Book of Common Prayer

Psalm 26

[A Psalm] of David.

¹ Vindicate me, O Lord, for I have walked in my integrity; I have [expectantly] trusted in, leaned on, and relied on the Lord without wavering and I shall not slide.

² Examine me, O Lord, and prove me; test my heart and my mind.

³ For Your loving-kindness is before my eyes, and I have walked in Your truth [faithfully].

⁴ I do not sit with false persons, nor fellowship with pretenders;

⁵ I hate the company of evildoers and will not sit with the wicked.

⁶ I will wash my hands in innocence, and go about Your altar, O Lord,

⁷ That I may make the voice of thanksgiving heard and may tell of all Your wondrous works.

⁸ Lord, I love the habitation of Your house, and the place where Your glory dwells.

⁹ Gather me not with sinners and sweep me not away [with them], nor my life with bloodthirsty men,

¹⁰ In whose hands is wickedness, and their right hands are full of bribes.

¹¹ But as for me, I will walk in my integrity; redeem me and be merciful and gracious to me.

¹² My foot stands on an even place; in the congregations will I bless the Lord.

Psalm 28

[A Psalm] of David.

¹ Unto You do I cry, O Lord my Rock, be not deaf and silent to me, lest, if You be silent to me, I become like those going down to the pit [the grave].

² Hear the voice of my supplication as I cry to You for help, as I lift up my hands toward Your innermost sanctuary (the Holy of Holies).

³ Drag me not away with the wicked, with the workers of iniquity, who speak peace with their neighbors, but malice and mischief are in their hearts.

⁴ Repay them according to their work and according to the wickedness of their doings; repay them according to the work of their hands; render to them what they deserve.^(A)

⁵ Because they regard not the works of the Lord nor the operations of His hands, He will break them down and not rebuild them.

⁶ Blessed be the Lord, because He has heard the voice of my supplications.

⁷ The Lord is my Strength and my [impenetrable] Shield; my heart trusts in, relies on, and confidently leans on Him, and I am helped; therefore my heart greatly rejoices, and with my song will I praise Him.

⁸ The Lord is their [unyielding] Strength, and He is the Stronghold of salvation to [me] His anointed.

⁹ Save Your people and bless Your heritage; nourish and shepherd them and carry them forever.

Psalm 36

To the Chief Musician. [A Psalm] of David the servant of the Lord.

¹ Transgression [like an oracle] speaks to the wicked deep in his heart. There is no fear or dread of God before his eyes.^(A)

² For he flatters and deceives himself in his own eyes that his iniquity will not be found out and be hated.

³ The words of his mouth are wrong and deceitful; he has ceased to be wise and to do good.

⁴ He plans wrongdoing on his bed; he sets himself in a way that is not good; he does not reject or despise evil.

⁵ Your mercy and loving-kindness, O Lord, extend to the skies, and Your faithfulness to the clouds.

⁶ Your righteousness is like the mountains of God, Your judgments are like the great deep. O Lord, You preserve man and beast.

⁷ How precious is Your steadfast love, O God! The children of men take refuge and put their trust under the shadow of Your wings.

⁸ They relish and feast on the abundance of Your house; and You cause them to drink of the stream of Your pleasures.

⁹ For with You is the fountain of life; in Your light do we see light.^(B)

¹⁰ O continue Your loving-kindness to those who know You, Your righteousness (salvation) to the upright in heart.

¹¹ Let not the foot of pride overtake me, and let not the hand of the wicked drive me away.

¹² There the workers of iniquity fall and lie prostrate; they are thrust down and shall not be able to rise.

Psalm 39

To the Chief Musician; for Jeduthun [founder of an official musical family]. A Psalm of David.

¹ I said, I will take heed and guard my ways, that I may sin not with my tongue; I will muzzle my mouth as with a bridle while the wicked are before me.

² I was dumb with silence, I held my peace without profit and had no comfort away from good, while my distress was renewed.

³ My heart was hot within me. While I was musing, the fire burned; then I spoke with my tongue:

⁴ Lord, make me to know my end and [to appreciate] the measure of my days—what it is; let me know and realize how frail I am [how transient is my stay here].

⁵ Behold, You have made my days as [short as] handbreadths, and my lifetime is as nothing in Your sight. Truly every man at his best is merely a breath! Selah [pause, and think calmly of that]!

⁶ Surely every man walks to and fro—like a shadow in a pantomime; surely for futility and emptiness he is in turmoil; each one heaps up riches, not knowing who will gather them.^(A)

⁷ And now, Lord, what do I wait for and expect? My hope and expectation are in You.

⁸ Deliver me from all my transgressions; make me not the scorn and reproach of the [self-confident] fool!

⁹ I am dumb, I open not my mouth, for it is You Who has done it.

¹⁰ Remove Your stroke away from me; I am consumed by the conflict and the blow of Your hand.

¹¹ When with rebukes You correct and chasten man for sin, You waste his beauty like a moth and what is dear to him consumes away; surely every man is a mere breath. Selah [pause, and think calmly of that]!

