Book of Common Prayer

Prayer of Trust in God

31 O Lord, in You I have found a safe place. Let me never be ashamed. Set me free, because You do what is right and good. ² Turn Your ear to me, and be quick to save me. Be my rock of strength, a strong place to keep me safe. ³ For You are my rock and my safe place. For the honor of Your name, lead me and show me the way. ⁴ You will free me from the net that they have hidden for me. For You are my strength. ⁵ I give my spirit into Your hands. You have made me free, O Lord, God of truth.

⁶ I hate those who worship false gods. But I trust in the Lord. ⁷ I will be glad and full of joy in Your loving-kindness. For You have seen my suffering. You have known the troubles of my soul. ⁸ You have not given me into the hand of those who hate me. You have set my feet in a large place.

⁹ Show me loving-kindness, O Lord, for I am in trouble. My eyes, my soul and my body are becoming weak from being sad. ¹⁰ For my life gets weaker with sorrow, and my years with crying inside myself. My strength has left me because of my sin. And my bones waste away. ¹¹ Because of all those who hate me, I have become a shame to my neighbors. Even my friends do not want to be with me. Those who see me on the street run from me. ¹² I am forgotten like a dead man and they do not think about me. I am like a broken pot. ¹³ For I have heard many say things to hurt me. Fear is on every side. They planned together against me. They thought of ways to take away my life.

¹⁴ But as for me, I trust in You, O Lord. I say, “You are my God.” ¹⁵ My times are in Your hands. Free me from the hands of those who hate me, and from those who try to hurt me. ¹⁶ Make Your face shine upon Your servant. Save me in Your loving-kindness. ¹⁷ Do not let me be put to shame, O Lord. For I call to You. Let the sinful be put to shame. Let them be quiet in the grave. ¹⁸ Let the lying lips be quiet. For they speak with pride and hate those who do right and good.

¹⁹ How great is Your loving-kindness! You have stored it up for those who fear You. You show it to those who trust in You in front of the sons of men. ²⁰ You will hide them with You in secret from the sinful plans of men. You keep them in Your tent in secret from those who fight with tongues. ²¹ Honor and thanks be to the Lord. For He has shown His great loving-favor to me when I was in a city with armies all around. ²² In my fear I said, “You have closed Your eyes to me!” But You heard my cry for loving-kindness when I called to You.

²³ Love the Lord, all you who belong to Him! The Lord keeps the faithful safe. But He gives the proud their pay in full. ²⁴ Be strong. Be strong in heart, all you who hope in the Lord.

Prayer for Help

35 O Lord, stand against those who stand against me. Fight those who fight me. ² Take hold of a safe-covering and rise up to help me. ³ Take a spear and battle-ax against those who come to get me. Say to my soul, “I am the One Who saves you.” ⁴ Let the people be ashamed and without honor who want to take my life. Let those be turned away and brought to shame who plan to hurt me. ⁵ Let them be like straw in the wind. May the angel of the Lord drive them away. ⁶ Let their way be dark and dangerous, with the angel of the Lord going to get them. ⁷ For without a reason they hid their net for me. Without a reason, they dug a hole for my soul. ⁸ Let them be destroyed before they know it. And let them be caught in their own net. May they destroy themselves as they fall into their own hole.

⁹ My soul will be happy in the Lord. It will be full of joy because He saves. ¹⁰ All my bones will say, “Lord, who is like You? Who saves the weak from those too strong for them? Who saves the poor from those who would rob them?” ¹¹ People come telling lies. They ask me of things that I do not know. ¹² They pay me what is bad in return for what is good. My soul is sad. ¹³ But when they were sick, I put on clothes made from hair. With no pride in my soul, I would not eat. And I prayed with my head on my chest. ¹⁴ I went about as if it were my friend or brother. I put my head down in sorrow, like one crying for his mother. ¹⁵ But when I would fall, they would gather together in joy. Those who say things to hurt people would gather against me. I did not know them. They spoke against me without stopping. ¹⁶ They ground their teeth at me like bad people making fun of others at a special supper.

¹⁷ Lord, how long will You look on? Save me from being destroyed by them. Save my life from the lions. ¹⁸ I will give You thanks in the big meeting. I will praise You among many people. ¹⁹ Do not let those who hate me for no reason stand over me with joy. Do not let those who hate me for no reason wink their eye. ²⁰ They do not speak peace. But they make up lies against those who are quiet in the land. ²¹ And they opened their mouth wide against me. They said, “O, O, our eyes have seen it.”

²² You have seen it, O Lord. Do not keep quiet. O Lord, do not be far from me. ²³ Awake Yourself. Come and help me. Fight for me, my God and my Lord. ²⁴ Say what is right or wrong with me, O Lord my God, because You are right and good. Do not let them have joy over me. ²⁵ Do not let them say in their heart, “O, just what we wanted!” Do not let them say, “We have swallowed him up!” ²⁶ Let all who are happy because of my trouble be ashamed and without honor. Let those who think they are better than I, be covered with shame and without honor.

²⁷ Let them call out for joy and be glad, who want to see the right thing done for me. Let them always say, “May the Lord be honored. He is pleased when all is going well for His servant.” ²⁸ And my tongue will tell about how right and good You are, and about Your praise all day long.

Job Talks

19 Then Job answered, ² “How long will you make me suffer and crush me with words? ³ Ten times you have put me to shame and are not ashamed to wrong me. ⁴ Even if it is true that I have done wrong, it stays with me. ⁵ You put yourselves up high against me, and try to prove my shame to me. ⁶ You will know then that God has wronged me, and has set a trap around me.

