Book of Common Prayer
Psalm 101
A Psalm of David.
1 I will sing of mercy and justice;
to You, O Lord, I will sing.
2 I will consider the path that is blameless.
When will You come to me?
I will walk within my house
with a perfect heart.
3 I will set no wicked thing
before my eyes.
I hate the work of those who turn aside;
it shall not have part of me.
4 A perverted heart shall be far from me;
I will not know anything wicked.
5 Whoever privately slanders his neighbor,
him I will destroy;
whoever has a haughty look and a proud heart
I will not endure.
6 My eyes shall be favorable to the faithful in the land,
that they may live with me;
he who walks in a blameless manner,
he shall serve me.
7 He who practices deceit
shall not dwell within my house;
he who tells lies
shall not remain in my sight.
8 Every morning I will destroy
all the wicked in the land,
that I may cut off all wicked doers
from the city of the Lord.
Psalm 109
For the Music Director. A Psalm of David.
1 Do not remain silent,
O God of my praise!
2 For the mouth of the wicked and deceitful
are opened against me;
they have spoken against me with a lying tongue.
3 They encircled me with words of hatred
and fought against me without cause.
4 In return for my love they are my adversaries,
but I give myself to prayer.
5 They have rewarded me evil for good
and hatred for my love.
6 Set a wicked man against him,
and let an accuser stand at his right hand.
7 When he shall be judged, let him be condemned,
and let his prayer be reckoned as sin.
8 Let his days be few,
and let another take his office.
9 Let his children be fatherless
and his wife a widow.
10 Let his children be wandering beggars;
let them seek their bread far from their desolate places.
11 Let the creditor seize all that he has;
let the strangers plunder the fruit of his labor.
12 Let there be none to extend mercy unto him,
neither let there be any to pity his fatherless children.
13 Let his posterity be cut off,
and in the generation following let his name be blotted out.
14 Let the iniquity of his fathers be remembered with the Lord,
and let not the sin of his mother be blotted out.
15 Let them be before the Lord continually,
that the Lord may cut off the memory of them from the earth.
16 For he did not remember to show kindness,
but pursued the poor and needy and broken-hearted
to their death.
17 As he loved cursing,
so let it come over him;
as he did not delight in blessing,
so let it be far from him.
18 As he clothed himself with cursing like a garment,
so let it soak into him like water,
and like oil into his bones.
19 Let it be unto him as the garment that covers him,
and a belt that he continually wears.
20 Let this be the reward of my adversaries from the Lord,
and of those who speak evil against my soul.
21 But You, O God my Lord,
work on my behalf for your name’s sake;
because your mercy is good, deliver me.
22 For I am poor and needy,
and my heart is wounded within me.
23 I am gone like a shadow in the evening;
I am tossed as the locust.
24 My knees are weak through fasting,
and my body is thin with no fat.
25 I am a reproach to my accusers;
when they look upon me, they shake their heads.
26 Help me, O Lord my God!
Save me according to Your mercy,
27 that they may know that this is by Your hand,
that You, O Lord, have done it.
28 Let them curse, but You will bless;
when they arise, let them be ashamed,
but let Your servant rejoice.
29 Let my adversaries be clothed with shame,
and let them cover themselves with their own disgrace like a cloak.
30 I will greatly praise the Lord with my mouth;
indeed, I will praise Him among the multitude.
ע Ayin
121 I have done what is right and just;
do not abandon me to my oppressors.
122 Be true to Your servant for good;
let not the proud ones oppress me.
123 My eyes long for Your deliverance
and for the promise of Your righteousness.
124 Deal with Your servant according to Your mercy,
and teach me Your statutes.
125 I am Your servant; grant me understanding,
that I may know Your testimonies.
126 It is time for You, O Lord, to act,
for they have broken Your law.
127 Therefore I love Your commandments
above gold, even fine gold.
128 For I follow all Your precepts to be right,
and I hate every false way.
פ Pe
129 Your testimonies are wonderful;
therefore my soul keeps them.
130 The giving of Your words gives light;
it grants understanding to the simple.
131 I opened my mouth and panted,
for I long for Your commandments.
132 Look upon me, and be merciful to me,
as You are for those who love Your name.
133 Order my steps according to Your word,
and let not any iniquity have dominion over me.
134 Deliver me from the oppression of man,
so I will keep Your precepts.
135 Make Your face to shine upon Your servant,
and teach me Your statutes.
136 Rivers of waters run down my eyes,
because people do not keep Your law.
צ Tsadhe
137 You are righteous, O Lord,
and upright are Your judgments.
138 You have set Your testimonies in righteousness
and faithfulness.
139 My zeal has consumed me,
because my enemies have forgotten Your words.
