Book of Common Prayer
Psalm 88
For the Music Director. A Song. A Psalm of the sons of Korah. To the melody of “Suffering of Affliction.” A Contemplative Maskil of Heman the Ezrahite.
1 O Lord, God of my salvation,
I cry out day and night before You.
2 Let my prayer come before You;
incline Your ear to my cry.
3 For my soul is full of troubles,
and my life draws near to Sheol.
4 I am counted with those who go down to the grave;
I am a man who has no strength,
5 like one who is set free among the dead,
like the slain who lie in the grave,
like those whom You remember no more,
for they are cut off from Your hand.
6 You have laid me in the depths of the pit,
in dark and deep regions.
7 Your wrath lies heavy upon me,
and You have afflicted me with all Your waves. Selah
8 You have caused my companions to be far from me;
You have made me an abomination to them;
I am shut up, and I cannot escape;
9 my eye is dim from my affliction.
Lord, I call daily upon You,
and I have stretched out my hands to You.
10 Will You show wonders to the dead?
Shall the dead rise up to praise You? Selah
11 Shall Your lovingkindness be declared in the grave,
or your faithfulness in Abaddon?
12 Shall Your wonders be known in the darkness
or Your righteousness in the land of forgetfulness?
13 But unto You have I cried, O Lord,
and in the morning my prayer comes before You.
14 O Lord, why do You cast away my soul?
Why do You hide Your face from me?
15 I am afflicted and close to death since my youth;
while I suffer Your terrors I am helpless.
16 Your fierce wrath sweeps over me;
Your terrors destroy me.
17 They come around me daily like a flood;
they encircle me together.
18 You have caused to be far from me my lovers and friends,
and my companion is darkness.
Psalm 91
1 He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High
shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.
2 I will say of the Lord, “He is my refuge and my fortress,
my God in whom I trust.”
3 Surely He shall deliver you from the snare of the hunter
and from the deadly pestilence.
4 He shall cover you with His feathers,
and under His wings you shall find protection;
His faithfulness shall be your shield and wall.
5 You shall not be afraid of the terror by night,
nor of the arrow that flies by day;
6 nor of the pestilence that pursues in darkness,
nor of the destruction that strikes at noonday.
7 A thousand may fall at your side
and ten thousand at your right hand,
but it shall not come near you.
8 Only with your eyes shall you behold
and see the reward of the wicked.
9 Because you have made the Lord, who is my refuge,
even the Most High, your dwelling,
10 there shall be no evil befall you,
neither shall any plague come near your tent;
11 for He shall give His angels charge over you
to guard you in all your ways.
12 They shall bear you up in their hands,
lest you strike your foot against a stone.
13 You shall tread upon the lion and adder;
the young lion and the serpent you shall trample underfoot.
14 Because he has set his love upon Me, therefore I will deliver him;
I will set him on high, because he has known My name.
15 He shall call upon Me, and I will answer him;
I will be with him in trouble,
and I will deliver him and honor him.
16 With long life I will satisfy him
and show him My salvation.
Psalm 92
A Psalm. A Song for the Sabbath day.
1 It is good to give thanks to the Lord,
and to sing praises unto Your name, O Most High:
2 to declare forth Your lovingkindness in the morning
and Your faithfulness in the night,
3 on a ten-stringed lute and on the harp,
and on the lyre with a solemn sound.
4 For you, O Lord, have made me glad through Your work;
I will sing joyfully at the works of Your hands.
5 O Lord, how great are Your works!
Your thoughts are very deep!
6 A brutish man does not recognize,
neither does the fool understand this.
7 Though the wicked spring up as the grass
and all those who do iniquity flourish,
they shall be destroyed forever:
8 But You, O Lord, are on high forever.
9 For Your enemies, O Lord,
for Your enemies shall perish;
all those who do iniquity shall be scattered.
10 But my horn You have exalted like the horn of the wild ox;
You have anointed me with fresh oil.
