Book of Common Prayer
A Royal Wedding Song
Psalm 45
1 For the music director, according to “Lilies.” Of the sons of Korah, a contemplative song, a love song.
2 My heart is stirred with a good word.
I speak my verses to the king.
My tongue is the pen of a skillful writer.
3 You are the most handsome of the sons of men.
Grace pours from your lips.
Therefore God has blessed you forever.
4 Gird your sword on your thigh, O mighty one,
in your splendor and your majesty.
5 In your majesty ride victoriously,
on behalf of truth, meekness and justice.
Let your right hand display awesome things.
6 Your arrows are sharp.
Peoples fall beneath you—
into the heart of the king’s enemies.
7 Your throne, O God, is forever and ever,
and a scepter of justice is the scepter of Your kingdom.
8 You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness.
Therefore, God, your God, anointed you with the oil of gladness above your companions.[a]
9 All your robes have myrrh, aloes, cassia.
From ivory palaces, stringed instruments
make you glad.
10 Kings’ daughters are among your honored women.
At your right hand stands the queen
in gold of Ophir.
11 “Listen, O daughter, consider and incline your ear.
Forget your people and your father’s house.
12 Then the king will desire your beauty.
Honor him, for he is your lord.
13 A daughter of Tyre comes with a gift.
The richest people will court your favor.”
14 All glorious is the king’s daughter within the palace—
her gown is interwoven with gold.[b]
15 She will be led to the king in embroidered garments.
Her virgins, her companions following her, are coming in to you.
16 They are led in with joy and gladness—
they enter into the palace of the king.
17 Your sons will take your fathers’ place.
You will make them princes throughout the land.
18 I will cause your name to be remembered in all generations.
Therefore the nations will praise you forever and ever.
In Celebration of God’s Reign
Psalm 47
1 For the music director, a psalm for the sons of Korah.
2 Clap your hands, all you peoples!
Shout to God with the voice of joy!
3 For Adonai Elyon is awesome,
a great King over all the earth.
4 He subdues peoples under us,
and nations under our feet.
5 He chooses our inheritance for us,
the glory of Jacob whom He loved. Selah
6 God is gone up amidst shouting,
Adonai amidst the sound of the shofar.
7 Sing praises to God, sing praises!
Sing praises to our King, sing praises!
8 For God is the King of all the earth.
Sing praises with a skillful song.
9 God reigns over the nations.
God sits upon His holy throne.
10 The princes of the peoples are gathered as a people of the God of Abraham.
For the shields of earth belong to God—
He is greatly exalted!
Consider Zion’s Towers
Psalm 48
1 A song, a psalm of the sons of Korah.
2 Great is Adonai, and greatly to be praised
in the city of our God—His holy mountain.
3 A beautiful height—the joy of the whole earth—
is Mount Zion, on the northern side of the city of the great King.[a]
4 God, in her palaces,
is known as a stronghold.
5 For behold, the kings assembled,
they advanced together.
6 They saw, then they were astounded,
they fled in terror.
7 Trembling seized them there,
pain like a woman in labor.
8 With an east wind
You broke the ships of Tarshish.
9 As we have heard, so have we seen,
in the city of Adonai-Tzva’ot,
in the city of our God.
God will establish her forever. Selah
10 We have meditated on Your lovingkindness, O God,
in the midst of Your Temple.
11 Like Your Name, O God,
so is Your praise
to the ends of the earth.
Your right hand is full of righteousness.
12 Mount Zion is glad,
the daughters of Judah rejoice,
because of Your judgments.
13 Walk about Zion, go around her.
Count her towers.
14 Consider her ramparts,
go through her palaces,
so you may describe it to the next generation.
15 For this God is our God, forever and ever!
He will guide us to the end.
12 Listen to Me, Jacob,
Israel whom I called:
I am He;
I am the first; I am also the last.[a]
13 Surely My hand founded the earth,
My right hand spread out the heavens.
When I call to them, they stand together.
14 Assemble, all of you, and listen!
Who among them foretold these things?
Adonai loves him.
He will do His will against Babylon—
His arm against the Chaldeans.
