Book of Common Prayer
Psalm 97[a]
97 The Lord reigns.
Let the earth be happy.
Let the many coastlands rejoice.
2 Dark clouds surround him;
equity and justice are the foundation of his throne.[b]
3 Fire goes before him;
on every side[c] it burns up his enemies.
4 His lightning bolts light up the world;
the earth sees and trembles.
5 The mountains melt like wax before the Lord,
before the Lord of the whole earth.
6 The sky declares his justice,
and all the nations see his splendor.
7 All who worship idols are ashamed,
those who boast about worthless idols.
All the gods bow down before him.[d]
8 Zion hears and rejoices,
the towns[e] of Judah are happy,
because of your judgments, O Lord.
9 For you, O Lord, are the Most High[f] over the whole earth;
you are elevated high above all gods.
10 You who love the Lord, hate evil!
He protects[g] the lives of his faithful followers;
he delivers them from the power[h] of the wicked.
11 The godly bask in the light;
the morally upright experience joy.[i]
12 You godly ones, rejoice in the Lord.
Give thanks to his holy name.[j]
Psalm 99[a]
99 The Lord reigns!
The nations tremble.[b]
He sits enthroned above the cherubim;[c]
the earth shakes.[d]
2 The Lord is elevated[e] in Zion;
he is exalted over all the nations.
3 Let them praise your great and awesome name.
He[f] is holy!
4 The king is strong;
he loves justice.[g]
You ensure that legal decisions will be made fairly;[h]
you promote justice and equity in Jacob.
5 Praise[i] the Lord our God.
Worship[j] before his footstool.
He is holy!
6 Moses and Aaron were among his priests;
Samuel was one of those who prayed to him.[k]
They[l] prayed to the Lord and he answered them.
7 He spoke to them from a pillar of cloud;[m]
they obeyed his regulations and the ordinance he gave them.
8 O Lord our God, you answered them.
They found you to be a forgiving God,
but also one who punished their sinful deeds.[n]
9 Praise[o] the Lord our God!
Worship on his holy hill,
for the Lord our God is holy.
Psalm 100[p]
A thanksgiving psalm.
100 Shout out praises to the Lord, all the earth!
2 Worship[q] the Lord with joy.
Enter his presence with joyful singing.
3 Acknowledge that the Lord is God.
He made us and we belong to him,[r]
we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.
4 Enter his gates with thanksgiving,
and his courts with praise.
Give him thanks.
Praise his name.
5 For the Lord is good.
His loyal love endures,[s]
and he is faithful through all generations.[t]
Psalm 94[a]
94 O Lord, the God who avenges!
O God who avenges, reveal your splendor.[b]
2 Rise up, O judge of the earth.
Pay back the proud.
3 O Lord, how long will the wicked,
how long will the wicked celebrate?[c]
4 They spew out threats[d] and speak defiantly;
all the evildoers boast.[e]
5 O Lord, they crush your people;
they oppress the nation that belongs to you.[f]
6 They kill the widow and the resident foreigner,
and they murder the fatherless.[g]
7 Then they say, “The Lord does not see this;
the God of Jacob does not take notice of it.”[h]
8 Take notice of this,[i] you ignorant people.[j]
You fools, when will you ever understand?
9 Does the one who makes the human ear not hear?
Does the one who forms the human eye not see?[k]
10 Does the one who disciplines the nations not punish?
He is the one who imparts knowledge to human beings!
11 The Lord knows that peoples’ thoughts
are morally bankrupt.[l]
12 How blessed is the one[m] whom you instruct, O Lord,
the one whom you teach from your law,
13 in order to protect him from times of trouble,[n]
until the wicked are destroyed.[o]
14 Certainly[p] the Lord does not forsake his people;
he does not abandon the nation that belongs to him.[q]
15 For justice will prevail,[r]
and all the morally upright[s] will be vindicated.[t]
16 Who will rise up to defend me[u] against the wicked?
Who will stand up for me against the evildoers?[v]
17 If the Lord had not helped me,
I would soon have dwelt in the silence of death.[w]
18 If I say, “My foot is slipping,”
your loyal love, O Lord, supports me.
19 When worries threaten to overwhelm me,[x]
your soothing touch makes me happy.[y]
20 Cruel rulers[z] are not your allies,
those who make oppressive laws.[aa]
21 They conspire against[ab] the blameless,[ac]
and condemn to death the innocent.[ad]
22 But the Lord will protect me,[ae]
and my God will shelter me.[af]
23 He will pay them back for their sin.[ag]
He will destroy them because of[ah] their evil;
the Lord our God will destroy them.
Psalm 95[ai]
95 Come, let us sing for joy to the Lord.
Let us shout out praises to our Protector who delivers us.[aj]
2 Let us enter his presence[ak] with thanksgiving.
Let us shout out to him in celebration.[al]
3 For the Lord is a great God,
a great king who is superior to[am] all gods.
4 The depths of the earth are in his hand,[an]
and the mountain peaks belong to him.
5 The sea is his, for he made it.
His hands formed the dry land.
6 Come, let us bow down and worship.[ao]
Let us kneel before the Lord, our Creator.
7 For he is our God;
we are the people of his pasture,
the sheep he owns.[ap]
Today, if only you would obey him.[aq]
8 He says,[ar] “Do not be stubborn like they were at Meribah,[as]
like they were that day at Massah[at] in the wilderness,[au]
9 where your ancestors challenged my authority,[av]
and tried my patience, even though they had seen my work.