⁷ “See, I cry, ‘Someone is hurting me!’ but I get no answer. I call for help, but no one stands for what is right and fair.

¹⁴ My brothers have left me, and my close friends have forgotten me. ¹⁵ Those who live in my house and my women servants think of me as a stranger. I am like one from another country in their eyes. ¹⁶ I call to my servant, but he does not answer. I have to beg him. ¹⁷ My breath smells bad to my wife, and I am hated by my own brothers. ¹⁸ Even young children hate me. When I get up they speak against me. ¹⁹ All my friends hate me. Those I love have turned against me. ²⁰ I am only skin and flesh. And I have gotten away only by the skin of my teeth. ²¹ Have pity on me. Have pity on me, O you my friends. For the hand of God has hit me. ²² Why do you make it hard for me as God does? Have I not suffered enough to please you?

²³ “If only my words were written! If only they were written down in a book! ²⁴ If only they were cut forever into the rock with an iron cutter and lead! ²⁵ But as for me, I know that the One Who bought me and made me free from sin lives, and that He will stand upon the earth in the end. ²⁶ Even after my skin is destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God. ²⁷ I myself will see Him. With my own eyes I will see Him and not another. My heart becomes weak within me.

¹³ Paul and those with him went by ship from Paphos to the city of Perga in the country of Pamphylia. John Mark did not go with them but went back to Jerusalem.

Paul Preaches in Antioch

¹⁴ From Perga they went on to the city of Antioch in the country of Pisidia. On the Day of Rest they went into the Jewish place of worship and sat down. ¹⁵ After the leaders had read from the Jewish Law and the writings of the early preachers, they sent to them saying, “Brothers, if you have any word of comfort and help for the people, say it now.” ¹⁶ Paul got up. He raised his hand and said, “Jewish men and you who honor God, listen! ¹⁷ The God of the Jews chose our early fathers and made them a great people during the time they lived in the land of Egypt. With a strong hand He took them out from there. ¹⁸ For about forty years He took care of them in the desert. ¹⁹ He destroyed the people of seven nations in the land of Canaan. Then He divided the land and gave it to them as their own. ²⁰ For about 450 years He let them have special leaders. They had these leaders until the time of Samuel.

²¹ “Then they wanted a king. God gave them Saul who was the son of Kish from the family group of Benjamin. He was king forty years. ²² When God took Saul as king from them, He made David to be their king. He said, ‘David, Jesse’s son, will please My heart. He will do all I want done.’

²³ “From this man’s family, God gave to the Jews the One Who saves from the punishment of sin as He had promised. He is Jesus. ²⁴ Before Jesus came, John had preached to all the Jews that they should be baptized because they were sorry for their sins and turned from them. ²⁵ When John was near the end of his work, he asked, ‘Who do you think I am? I am not the Christ. No, but He is coming later and I am not good enough to get down and help Him take off His shoes!’

¹⁸ The Jews did not believe this man had been blind and had been made to see. They called his parents ¹⁹ and asked them, “Is this your son? Do you say he was born blind? How does he see now?” ²⁰ They answered, “We know this is our son and we know he was born blind. ²¹ But we do not know how it is that he can see now. We do not know who opened his eyes. He is old enough, ask him. He can tell you himself.” ²² His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jews. The Jews had talked among themselves. They had agreed that the person who said that Jesus was the Christ would be put out of the Jewish place of worship. ²³ That is why his parents said, “He is old enough, ask him.”

²⁴ The proud religious law-keepers asked the man again, who had been blind, to come. They said to him, “Give thanks to God. We know this man is a sinner.” ²⁵ The man who had been blind said to them, “I do not know if He is a sinner or not. One thing I know. I was blind, but now I can see.” ²⁶ They asked him again, “What did He do to you? How did He open your eyes?” ²⁷ He answered, “I have told you already. You did not listen. Why do you want to hear it again? Do you want to become His followers also?”

²⁸ The proud religious law-keepers became angry at him and said, “You are a follower of Jesus. We are followers of Moses. ²⁹ We know God spoke to Moses. We do not know where this Man is from.” ³⁰ The man said to them, “This is strange! You do not know where He came from and yet He opened my eyes. ³¹ We know that God does not listen to sinners. We know if anyone loves and worships God, and does what He wants, God listens to him. ³² From the beginning of the world no one has ever heard of anyone opening the eyes of a man born blind. ³³ If this Man were not from God, He would not be able to do anything like this.”

³⁴ They said to him, “You were born in sin. Are you trying to teach us?” Then they put him out of the place of worship.

Jesus Speaks Sharp Words to the Proud Religious Law-Keepers

³⁵ Jesus heard that the proud religious law-keepers had put the man who had been healed out of the place of worship. He found the man and said to him, “Do you put your trust in the Son of God?” ³⁶ He said, “Who is He, Sir? Tell me so that I can put my trust in Him.” ³⁷ Jesus said to him, “You have seen Him. He is talking with you.” ³⁸ He said, “I do put my trust in You, Lord.” Then he bowed down before Jesus and worshiped Him.

³⁹ Jesus said, “I came into this world to say what is right from wrong. I came so those who do not see might see, and those who do see might be made blind.” ⁴⁰ Some of the proud religious law-keepers who were with Him heard this. They said to Him, “Are we blind also?” ⁴¹ Jesus said to them, “If you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin. But because you say, ‘We see,’ you still are guilty of your sin.