11 My eyes also shall see the downfall of my enemies,
and my ears shall hear the doom of my wicked adversaries.
12 The righteous shall flourish like the palm tree
and grow like a cedar in Lebanon.
13 Those that are planted in the house of the Lord
shall flourish in the courts of our God.
14 They shall still bring forth fruit in old age;
they shall be filled with vitality and foliage,
15 to show that the Lord is upright;
He is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in Him.
The Outpouring of the Spirit
28 And it will be that, afterwards,
I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh;
then your sons and your daughters will prophesy,
your old men will dream dreams,
and your young men will see visions.
29 Even on the menservants and maidservants
in those days I will pour out My Spirit.
30 Then I will work wonders in the heavens
and the earth—
blood and fire and columns of smoke.
31 The sun will be turned to darkness,
and the moon to blood,
before the great and awe-inspiring day of the Lord comes.
32 And it will be that everyone
who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.
For on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem
there will be deliverance,
as the Lord has said,
and among the survivors
whom the Lord calls.
Judging the Nations
3 In those days and at that time,
when I restore the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem,
2 I will gather all the nations,
and bring them down to the Valley of Jehoshaphat.
I will enter into judgment with them there
regarding My people and My heritage Israel,
whom they have scattered among the nations;
they have also divided up My land.
3 They have cast lots for My people,
and have traded a boy for a prostitute;
they have sold a girl for wine,
that they might drink.
4 Also, what are you to Me, Tyre and Sidon and all the regions of Philistia? Are you repaying Me for something? If you are repaying Me, I will return your payment swiftly and speedily on your head. 5 For you have taken My silver and My gold, and you have carried off My finest treasures to your temples. 6 You have sold the people of Judah and Jerusalem to the Greeks in order to remove them far from their border.
7 I am about to rouse them from the place to which you have sold them, and I will return your payment on your head. 8 I will sell your sons and your daughters into the hand of the people of Judah, and they will sell them to the Sabeans—to a distant nation, for the Lord has spoken.
16 Do not err, my beloved brothers. 17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom is no change or shadow of turning. 18 Of His own will He brought us forth with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first fruits of His creatures.
Hearing and Doing the Word
19 Therefore, my beloved brothers, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, and slow to anger, 20 for the anger of man does not work the righteousness of God. 21 Therefore lay aside all filthiness and remaining wickedness and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls.
22 Be doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. 23 For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man viewing his natural face in a mirror. 24 He views himself, and goes his way, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was. 25 But whoever looks into the perfect law of liberty, and continues in it, and is not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work, this man will be blessed in his deeds.
26 If anyone among you seems to be religious and does not bridle his tongue, but deceives his own heart, this man’s religion is vain. 27 Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction and to keep oneself unstained by the world.
The Parable of the Dishonest Steward
16 He told His disciples: “There was a rich man who had a steward who was accused to the man of wasting his resources. 2 So he called him and said, ‘How is it that I hear this about you? Give an account of your stewardship, for you may no longer be steward.’
3 “Then the steward said to himself, ‘What shall I do, for my master is taking away the stewardship from me? I cannot dig. I am ashamed to beg. 4 I know what to do so that, when I am removed from the stewardship, others may receive me into their houses.’
5 “So he called each of his master’s debtors, and said to the first, ‘How much do you owe my master?’
6 “He said, ‘Eight hundred gallons[a] of oil.’
“He said to him, ‘Take your bill, and sit down quickly and write four hundred.’
7 “Then he said to another, ‘And how much do you owe?’
“He said, ‘One thousand bushels[b] of wheat.’
“He said to him, ‘Take your bill, and write eight hundred.’
8 “The master commended the dishonest steward, because he had acted prudently. For the sons of this world are wiser in their own generation than the sons of light. 9 I say to you, make friends for yourself by means of unrighteous wealth, so that when you fall short, they may receive you into eternal dwellings.
The Holy Bible, Modern English Version. Copyright © 2014 by Military Bible Association. Published and distributed by Charisma House.