Book of Common Prayer

Psalm 118

Psalm 145^[a]

Praise. Of David.

¹⁵ Delilah said to him, “How can you say, ‘I love you,’ when you won’t trust me? Three times now you’ve made a fool out of me and not told me what gives you such great strength!” ¹⁶ She nagged him with her words day after day and begged him until he became worn out to the point of death.

¹⁷ So he told her his whole secret. He said to her, “No razor has ever touched my head, because I’ve been a nazirite for God from the time I was born. If my head is shaved, my strength will leave me, and I’ll become weak. I’ll be like every other person.”

¹⁸ When Delilah realized that he had told her his whole secret, she sent word to the rulers of the Philistines, “Come one more time, for he has told me his whole secret.” The rulers of the Philistines came up to her and brought the silver with them.

¹⁹ She got him to fall asleep with his head on her lap. Then she called a man and had him shave off the seven braids of Samson’s hair. He began to weaken,^[a] and his strength left him. ²⁰ She called out, “Samson, the Philistines are on you!”

He woke up from his sleep and thought, I’ll escape just like the other times and shake myself free. But he didn’t realize that the Lord had left him. ²¹ So the Philistines captured him, put out his eyes, and took him down to Gaza. They bound him with bronze chains, and he worked the grinding mill in the prison.

²² But the hair on his head began to grow again right after it had been shaved.

Samson’s death

²³ The rulers of the Philistines gathered together to make a great sacrifice to their god Dagon and to hold a celebration. They cheered, “Our god has handed us Samson our enemy!” ²⁴ When the people saw him, they praised their god, for they said, “Our god has handed us our enemy, the very one who devastated our land and killed so many of our people.” ²⁵ At the height of the celebration,^[b] they said, “Call for Samson so he can perform for us!” So they called Samson from the prison, and he performed in front of them. Then they had him stand between the pillars.

²⁶ Samson said to the young man who led him by the hand, “Put me where I can feel the pillars that hold up the temple, so I can lean on them.” ²⁷ Now the temple was filled with men and women. All the rulers of the Philistines were there, and about three thousand more men and women were on the roof watching as Samson performed. ²⁸ Then Samson called out to the Lord, “Lord God, please remember me! Make me strong just this once more, God, so I can have revenge on the Philistines, just one act of revenge for my two eyes.”^{[c] 29} Samson grabbed the two central pillars that held up the temple. He leaned against one with his right hand and the other with his left. ³⁰ And Samson said, “Let me die with the Philistines!” He strained with all his might, and the temple collapsed on the rulers and all the people who were in it. So it turned out that he killed more people in his death than he did during his life.

³¹ His brothers and his father’s entire household traveled down, carried him back up, and buried him between Zorah and Eshtaol in the tomb of his father Manoah. He had led Israel for twenty years.

13 This is the third time that I’m coming to visit you. Every matter is settled on the evidence of two or three witnesses. ² When I was with you on my second visit, I already warned those who continued to sin. Now I’m repeating that warning to all the rest of you while I’m at a safe distance: if I come again, I won’t spare anyone. ³ Since you are demanding proof that Christ speaks through me, Christ isn’t weak in dealing with you but shows his power among you. ⁴ Certainly he was crucified because of weakness, but he lives by the power of God. Certainly we also are weak in him, but we will live together with him, because of God’s power that is directed toward you.

⁵ Examine yourselves to see if you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Don’t you understand that Jesus Christ is in you? Unless, of course, you fail the test. ⁶ But I hope that you will realize that we don’t fail the test. ⁷ We pray to God that you don’t do anything wrong, not because we want to appear to pass the test but so that you might do the right thing, even if we appear to fail.

⁸ We can’t do anything against the truth but only to help the truth. ⁹ We are happy when we are weak but you are strong. We pray for this: that you will be made complete. ¹⁰ This is why I’m writing these things while I’m away. I’m writing so that I won’t need to act harshly when I’m with you by using the authority that the Lord gave me. He gave it to me so that I could build you up, not tear you down.

Final greeting

¹¹ Finally, brothers and sisters, good-bye. Put things in order, respond to my encouragement, be in harmony with each other, and live in peace—and the God of love and peace will be with you.

²⁵ A woman was there who had been bleeding for twelve years. ²⁶ She had suffered a lot under the care of many doctors, and had spent everything she had without getting any better. In fact, she had gotten worse. ²⁷ Because she had heard about Jesus, she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his clothes. ²⁸ She was thinking, If I can just touch his clothes, I’ll be healed. ²⁹ Her bleeding stopped immediately, and she sensed in her body that her illness had been healed.

³⁰ At that very moment, Jesus recognized that power had gone out from him. He turned around in the crowd and said, “Who touched my clothes?”

³¹ His disciples said to him, “Don’t you see the crowd pressing against you? Yet you ask, ‘Who touched me?’” ³² But Jesus looked around carefully to see who had done it.

³³ The woman, full of fear and trembling, came forward. Knowing what had happened to her, she fell down in front of Jesus and told him the whole truth. ³⁴ He responded, “Daughter, your faith has healed you; go in peace, healed from your disease.”