Book of Common Prayer
Psalm 5
For the Music Director. With the flutes. A Psalm of David.
1 Give ear to my words, O Lord;
consider my meditation.
2 Listen to the voice of my cry,
my King and my God,
for to You will I pray.
3 O Lord, in the morning You will hear my voice;
in the morning I will direct my prayer to You,
and I will watch expectantly.
4 For You are not a God who has pleasure in wickedness,
nor will evil dwell with You.
5 Those who boast will not stand in Your sight;
You hate all workers of iniquity.
6 You will destroy those who speak lies;
the Lord abhors
the bloodthirsty and deceitful man.
7 But as for me, in the abundance of Your mercy
I will enter Your house;
in fear of You I will worship
at Your holy temple.
8 Lead me, O Lord, in Your righteousness
because of my enemies;
make Your way straight before me.
9 For there is no uprightness in their mouth;
destruction is in their midst;
their throat is an open tomb;
they flatter with their tongue.
10 Declare them guilty, O God;
may they fall by their own counsels;
cast them out in the multitude of their transgressions,
for they have rebelled against You.
11 But may all those who seek refuge in You rejoice;
may they ever shout for joy,
because You defend them;
may those who love Your name be joyful in You.
12 For You, Lord, will bless the righteous;
You surround him with favor like a shield.
Psalm 6
For the Music Director. With stringed instruments. According to The Sheminith. A Psalm of David.
1 O Lord, do not rebuke me in Your anger,
nor discipline me in the heat of Your anger.
2 Be gracious to me, O Lord, for I am weak;
O Lord, heal me, for my bones are terrified.
3 My soul is greatly troubled,
but You, O Lord, how long?
4 Return, O Lord, rescue my soul.
Save me for the sake of Your lovingkindness.
5 For in death there is no remembrance of You;
in Sheol who will give You thanks?
6 I am weary with my groaning;
all night I flood my bed with weeping;
I drench my couch with my tears.
7 My eye wastes away from grief;
it grows weak because of all those hostile to me.
8 Depart from me, all you workers of iniquity;
for the Lord has heard the voice of my weeping.
9 The Lord has heard my supplication;
the Lord accepts my prayer.
10 May all my enemies be ashamed and greatly terrified;
may they turn back and be suddenly ashamed.
Psalm 10
1 Why do You stand far off, O Lord?
Why do You hide Yourself in times of trouble?
2 In arrogance the wicked persecutes the poor;
let them be caught in the devices they have planned.
3 For the wicked boasts of his soul’s desire;
he blesses the greedy and despises the Lord.
4 The wicked, through the pride of his countenance, will not seek God;
God is not in all his thoughts.
5 His ways are always prosperous;
Your judgments are high and distant from him;
as for all his enemies, they scoff at him.
6 He says in his heart, “I shall not be moved;
for generations I shall not meet adversity.”
7 His mouth is filled with cursing and deceit and oppression;
under his tongue is mischief and iniquity.
8 He sits in the lurking places of the villages;
in the secret places he murders the innocent;
his eyes lurk against the unfortunate.
9 He lies in wait secretly as a lion in his den;
he lies in wait to catch the poor;
he catches the poor, drawing them into his net.
10 He crouches; he lies low,
so that the unfortunate fall by his strength.
11 He says in his heart, “God has forgotten;
He hides His face; He will never see it.”
12 Arise, O Lord! O God, lift up Your hand!
Do not forget the humble.
13 Why do the wicked despise God?
He says in his heart,
“You will require an account.”
14 You have seen it, for You observe trouble and grief,
to repay it with Your hand.
The unfortunate one entrusts it to You;
You are the helper of the orphan.
15 Break the arm of the wicked and the evil man;
seek out his wickedness
until You find none.
16 The Lord is King forever and ever;
the nations perished from His land.
17 The desire of the humble You have heard, O Lord;
You make their heart attentive; You bend Your ear
18 to judge the orphan and the oppressed;
man on earth no longer trembles.
Psalm 11
For the Music Director. A Psalm of David.
1 In the Lord I seek refuge;
how do you say to my soul,
“Flee as a bird to your mountain,
2 for the wicked bend their bow;
they make ready their arrow on the string,
that they may treacherously shoot
the upright in heart.
3 If the foundations are broken,
what can the righteous do?”
