Book of Common Prayer
To the Overcomer, A Psalm of David.
1 ¶ I waited patiently for the LORD, and he inclined unto me and heard my cry.
2 He brought me up also out of the pit of hopelessness, out of the miry clay and set my feet upon a rock and straightened my steps.
3 And he has put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto our God; many shall see it and fear and shall wait on the LORD.
4 Blessed is that man that makes the LORD his trust and does not respect the proud, nor such as turn aside to lies.
5 Thou hast increased, O LORD my God, thy wonderful works which thou hast done and thy thoughts regarding us; they are beyond our ability to express, declare, or speak; they cannot be told.
6 ¶ Sacrifice and offering thou didst not desire; mine ears hast thou opened; burnt offering and sin offering thou hast not required.
7 Then said I, Behold, I come; in the volume of the book it is written of me,
8 I delight to do thy will, O my God; thy law is within my bowels.
9 I have preached righteousness in the great congregation; behold, I have not refrained my lips, O LORD, thou knowest.
10 I have not hid thy righteousness within my heart; I have declared thy truth and thy salvation; I have not concealed thy mercy and thy truth from the great congregation.
11 ¶ Do not withhold thy tender mercies from me, O LORD; let thy mercy and thy truth continually preserve me.
12 For innumerable evils have compassed me about; my iniquities have taken hold upon me, so that I am not able to see; they are more than the hairs of my head; therefore my heart fails me.
13 Be pleased, O LORD, to deliver me; O LORD, make haste to help me.
14 Let them be ashamed and confounded together that seek after my life to destroy it; let them be driven backward and put to shame that wish me evil.
15 Let them be desolate for a reward of their shame that say unto me, Aha, aha.
16 Let all those that seek thee rejoice and be glad in thee; let such as love thy salvation say continually, The LORD be magnified.
17 When I am poor and needy; the Lord will remember me; thou art my help and my deliverer; make no tarrying, O my God.
To the Overcomer on Neginoth, Maschil, A Psalm of David, when the Ziphims came and said to Saul, Does David not hide himself with us?
1 ¶ Save me, O God, in thy name and defend me by thy valour.
2 Hear my prayer, O God; give ear to the words of my mouth.
3 For strangers are risen up against me, and oppressors seek after my soul; they have not set God before them. Selah.
4 ¶ Behold, God is my helper; the Lord is with those that uphold my soul.
5 He shall reward evil unto my enemies; cut them off in thy truth.
6 I will freely sacrifice unto thee; I will praise thy name, O LORD; for it is good.
7 For he has delivered me out of all trouble, and my eye has seen his desire upon my enemies.
To the Overcomer, A Psalm of David, when Nathan the prophet came unto him, after he had gone in to Bathsheba.
1 ¶ Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy mercy; according unto the multitude of thy compassion eradicate my rebellion.
2 Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.
3 For I acknowledge my rebellion; and my sin is ever before me.
4 Against thee, against thee only, have I sinned and done this evil in thy sight that thou be declared just in thy word and pure in thy judgment.
5 Behold, the pain of my iniquity has caused me to writhe; my mother conceived me so that sin might be removed from me.
6 Behold, thou dost desire truth in the inward parts, and in the secret things thou hast made me to know wisdom.
7 ¶ Remove the sin in me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
8 Make me to hear joy and gladness that the bones which thou hast broken may rejoice.
9 Hide thy face from my sins and eradicate all my iniquities.
10 Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.
11 Cast me not away from thy presence and take not thy Holy Spirit from me.
12 Restore unto me the joy of thy saving health, and thy spirit of liberty shall uphold me.
13 Then I will teach transgressors thy ways, and sinners shall be converted unto thee.
14 ¶ Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God, thou God of my salvation, and my tongue shall sing aloud of thy righteousness.
15 O Lord, open my lips; and my mouth shall show forth thy praise.
16 For thou dost not desire sacrifice or else would I give it; thou dost not delight in burnt offering.
17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.
18 Do good in thy good pleasure unto Zion; build thou the walls of Jerusalem.
19 Then thou shalt be pleased with the sacrifices of righteousness, the burnt offering, the offering that has been totally consumed by the fire; then shall they offer bullocks upon thine altar.
2 ¶ And it came to pass in the month Nisan, in the twentieth year of Artaxerxes, the king, that as wine was before him, I took up the wine and gave it unto the king. And as I had not been sad before in his presence,
2 the king said unto me, Why is thy countenance sad, seeing thou art not sick? This is nothing else but brokenness of heart. Then I was very sore afraid
3 and said unto the king, Let the king live for ever; why should not my countenance be sad, when the city, the house of my fathers’ sepulchres, lies waste, and its gates are consumed with fire?