140 Your word is pure and true;
therefore Your servant loves it.
141 I am small and despised,
yet I do not forget Your precepts.
142 Your righteousness is an everlasting righteousness,
and Your law is true.
143 Trouble and anguish have discovered me,
but Your commandments are my delight.
144 The righteousness of Your testimonies is everlasting;
grant me understanding, and I shall live.
36 The Lord spoke to Moses, saying: 37 Tell Eleazar the son of Aaron the priest to take up the censers out of the blaze, for they are holy. Then scatter the fire far and wide. 38 As for the censers of these men who have sinned at the cost of their own lives, make them into hammered plates as a covering for the altar, for they presented them before the Lord and they are holy. They shall be a sign to the children of Israel.
39 So Eleazar the priest took the bronze censers, which those who were burned had offered, and they were hammered out as a covering on the altar, 40 to be a memorial to the children of Israel, that no outsider, who is not of the descendants of Aaron, shall approach to offer incense before the Lord, that he might not become like Korah and his company, as the Lord has said to him through Moses.
The People Complain
41 But the next day all the assembly of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and against Aaron, saying, “You have killed the people of the Lord.”
42 When the assembly was gathered against Moses and Aaron, they looked toward the tent of meeting. The cloud covered it, and the glory of the Lord appeared. 43 Moses and Aaron went before the tent of meeting. 44 And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 45 “Get up from among this assembly, that I may destroy them in a moment.” And they fell on their faces.
46 Moses said to Aaron, “Take a censer and put fire in it from off the altar, and put in incense, and go quickly to the assembly, and make an atonement for them, because wrath has gone out from the Lord. The plague has begun.” 47 Aaron took it as Moses commanded and ran into the midst of the assembly, where the plague had begun among the people. He put in incense and made an atonement for the people. 48 He stood between the dead and the living, and the plague was stopped. 49 Now those who died in the plague were fourteen thousand seven hundred, besides those that died concerning the thing of Korah. 50 Aaron returned to Moses, to the door of the tent of meeting, and the plague was stopped.
The Promise Received Through Faith
13 It was not through the law that Abraham and his descendants received the promise that he would be the heir of the world, but through the righteousness of faith. 14 For if those who are of the law become heirs, faith would be made void and the promise nullified, 15 because the law produces wrath, for where there is no law, there is no sin.
16 Therefore the promise comes through faith, so that it might be by grace, that the promise would be certain to all the descendants, not only to those who are of the law, but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all 17 (as it is written, “I have made you a father of many nations”[a]) before God whom he believed, and who raises the dead, and calls those things that do not exist as though they did.
18 Against all hope, he believed in hope, that he might become the father of many nations according to what was spoken, “So shall your descendants be.”[b] 19 And not being weak in faith, he did not consider his own body to be dead (when he was about a hundred years old), nor yet the deadness of Sarah’s womb. 20 He did not waver at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith, giving glory to God, 21 and being fully persuaded that what God had promised, He was able to perform. 22 Therefore “it was credited to him as righteousness.”[c] 23 Now the words, “it was credited to him,” were not written for his sake only, 24 but also for us, to whom it shall be credited if we believe in Him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead, 25 who was delivered for our transgressions, and was raised for our justification.
The Workers in the Vineyard
20 “For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard. 2 When he had agreed with the laborers for a denarius a day, he sent them into his vineyard.
3 “Then he went out about the third hour and saw others standing idle in the marketplace, 4 and said to them, ‘You also go into the vineyard, and whatever is right I will give you.’ So they went. 5 Again he went out about the sixth hour and the ninth hour and did likewise.
6 “About the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing idle, and said to them, ‘Why do you stand here idle all day?’
7 “They said to him, ‘Because no one has hired us.’
“He said to them, ‘You also go into the vineyard, and whatever is right you will receive.’
8 “So when evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his steward, ‘Call the laborers and give them their wages, beginning with the last to the first.’
9 “When they who were hired about the eleventh hour came, they each received a denarius. 10 But when the first came, they supposed that they would receive more, but each of them likewise received a denarius. 11 When they received it, they grumbled against the landowner, 12 saying, ‘These last worked only one hour, and you made them equal to us, who have borne the burden and the heat of the day.’
13 “But he answered one of them, ‘Friend, I am doing you no wrong. Did you not agree with me for a denarius? 14 Take what is yours and go your way. I will give to this last one even as I give to you. 15 Is it not lawful for me to do what I wish with my own things? Or is your eye evil because I am good?’
16 “So the last will be first, and the first last. For many are called, but few are chosen.”
The Holy Bible, Modern English Version. Copyright © 2014 by Military Bible Association. Published and distributed by Charisma House.