¹² Hear my prayer, O Lord, and give ear to my cry; hold not Your peace at my tears! For I am Your passing guest, a temporary resident, as all my fathers were.

¹³ O look away from me and spare me, that I may recover cheerfulness and encouraging strength and know gladness before I go and am no more!

⁶⁵ So at that time Solomon held the feast, and all Israel with him, a great assembly, from the entrance of Hamath to the Brook of Egypt, before the Lord our God, for seven days [for the dedication] and seven days [for the Feast of Tabernacles], fourteen days in all.

⁶⁶ On the eighth day he sent the people away; they blessed the king and went to their tents with greatest joy and gratitude for all the goodness the Lord had shown to David His servant and Israel His people.

9 When Solomon finished the building of the Lord’s house and the king’s house, and all he desired and was pleased to do,

² The Lord appeared to Solomon the second time, as He had appeared to him at Gibeon.

³ The Lord told him, I have heard your prayer and supplication which you have made before Me; I have hallowed this house which you have built, and I have put My Name [and My Presence] there forever. My eyes and My heart shall be there perpetually.

⁴ And if you will walk before Me, as David your father walked, in integrity of heart and uprightness, doing according to all that I have commanded you, keeping My statutes and My precepts,

⁵ Then I will establish your royal throne over Israel forever, as I promised David your father, saying, There shall not fail you [to have] a man upon the throne of Israel.

⁶ But if you turn away from following Me, you or your children, and will not keep My commandments and My statutes which I have set before you but go and serve other gods and worship them,

⁷ Then I will cut off Israel from the land I have given them, and this house I have hallowed for My Name (renown) I will cast from My sight. And Israel shall be a proverb and a byword among all the peoples.

⁸ This house shall become a heap of ruins; every passerby shall be astonished and shall hiss [with surprise] and say, Why has the Lord done thus to this land and to this house?

⁹ Then they will answer, Because they forsook the Lord their God, Who brought their fathers out of the land of Egypt, and have laid hold of other gods and have worshiped and served them; therefore the Lord has brought on them all this evil.

¹⁴ What is the use (profit), my brethren, for anyone to profess to have faith if he has no [good] works [to show for it]? Can [such] faith save [his soul]?

¹⁵ If a brother or sister is poorly clad and lacks food for each day,

¹⁶ And one of you says to him, Good-bye! Keep [yourself] warm and well fed, without giving him the necessities for the body, what good does that do?

¹⁷ So also faith, if it does not have works (deeds and actions of obedience to back it up), by itself is destitute of power (inoperative, dead).

¹⁸ But someone will say [to you then], You [say you] have faith, and I have [good] works. Now you show me your [alleged] faith apart from any [good] works [if you can], and I by [good] works [of obedience] will show you my faith.

¹⁹ You believe that God is one; you do well. So do the demons believe and shudder [in terror and horror such as ^[a]make a man’s hair stand on end and contract the surface of his skin]!

²⁰ Are you willing to be shown [proof], you foolish (unproductive, spiritually deficient) fellow, that faith apart from [good] works is inactive and ineffective and worthless?

²¹ Was not our forefather Abraham [shown to be] justified (made acceptable to God) by [his] works when he brought to the altar as an offering his [own] son Isaac?^(A)

²² You see that [his] faith was cooperating with his works, and [his] faith was completed and reached its supreme expression [when he implemented it] by [good] works.

²³ And [so] the Scripture was fulfilled that says, Abraham believed in (adhered to, trusted in, and relied on) God, and this was accounted to him as righteousness (as conformity to God’s will in thought and deed), and he was called God’s friend.^(B)

²⁴ You see that a man is justified (pronounced righteous before God) through what he does and not alone through faith [through works of obedience as well as by what he believes].

²⁵ So also with Rahab the harlot—was she not shown to be justified (pronounced righteous before God) by [good] deeds when she took in the scouts (spies) and sent them away by a different route?^(C)

²⁶ For as the human body apart from the spirit is lifeless, so faith apart from [its] works of obedience is also dead.

⁶⁶ While Peter was down below in the courtyard, one of the [serving] maids of the high priest came;

⁶⁷ And when she saw Peter warming himself, she gazed intently at him and said, You were with Jesus of Nazareth too.

⁶⁸ But he denied it ^[a]falsely and disowned Him, saying, I neither know nor understand what you say. Then he went outside [the courtyard and was] into the ^[b]vestibule. ^[c]And a cock crowed.

⁶⁹ And the maidservant saw him, and began again to say to the bystanders, This [man] is [one] of them.

⁷⁰ But again he denied it ^[d]falsely and disowned Him. And after a short while, again the bystanders said to Peter, ^[e]Really, you are one of them, for you are a Galilean ^[f]and your dialect shows it.

⁷¹ Then he commenced invoking a curse on himself [should he not be telling the truth] and swearing, I do not know the Man about Whom you are talking!

⁷² And at once for the second time a cock crowed. And Peter remembered how Jesus said to him, Before a cock crows twice, you will ^[g]utterly deny Me [disclaiming all connection with Me] three times. And ^[h]having put his thought upon it [and remembering], he broke down and wept aloud and ^[i]lamented.