4 Then the king said unto me, For what dost thou make request? So I prayed to the God of the heavens.
5 And I said unto the king, If it pleases the king, and if thy slave has found favour in thy sight, that thou would send me unto Judah, unto the city of my fathers’ sepulchres, that I may rebuild it.
6 Then the king said unto me (the queen also sitting by him), For how long shall thy journey be, and when wilt thou return? So the matter pleased the king, and he sent me; and I set him a time.
7 Moreover, I said unto the king, If it pleases the king, let letters be given me to the captains on the other side of the river, that they may convey me over until I come into Judah,
8 and a letter unto Asaph, the keeper of the king’s forest, that he may give me timber to make beams for the gates of the palace of the house and for the wall of the city and for the house that I shall enter into. And the king granted me, according to the good hand of the LORD upon me.
9 ¶ Then I came to the captains of the other side of the river and gave them the king’s letters. Now the king had sent princes of the army and horsemen with me.
10 When Sanballat, the Horonite, and Tobiah, the slave, the Ammonite, heard of it, it grieved them exceedingly that there was come a man to seek the welfare of the sons of Israel.
11 So I came to Jerusalem, and was there three days.
12 And I arose in the night, I and some few men with me; neither did I tell any man what my God had put in my heart to do at Jerusalem; neither was there any beast with me, except the beast that I rode upon.
13 And I went out by night by the gate of the valley, even before the fountain of the dragon and to the dung port and considered the walls of Jerusalem, which were broken down, and its gates were consumed with fire.
14 Then I went on to the gate of the fountain and to the king’s pool, but there was no place for the beast that was under me to pass.
15 Then went I up in the night by the brook and considered the wall and turned back and entered by the gate of the valley and so returned.
16 And the rulers did not know where I had gone or what I had done; neither had I as yet told it to the Jews nor to the priests nor to the nobles nor to the rulers nor to the rest that did the work.
17 Then said I unto them, Ye see the distress that we are in, how Jerusalem lies waste and its gates are burned with fire; come, and let us build up the wall of Jerusalem, that we be no longer in reproach.
18 Then I told them how the hand of my God was good upon me and likewise the king’s words that he had spoken unto me. And they said, Let us rise up and build. So they comforted their hands for good.
19 But when Sanballat, the Horonite, and Tobiah, the slave, the Ammonite, and Geshem, the Arabian, heard it, they laughed us to scorn and despised us and said, What is this thing that ye do? Will ye rebel against the king?
20 Then I gave them a reply and said unto them, The God of the heavens, he will prosper us; therefore, we, his slaves, will arise and build; but ye have no portion nor righteousness, nor memorial in Jerusalem.
12 And I saw when he had opened the sixth seal, and, behold, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood;
13 and the stars of heaven fell upon the earth, even as a fig tree casts her figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind.
14 And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.
15 And the kings of the earth and the princes and the rich and the captains and the strong and every slave and every free man hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains
16 and said to the mountains and to the rocks, Fall on us and hide us from the face of him that is seated upon the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb;
17 for the great day of his wrath is come, and who shall be able to stand before him?
7 ¶ And after these things I saw four angels standing upon the four corners of the earth, holding back the four winds of the earth that no wind should blow upon the earth nor upon the sea nor upon any tree.
2 And I saw another angel ascending from the rising of the sun, having the seal of the living God: and he cried out with a loud voice to the four angels, to whom it was given to hurt the land and the sea,
3 saying, Hurt not the land neither the sea nor the trees until we have sealed the slaves of our God in their foreheads.
4 And I heard the number of those that were sealed: and there were sealed a hundred and forty-four thousand of all the tribes of the sons of Israel.
24 ¶ He put forth another parable unto them, saying, The kingdom of the heavens is likened unto a man who sows good seed in his field
25 But while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat and went away.
26 But when the blade was sprung up and brought forth fruit, then the tares appeared also.
27 So the slaves of the husband of the house came and said unto him, Lord, didst thou not sow good seed in thy field? From where then does it have tares?
28 He said unto them, The enemy, a man, has done this. The slaves said unto him, Wilt thou then that we go and gather them up?
29 But he said, No, lest while ye gather up the tares, ye root up also the wheat with them.
30 Let both grow together until the harvest, and in the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, Gather ye together first the tares and bind them in bundles to burn them, but gather the wheat into my barn.
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