15 I, I have spoken, yes I called him.
I will bring him, so his ways will succeed.
16 Draw near to Me, hear this:
Since the beginning, I have not spoken in secret.
From the time it existed, I was there.
So now Adonai Elohim has sent Me,
and His Ruach.”[b]
17 Thus says Adonai, your Redeemer,
the Holy One of Israel:
“I am Adonai your God,
who teaches you to profit,
who leads you in the way you should go.
18 If only you had listened to My commandments!
then your peace would be like a river,
and your righteousness like the waves of the sea.
19 Your seed would have been like sand,
and your offspring like its grains.
Their name would never be cut off
or destroyed from before Me.”
20 “Get out of Babylon,
flee from Chaldea!
With a shout of joy,
proclaim this,
send it out to the end of the earth, say:
‘Adonai has redeemed His servant Jacob!
21 They did not thirst when He led them through the deserts.
He caused the water to flow out of the rock for them.
He split the rock also,
and the waters gushed out.’”
18 Then three years later I went to Jerusalem to visit with Peter, and I stayed with him fifteen days. 19 But I saw no other emissaries except Jacob, the Lord’s brother. 20 (In what I’m writing you, before God, I do not lie.)
21 Then I went to the regions of Syria and Cilicia. 22 But I was personally unknown to Messiah’s communities of Judea; 23 they only kept hearing, “The one who once persecuted us now proclaims the Good News he once tried to destroy!” 24 So they were praising God because of me.
Accepted in Jerusalem
2 Then after fourteen years I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, taking Titus with me. 2 Because of a revelation, I went up and presented to them the Good News that I proclaim among the Gentiles. But I did so privately to those who seemed to be influential, to make sure I would not run—or had not run—in vain. [a] 3 Yet not even Titus who was with me, a Greek, was forced to be circumcised. 4 Now this issue came up because of false brothers secretly brought in (who slipped in to spy out our freedom in Messiah, in order to bring us into bondage). 5 But we did not give in to them even for a moment, so that the truth of the Good News might be preserved for you.
6 But from those who seemed to be influential (whatever they were makes no difference to me; God shows no partiality)—well, those influential ones added nothing to my message. 7 On the contrary, they saw that I had been entrusted with the Good News for the uncircumcised just as Peter was for the circumcised. 8 (For the same God who was at work in Peter as an emissary to the Jews, also was at work in me as a emissary to the Gentiles.) 9 Realizing the favor that had been given to me, Jacob and Peter[b] and John—who are the recognized pillars—shook hands in partnership with Barnabas and me,[c] so that we would go to the Gentiles and they to the Jews. 10 They asked only that we remember the poor—something I also was eager to do.
Responding to Rejection
6 Now Yeshua went out from there, and He comes to His hometown, and His disciples follow Him. 2 When Shabbat came, He began to teach in the synagogue. Many listeners were amazed, saying, “Where did this fellow get these things? What’s this wisdom given to Him? Such miracles are done by His hands! 3 Isn’t this the carpenter, the son of Miriam, and the brother of Jacob and Joseph and Judah and Simon? Aren’t His sisters here with us?” And they took offense at Him.
4 Then Yeshua began saying to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his hometown, among his relatives, and in his own house.” 5 He was not able to do any miracle, except that He laid hands on a few sick people and healed them. 6 And He was astonished because of their unbelief.[a] And He was going around among the villages teaching.
7 Yeshua summoned the Twelve, and He began to send them out two by two. And He gave them authority over the unclean spirits. 8 He directed them to take nothing for the journey except a walking stick—no bread, no bag, no copper coin in their belt— 9 but to wear sandals and not to put on two shirts.[b]
10 He was also telling them, “Wherever you enter a house, stay there until you leave that place. 11 And whatever place will not receive you or listen to you, as you leave from there, shake the dust off the bottom of your feet as a witness against them.” 12 So they went out and proclaimed that all should repent, 13 and they were driving out many demons and anointing with oil many who were sick and healing them.
Tree of Life (TLV) Translation of the Bible. Copyright © 2015 by The Messianic Jewish Family Bible Society.