamation[b] throughout all Israel, from Beersheba to Dan, to come to make a Passover feast to Yahweh the God of Israel. 6 And the runners went with the letter from the hand of the king and his princes throughout all Israel and Judah according to the command of the king, saying, “O sons of Israel, return to Yahweh, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, that he may turn again to the remnant of you who escaped from the hand of the kings of Assyria. 7 Do not be like your fathers and like your brothers, who acted unfaithfully before Yahweh, the God of their ancestors,[c] so that he made them as a desolation, as you see. 8 Now, do not stiffen your neck as your fathers,[d] but give a hand to Yahweh and come to his sanctuary, which he has consecrated forever, and serve Yahweh your God that his fierce anger may turn away from you. 9 For when you return to Yahweh, your brothers and your children will find compassion before their captors and return to this land, for Yahweh your God is gracious and compassionate, and he will not turn away his face from you if you return to him.”
10 And it happened that the runners were passing from city to city in the land of Ephraim and Manasseh, and up to Zebulun, but they were laughing at them and mocking them. 11 Only men from Asher, Manasseh, and Zebulun humbled themselves and came to Jerusalem. 12 The hand of God was also upon Judah, to give them one heart to obey the command of the king and the princes concerning the word of Yahweh.
13 So many people gathered in Jerusalem to hold the Feast of Unleavened Bread in the second month; it was a very great assembly. 14 And they rose up and removed the altars that were in Jerusalem. And they removed all the incense altars and threw them away in the Wadi[e] Kidron. 15 And they slaughtered the Passover lamb on the fourteenth day of the second month. And the priests and the Levites were disgraced, so they consecrated themselves and brought burnt offerings into the house of Yahweh. 16 Then they stood at their positions according to custom, according to the law of Moses the man of God. The priests were sprinkling the blood from the hand of the Levites. 17 For there were many in the assembly who did not consecrate themselves, so the Levites were over the killing of the Passover sacrifices for all who were not clean, to consecrate them to Yahweh. 18 For a majority of the people, many from Ephraim, Manasseh, Issachar, and Zebulun, had not cleansed themselves. But they ate the Passover sacrifice otherwise than prescribed,[f] but Hezekiah had prayed for them, saying, “May the good Yahweh make atonement unto 19 everyone whose heart is set to seek God, Yahweh the God of his ancestors,[g] though not according to the cleansing for the sanctuary.” 20 And Yahweh listened to Hezekiah, and he healed the people. 21 And the Israelites[h] who were found in Jerusalem kept the Feast of Unleavened Bread seven days with great joy. And the Levites and the priests were offering praise to Yahweh day by day, with powerful instruments to Yahweh. 22 And Hezekiah spoke to the heart of all the Levites who were skilled at service[i] to Yahweh. So they ate the feast seven days, offering peace offerings and giving thanks to Yahweh, the God of their ancestors.[j]
23 Then the whole assembly decided to make seven more days of feasting, so they made seven more days with joy, 24 for Hezekiah the king of Judah had provided[k] one thousand bulls and seven thousand sheep for the assembly, and the princes provided[l] one thousand bulls and ten thousand sheep for the assembly. And many priests consecrated themselves. 25 And the whole assembly of Judah, the priests and the Levites, all the assembly who had come from the land of Israel, and those living in Judah rejoiced. 26 And there was great joy in Jerusalem, for from the days of Solomon the son of David, king of Israel, there was nothing such as this in Jerusalem. 27 Then the priests and the Levites arose and blessed the people, and their voice was heard, and their prayer came to his holy dwelling place in the heavens.
32 But I want you to be free from care. The unmarried person cares for the things of the Lord, how he may please the Lord. 33 But the one who is married cares for the things of the world, how he may please his wife, 34 and he is divided. And the unmarried woman or the virgin cares for the things of the Lord, in order that she may be holy both in body and in spirit. But the married woman cares for the things of the world, how she may please her husband. 35 Now I am saying this for your own benefit, not that I may put a restriction on you, but to promote appropriate and devoted service to the Lord without distraction.
36 But if anyone thinks he is behaving dishonorably concerning his virgin, if she is past her prime[a] and it ought to be thus, let him do what he wishes. He does not sin. Let them marry. 37 But he who stands firm in his heart, not having necessity, but has authority concerning his own will, and has decided this in his own heart, to keep his own virgin, he will do well. 38 So then, the one who marries[b] his own virgin does well, and the one who does not marry her will do better.
39 A wife is bound for as long a time as her husband lives. But if her husband dies[c], she is free to marry whomever she wishes, only in the Lord. 40 But she is happier if she remains thus, according to my opinion—and I think I have the Spirit of God.
The Sermon on the Mount: On Judging Others
7 “Do not judge, so that you will not be judged. 2 For by what judgment you judge, you will be judged, and by what measure you measure out, it will be measured out to you. 3 And why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the beam of wood in your own eye? 4 Or how will you say to your brother, ‘Allow me to remove the speck from your eye,’ and behold, the beam of wood is in your own eye? 5 Hypocrite! First remove the beam of wood from your own eye and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye!
6 “Do not give what is holy to dogs, or throw your pearls in front of pigs, lest they trample them with their feet, and turn around and[a] tear you to pieces.
The Sermon on the Mount: Ask, Seek, Knock
7 “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and it will be opened for you. 8 For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. 9 Or what man is there among you, if his son will ask him for bread, will give him a stone? 10 Or also if he will ask for a fish, will give him a snake? 11 Therefore if you, although you[b] are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him? 12 Therefore in all things, whatever you want that people should do to you, thus also you do to them. For this is the law and the prophets.
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