10 For forty years I was continually disgusted[aw] with that generation,
and I said, ‘These people desire to go astray;[ax]
they do not obey my commands.’[ay]
11 So I made a vow in my anger,
‘They will never enter into the resting place I had set aside for them.’”[az]
29 Then he instructed them,[a] “I am about to go[b] to my people. Bury me with my fathers in the cave in the field of Ephron the Hittite. 30 It is the cave in the field of Machpelah, near Mamre in the land of Canaan, which Abraham bought for a burial plot from Ephron the Hittite. 31 There they buried Abraham and his wife Sarah; there they buried Isaac and his wife Rebekah; and there I buried Leah. 32 The field and the cave in it were acquired from the sons of Heth.”[c]
33 When Jacob finished giving these instructions to his sons, he pulled his feet up onto the bed, breathed his last breath, and went[d] to his people.
The Burials of Jacob and Joseph
50 Then Joseph hugged his father’s face.[e] He wept over him and kissed him. 2 Joseph instructed the physicians in his service[f] to embalm his father, so the physicians embalmed Israel. 3 They took forty days, for that is the full time needed for embalming.[g] The Egyptians mourned for[h] him seventy days.[i]
4 When the days of mourning[j] had passed, Joseph said to Pharaoh’s royal court,[k] “If I have found favor in your sight, please say to Pharaoh,[l] 5 ‘My father made me swear an oath. He said,[m] “I am about to die. Bury me[n] in my tomb that I dug for myself there in the land of Canaan.” Now let me go and bury my father; then I will return.’” 6 So Pharaoh said, “Go and bury your father, just as he made you swear to do.”[o]
7 So Joseph went up to bury his father; all Pharaoh’s officials went with him—the senior courtiers[p] of his household, all the senior officials of the land of Egypt, 8 all Joseph’s household, his brothers, and his father’s household. But they left their little children and their flocks and herds in the land of Goshen. 9 Chariots and horsemen also went up with him, so it was a very large entourage.[q]
10 When they came to the threshing floor of Atad[r] on the other side of the Jordan, they mourned there with very great and bitter sorrow.[s] There Joseph observed a seven-day period of mourning for his father. 11 When the Canaanites who lived in the land saw them mourning at the threshing floor of Atad, they said, “This is a very sad occasion[t] for the Egyptians.” That is why its name was called[u] Abel Mizraim,[v] which is beyond the Jordan.
12 So the sons of Jacob did for him just as he had instructed them. 13 His sons carried him to the land of Canaan and buried him in the cave of the field of Machpelah, near Mamre. This is the field Abraham purchased as a burial plot from Ephron the Hittite. 14 After he buried his father, Joseph returned to Egypt, along with his brothers and all who had accompanied him to bury his father.
The Lord’s Supper
17 Now in giving the following instruction I do not praise you, because you come together not for the better but for the worse. 18 For in the first place, when you come together as a church I hear there are divisions among you, and in part I believe it. 19 For there must in fact be divisions among you, so that those of you who are approved may be evident.[a] 20 Now when you come together at the same place, you are not really eating the Lord’s Supper. 21 For when it is time to eat, everyone proceeds with his own supper. One is hungry and another becomes drunk. 22 Do you not have houses so that you can eat and drink? Or are you trying to show contempt for the church of God by shaming those who have nothing? What should I say to you? Should I praise you? I will not praise you for this!
23 For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night in which he was betrayed took bread, 24 and after he had given thanks he broke it and said, “This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” 25 In the same way, he also took the cup after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, every time you drink it, in remembrance of me.” 26 For every time you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.
27 For this reason, whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. 28 A person should examine himself first,[b] and in this way[c] let him eat the bread and drink of the cup. 29 For the one who eats and drinks without careful regard[d] for the body eats and drinks judgment against himself. 30 That is why many of you are weak and sick, and quite a few are dead.[e] 31 But if we examined ourselves, we would not be judged. 32 But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined so that we may not be condemned with the world. 33 So then, my brothers and sisters,[f] when you come together to eat, wait for one another. 34 If anyone is hungry, let him eat at home, so that when you assemble it does not lead to judgment. I will give directions about other matters when I come.
The Feeding of the Four Thousand
8 In those days there was another large crowd with nothing to eat. So[a] Jesus[b] called his disciples and said to them, 2 “I have compassion on the crowd, because they have already been here with me three days, and they have nothing to eat. 3 If I send them home hungry, they will faint on the way, and some of them have come from a great distance.” 4 His disciples answered him, “Where can someone get enough bread in this desolate place to satisfy these people?” 5 He asked them, “How many loaves do you have?” They replied, “Seven.” 6 Then[c] he directed the crowd to sit down on the ground. After he took the seven loaves and gave thanks, he broke them and began giving them to the disciples to serve. So[d] they served the crowd. 7 They also had a few small fish. After giving thanks for these, he told them to serve these as well. 8 Everyone[e] ate and was satisfied, and they picked up the broken pieces left over, seven baskets full. 9 There were about 4,000[f] who ate.[g] Then he dismissed them.[h] 10 Immediately he got into a boat[i] with his disciples and went to the district of Dalmanutha.[j]
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