Book of Common Prayer
97 Yahweh reigns!
Let the earth rejoice!
Let the multitude of islands be glad!
2 Clouds and darkness are around him.
Righteousness and justice are the foundation of his throne.
3 A fire goes before him,
and burns up his adversaries on every side.
4 His lightning lights up 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 the whole earth.
6 The heavens declare his righteousness.
All the peoples have seen his glory.
7 Let all them be shamed who serve engraved images,
who boast in their idols.
Worship him, all you gods![a]
8 Zion heard and was glad.
The daughters of Judah rejoiced
because of your judgments, Yahweh.
9 For you, Yahweh, are most high above all the earth.
You are exalted far above all gods.
10 You who love Yahweh, hate evil!
He preserves the souls of his saints.
He delivers them out of the hand of the wicked.
11 Light is sown for the righteous,
and gladness for the upright in heart.
12 Be glad in Yahweh, you righteous people!
Give thanks to his holy Name.
99 Yahweh reigns! Let the peoples tremble.
He sits enthroned among the cherubim.
Let the earth be moved.
2 Yahweh is great in Zion.
He is high above all the peoples.
3 Let them praise your great and awesome name.
He is Holy!
4 The King’s strength also loves justice.
You establish equity.
You execute justice and righteousness in Jacob.
5 Exalt Yahweh our God.
Worship at his footstool.
He is Holy!
6 Moses and Aaron were among his priests,
Samuel was among those who call on his name.
They called on Yahweh, and he answered them.
7 He spoke to them in the pillar of cloud.
They kept his testimonies,
the statute that he gave them.
8 You answered them, Yahweh our God.
You are a God who forgave them,
although you took vengeance for their doings.
9 Exalt Yahweh, our God.
Worship at his holy hill,
for Yahweh, our God, is holy!
A Psalm of thanksgiving.
100 Shout for joy to Yahweh, all you lands!
2 Serve Yahweh with gladness.
Come before his presence with singing.
3 Know that Yahweh, he is God.
It is he who has made us, and we are his.
We are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.
4 Enter into his gates with thanksgiving,
and into his courts with praise.
Give thanks to him, and bless his name.
5 For Yahweh is good.
His loving kindness endures forever,
his faithfulness to all generations.
94 Yahweh, you God to whom vengeance belongs,
you God to whom vengeance belongs, shine out.
2 Rise up, you judge of the earth.
Pay back the proud what they deserve.
3 Yahweh, how long will the wicked,
how long will the wicked triumph?
4 They pour out arrogant words.
All the evildoers boast.
5 They break your people in pieces, Yahweh,
and afflict your heritage.
6 They kill the widow and the alien,
and murder the fatherless.
7 They say, “Yah will not see,
neither will Jacob’s God consider.”
8 Consider, you senseless among the people;
you fools, when will you be wise?
9 He who implanted the ear, won’t he hear?
He who formed the eye, won’t he see?
10 He who disciplines the nations, won’t he punish?
He who teaches man knows.
11 Yahweh knows the thoughts of man,
that they are futile.
12 Blessed is the man whom you discipline, Yah,
and teach out of your law,
13 that you may give him rest from the days of adversity,
until the pit is dug for the wicked.
14 For Yahweh won’t reject his people,
neither will he forsake his inheritance.
15 For judgment will return to righteousness.
All the upright in heart shall follow it.
16 Who will rise up for me against the wicked?
Who will stand up for me against the evildoers?
17 Unless Yahweh had been my help,
my soul would have soon lived in silence.
18 When I said, “My foot is slipping!”
Your loving kindness, Yahweh, held me up.
19 In the multitude of my thoughts within me,
your comforts delight my soul.
20 Shall the throne of wickedness have fellowship with you,
which brings about mischief by statute?
21 They gather themselves together against the soul of the righteous,
and condemn the innocent blood.
22 But Yahweh has been my high tower,
my God, the rock of my refuge.
23 He has brought on them their own iniquity,
and will cut them off in their own wickedness.
Yahweh, our God, will cut them off.
95 Oh come, let’s sing to Yahweh.
Let’s shout aloud to the rock of our salvation!
2 Let’s come before his presence with thanksgiving.
Let’s extol him with songs!
3 For Yahweh is a great God,
a great King above all gods.
4 In his hand are the deep places of the earth.
The heights of the mountains are also his.
5 The sea is his, and he made it.
His hands formed the dry land.
6 Oh come, let’s worship and bow down.
Let’s kneel before Yahweh, our Maker,
7 for he is our God.
We are the people of his pasture,
and the sheep in his care.
Today, oh that you would hear his voice!
8 Don’t harden your heart, as at Meribah,
as in the day of Massah in the wilderness,
9 when your fathers tempted me,
tested me, and saw my work.
10 Forty long years I was grieved with that generation,
and said, “They are a people who err in their heart.
They have not known my ways.”
11 Therefore I swore in my wrath,
“They won’t enter into my rest.”
14 Now Joab the son of Zeruiah perceived that the king’s heart was toward Absalom. 2 Joab sent to Tekoa and brought a wise woman from there, and said to her, “Please act like a mourner, and put on mourning clothing, please, and don’t anoint yourself with oil; but be as a woman who has mourned a long time for the dead. 3 Go in to the king and speak like this to him.” So Joab put the words in her mouth.