4 The Lord is in His holy temple,
His throne is in heaven;
His eyes see,
His eyes examine mankind.
5 The Lord tests the righteous,
but the wicked and one who loves violence
His soul hates.
6 Upon the wicked He will rain
coals of fire and brimstone and a burning wind;
this will be the portion of their cup.
7 For the righteous Lord
loves righteousness;
His countenance beholds the upright.
The Fall
3 Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, “Has God said, ‘You shall not eat of any tree of the garden’?”
2 And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit from the trees of the garden; 3 but from the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God has said, ‘You will not eat of it, nor will you touch it, or else you will die.’ ”
4 Then the serpent said to the woman, “You surely will not die! 5 For God knows that on the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
6 When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasing to the eyes and a tree desirable to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate; and she gave to her husband with her, and he ate. 7 Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. So they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.
8 Then they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. 9 The Lord God called to the man and said to him, “Where are you?”
10 He said, “I heard Your voice in the garden and was afraid because I was naked, so I hid myself.”
11 And He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?”
12 The man said, “The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me fruit of the tree, and I ate.”
13 Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What have you done?”
And the woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”
14 The Lord God said to the serpent: “Because you have done this,
You are cursed above all livestock,
and above every beast of the field;
you will go on your belly,
and you will eat dust
all the days of your life.
15 I will put enmity
between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and her offspring;
he will bruise your head,
and you will bruise his heel.”
16 To the woman He said,
“I will greatly multiply your pain in childbirth,
and in pain you will bring forth children;
your desire will be for your husband,
and he will rule over you.”
17 And to Adam He said, “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten from the tree about which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it,’
Cursed is the ground on account of you;
in hard labor you will eat of it
all the days of your life.
18 Thorns and thistles it will bring forth for you,
and you will eat the plants of the field.
19 By the sweat of your face
you will eat bread
until you return to the ground,
because out of it you were taken;
for you are dust,
and to dust you will return.”
20 The man called his wife’s name Eve because she was the mother of all the living.
21 The Lord God made garments of skins for both Adam and his wife and clothed them. 22 The Lord God said, “The man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil. And now, he might reach out his hand, and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever”— 23 therefore the Lord God sent him out from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from which he was taken. 24 He drove the man out, and at the east of the garden of Eden He placed the cherubim and a flaming sword which turned in every direction, to guard the way to the tree of life.
The Great Salvation
2 Therefore we should be more attentive to what we have heard, lest we drift away. 2 For if the word spoken by angels was true, and every sin and disobedience received a just recompense, 3 how shall we escape if we neglect such a great salvation, which was first declared by the Lord, and was confirmed to us by those who heard Him? 4 God also bore them witness with signs and wonders and diverse miracles and with gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed according to His own will.
The Pioneer of Salvation
5 For it was not to the angels that He has subjected the world to come, of which we are speaking. 6 But someone in a certain place testified, saying:
“What is man that You are mindful of him,
or the son of man that You care for him?
7 You made him a little lower than the angels;
You crowned him with glory and honor,
and set him over the works of Your hands.
8 You have put all things in subjection under his feet.”[a]
For in subjecting all things under him, He left nothing that is not subjected to him. Yet now we do not see all things subject to him. 9 But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels to suffer death, crowned with glory and honor, so that He, by the grace of God, should experience death for everyone.
10 For it was fitting for Him, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the Author of their salvation perfect through suffering.
The Testimony of John the Baptist(A)
19 Now this is the testimony of John, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, “Who are you?” 20 He confessed, and did not deny, but confessed, “I am not the Christ.”
21 They asked him, “Who then? Are you Elijah?”
He said, “I am not.”
“Are you the Prophet?”
He answered, “No.”
22 They said to him then, “Who are you? Tell us so that we may give an answer to those who sent us. What do you say concerning yourself?”
23 John said, “I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way of the Lord,’[a] just as the prophet Isaiah said.”
24 Now those who were sent were from the Pharisees. 25 They asked him, “Why do you baptize then, if you are not the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet?”
26 John answered them, “I baptize with water, but One stands among you, whom you do not know. 27 This is He who comes after me, who is preferred before me, the strap of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie.”
28 These things took place in Bethany beyond the Jordan, where John was baptizing.
The Holy Bible, Modern English Version. Copyright © 2014 by Military Bible Association. Published and distributed by Charisma House.