Book of Common Prayer
(A)A Hymn in Time of National Trouble[a]
89 O Lord, I will always sing of your constant love;
I will proclaim your faithfulness forever.
2 I know that your love will last for all time,
that your faithfulness is as permanent as the sky.
3 You said, “I have made a covenant with the man I chose;
I have promised my servant David,
4 (B)‘A descendant of yours will always be king;
I will preserve your dynasty forever.’”
5 The heavens sing of the wonderful things you do;
the holy ones sing of your faithfulness, Lord.
6 No one in heaven is like you, Lord;
none of the heavenly beings is your equal.
7 You are feared in the council of the holy ones;
they all stand in awe of you.
8 Lord God Almighty, none is as mighty as you;
in all things you are faithful, O Lord.
9 You rule over the powerful sea;
you calm its angry waves.
10 You crushed the monster Rahab[b] and killed it;
with your mighty strength you defeated your enemies.
11 Heaven is yours, the earth also;
you made the world and everything in it.
12 You created the north and the south;
Mount Tabor and Mount Hermon sing to you for joy.
13 How powerful you are!
How great is your strength!
14 Your kingdom is founded on righteousness and justice;
love and faithfulness are shown in all you do.
15 How happy are the people who worship you with songs,
who live in the light of your kindness!
16 Because of you they rejoice all day long,
and they praise you for your goodness.
17 You give us great victories;
in your love you make us triumphant.
18 You, O Lord, chose our protector;
you, the Holy God of Israel, gave us our king.
God's Promise to David
19 In a vision long ago you said to your faithful servants,
“I have given help to a famous soldier;
I have given the throne to one I chose from the people.
20 (C)I have made my servant David king
by anointing him with holy oil.
21 My strength will always be with him,
my power will make him strong.
22 His enemies will never succeed against him;
the wicked will not defeat him.
23 I will crush his foes
and kill everyone who hates him.
24 I will love him and be loyal to him;
I will make him always victorious.
25 I will extend his kingdom
from the Mediterranean to the Euphrates River.
26 He will say to me,
‘You are my father and my God;
you are my protector and savior.’
27 (D)I will make him my first-born son,
the greatest of all kings.
28 I will always keep my promise to him,
and my covenant with him will last forever.
29 His dynasty will be as permanent as the sky;
a descendant of his will always be king.
30 “But if his descendants disobey my law
and do not live according to my commands,
31 if they disregard my instructions
and do not keep my commandments,
32 then I will punish them for their sins;
I will make them suffer for their wrongs.
33 But I will not stop loving David
or fail to keep my promise to him.
34 I will not break my covenant with him
or take back even one promise I made him.
35 “Once and for all I have promised by my holy name:
I will never lie to David.
36 He will always have descendants,
and I will watch over his kingdom as long as the sun shines.
37 It will be as permanent as the moon,
that faithful witness in the sky.”
Lament over the Defeat of the King
38 But you are angry with your chosen king;
you have deserted and rejected him.
39 You have broken your covenant with your servant
and thrown his crown in the dirt.
40 You have torn down the walls of his city
and left his forts in ruins.
41 All who pass by steal his belongings;
all his neighbors laugh at him.
42 You have given the victory to his enemies;
you have made them all happy.
43 You have made his weapons useless
and let him be defeated in battle.
44 You have taken away his royal scepter[c]
and knocked his throne to the ground.
45 You have made him old before his time
and covered him with disgrace.
A Prayer for Deliverance
46 Lord, will you hide yourself forever?
How long will your anger burn like fire?
47 Remember how short my life is;
remember that you created all of us mortal!
48 Who can live and never die?
How can we humans keep ourselves from the grave?
49 Lord, where are the former proofs of your love?
Where are the promises you made to David?
50 Don't forget how I, your servant, am insulted,
how I endure all the curses[d] of the heathen.
51 Your enemies insult your chosen king, O Lord!
They insult him wherever he goes.
52 Praise the Lord forever!
Amen! Amen!
Jephthah and the Ephraimites
12 The men of Ephraim prepared for battle; they crossed the Jordan River to Zaphon and said to Jephthah, “Why did you cross the border to fight the Ammonites without calling us to go with you? We'll burn the house down over your head!”