4 When the woman of Tekoa spoke to the king, she fell on her face to the ground, showed respect, and said, “Help, O king!”
5 The king said to her, “What ails you?”
She answered, “Truly I am a widow, and my husband is dead. 6 Your servant had two sons; and they both fought together in the field, and there was no one to part them, but the one struck the other and killed him. 7 Behold, the whole family has risen against your servant, and they say, ‘Deliver him who struck his brother, that we may kill him for the life of his brother whom he killed, and so destroy the heir also.’ Thus they would quench my coal which is left, and would leave to my husband neither name nor remainder on the surface of the earth.”
8 The king said to the woman, “Go to your house, and I will give a command concerning you.”
9 The woman of Tekoa said to the king, “My lord, O king, may the iniquity be on me, and on my father’s house; and may the king and his throne be guiltless.”
10 The king said, “Whoever says anything to you, bring him to me, and he will not bother you any more.”
11 Then she said, “Please let the king remember Yahweh your God, that the avenger of blood destroy not any more, lest they destroy my son.”
He said, “As Yahweh lives, not one hair of your son shall fall to the earth.”
12 Then the woman said, “Please let your servant speak a word to my lord the king.”
He said, “Say on.”
13 The woman said, “Why then have you devised such a thing against the people of God? For in speaking this word the king is as one who is guilty, in that the king does not bring home again his banished one. 14 For we must die, and are like water spilled on the ground, which can’t be gathered up again; neither does God take away life, but devises means, that he who is banished not be an outcast from him. 15 Now therefore, seeing that I have come to speak this word to my lord the king, it is because the people have made me afraid. Your servant said, ‘I will now speak to the king; it may be that the king will perform the request of his servant.’ 16 For the king will hear, to deliver his servant out of the hand of the man who would destroy me and my son together out of the inheritance of God. 17 Then your servant said, ‘Please let the word of my lord the king bring rest; for as an angel of God, so is my lord the king to discern good and bad. May Yahweh, your God, be with you.’”
18 Then the king answered the woman, “Please don’t hide anything from me that I ask you.”
The woman said, “Let my lord the king now speak.”
19 The king said, “Is the hand of Joab with you in all this?”
The woman answered, “As your soul lives, my lord the king, no one can turn to the right hand or to the left from anything that my lord the king has spoken; for your servant Joab urged me, and he put all these words in the mouth of your servant. 20 Your servant Joab has done this thing to change the face of the matter. My lord is wise, according to the wisdom of an angel of God, to know all things that are in the earth.”
21 When we had departed from them and had set sail, we came with a straight course to Cos, and the next day to Rhodes, and from there to Patara. 2 Having found a ship crossing over to Phoenicia, we went aboard and set sail. 3 When we had come in sight of Cyprus, leaving it on the left hand, we sailed to Syria and landed at Tyre, for the ship was there to unload her cargo. 4 Having found disciples, we stayed there seven days. These said to Paul through the Spirit that he should not go up to Jerusalem. 5 When those days were over, we departed and went on our journey. They all, with wives and children, brought us on our way until we were out of the city. Kneeling down on the beach, we prayed. 6 After saying goodbye to each other, we went on board the ship, and they returned home again.
7 When we had finished the voyage from Tyre, we arrived at Ptolemais. We greeted the brothers and stayed with them one day. 8 On the next day, we who were Paul’s companions departed and came to Caesarea.
We entered into the house of Philip the evangelist, who was one of the seven, and stayed with him. 9 Now this man had four virgin daughters who prophesied. 10 As we stayed there some days, a certain prophet named Agabus came down from Judea. 11 Coming to us and taking Paul’s belt, he bound his own feet and hands, and said, “The Holy Spirit says: ‘So the Jews at Jerusalem will bind the man who owns this belt, and will deliver him into the hands of the Gentiles.’”
12 When we heard these things, both we and the people of that place begged him not to go up to Jerusalem. 13 Then Paul answered, “What are you doing, weeping and breaking my heart? For I am ready not only to be bound, but also to die at Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus.”
14 When he would not be persuaded, we ceased, saying, “The Lord’s will be done.”
10 He arose from there and came into the borders of Judea and beyond the Jordan. Multitudes came together to him again. As he usually did, he was again teaching them.
2 Pharisees came to him testing him, and asked him, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?”
3 He answered, “What did Moses command you?”
4 They said, “Moses allowed a certificate of divorce to be written, and to divorce her.”
5 But Jesus said to them, “For your hardness of heart, he wrote you this commandment. 6 But from the beginning of the creation, God made them male and female.(A) 7 For this cause a man will leave his father and mother, and will join to his wife, 8 and the two will become one flesh,(B) so that they are no longer two, but one flesh. 9 What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate.”
10 In the house, his disciples asked him again about the same matter. 11 He said to them, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her. 12 If a woman herself divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.”
13 They were bringing to him little children, that he should touch them, but the disciples rebuked those who were bringing them. 14 But when Jesus saw it, he was moved with indignation and said to them, “Allow the little children to come to me! Don’t forbid them, for God’s Kingdom belongs to such as these. 15 Most certainly I tell you, whoever will not receive God’s Kingdom like a little child, he will in no way enter into it.” 16 He took them in his arms and blessed them, laying his hands on them.
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