2 But Jephthah told them, “My people and I had a serious quarrel with the Ammonites. I did call you, but you would not rescue me from them. 3 When I saw that you were not going to, I risked my life and crossed the border to fight them, and the Lord gave me victory over them. So why are you coming up to fight me now?” 4 Then Jephthah brought all the men of Gilead together, fought the men of Ephraim and defeated them. (The Ephraimites had said, “You Gileadites in Ephraim and Manasseh, you are deserters from Ephraim!”) 5 In order to keep the Ephraimites from escaping, the Gileadites captured the places where the Jordan could be crossed. When any Ephraimite who was trying to escape would ask permission to cross, the men of Gilead would ask, “Are you an Ephraimite?” If he said, “No,” 6 they would tell him to say “Shibboleth.” But he would say “Sibboleth,” because he could not pronounce it correctly. Then they would grab him and kill him there at one of the Jordan River crossings. At that time forty-two thousand of the Ephraimites were killed.
7 Jephthah led Israel for six years. Then he died and was buried in his hometown[a] in Gilead.
Miracles and Wonders
12 Many miracles and wonders were being performed among the people by the apostles. All the believers met together in Solomon's Porch. 13 Nobody outside the group dared join them, even though the people spoke highly of them. 14 But more and more people were added to the group—a crowd of men and women who believed in the Lord. 15 As a result of what the apostles were doing, sick people were carried out into the streets and placed on beds and mats so that at least Peter's shadow might fall on some of them as he passed by. 16 And crowds of people came in from the towns around Jerusalem, bringing those who were sick or who had evil spirits in them; and they were all healed.
The Apostles Are Persecuted
17 Then the High Priest and all his companions, members of the local party of the Sadducees, became extremely jealous of the apostles; so they decided to take action. 18 They arrested the apostles and put them in the public jail. 19 But that night an angel of the Lord opened the prison gates, led the apostles out, and said to them, 20 “Go and stand in the Temple, and tell the people all about this new life.” 21 The apostles obeyed, and at dawn they entered the Temple and started teaching.
The High Priest and his companions called together all the Jewish elders for a full meeting of the Council; then they sent orders to the prison to have the apostles brought before them. 22 But when the officials arrived, they did not find the apostles in prison, so they returned to the Council and reported, 23 “When we arrived at the jail, we found it locked up tight and all the guards on watch at the gates; but when we opened the gates, we found no one inside!” 24 When the chief priests and the officer in charge of the Temple guards heard this, they wondered what had happened to the apostles. 25 Then a man came in and said to them, “Listen! The men you put in prison are in the Temple teaching the people!” 26 So the officer went off with his men and brought the apostles back. They did not use force, however, because they were afraid that the people might stone them.
Jesus and Nicodemus
3 There was a Jewish leader named Nicodemus, who belonged to the party of the Pharisees. 2 One night he went to Jesus and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher sent by God. No one could perform the miracles you are doing unless God were with him.”
3 Jesus answered, “I am telling you the truth: no one can see the Kingdom of God without being born again.”[a]
4 “How can a grown man be born again?” Nicodemus asked. “He certainly cannot enter his mother's womb and be born a second time!”
5 “I am telling you the truth,” replied Jesus, “that no one can enter the Kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit. 6 A person is born physically of human parents, but is born spiritually of the Spirit. 7 Do not be surprised because I tell you that you must all be born again.[b] 8 The wind blows wherever it wishes; you hear the sound it makes, but you do not know where it comes from or where it is going. It is like that with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
9 “How can this be?” asked Nicodemus.
10 Jesus answered, “You are a great teacher in Israel, and you don't know this? 11 I am telling you the truth: we speak of what we know and report what we have seen, yet none of you is willing to accept our message. 12 (A)You do not believe me when I tell you about the things of this world; how will you ever believe me, then, when I tell you about the things of heaven? 13 (B)And no one has ever gone up to heaven except the Son of Man, who came down from heaven.”[c]
14 (C)As Moses lifted up the bronze snake on a pole in the desert, in the same way the Son of Man must be lifted up, 15 so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life. 16 For God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not die but have eternal life. 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to be its judge, but to be its savior.
18 Those who believe in the Son are not judged; but those who do not believe have already been judged, because they have not believed in God's only Son. 19 This is how the judgment works: the light has come into the world, but people love the darkness rather than the light, because their deeds are evil. 20 Those who do evil things hate the light and will not come to the light, because they do not want their evil deeds to be shown up. 21 But those who do what is true come to the light in order that the light may show that what they did was in obedience to God.
Good News Translation® (Today’s English Version, Second Edition) © 1992 American Bible Society. All rights reserved. For more information about GNT, visit www.bibles.com and www.gnt.bible.