Book of Common Prayer
Psalm 121
A Song of [a]Ascents.
1 I will lift up my eyes to the hills [around Jerusalem, to sacred Mount Zion and Mount Moriah]—From whence shall my help come?(A)
2 My help comes from the Lord, Who made heaven and earth.
3 He will not allow your foot to slip or to be moved; He Who keeps you will not slumber.(B)
4 Behold, He who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.
5 The Lord is your keeper; the Lord is your shade on your right hand [the side not carrying a shield].(C)
6 The sun shall not smite you by day, nor the moon by night.(D)
7 The Lord will keep you from all evil; He will keep your life.
8 The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore.(E)
Psalm 122
A Song of [b]Ascents. Of David.
1 I was glad when they said to me, Let us go to the house of the Lord!(F)
2 Our feet are standing within your gates, O Jerusalem!—
3 Jerusalem, which is built as a city that is compacted together—
4 To which the tribes go up, even the tribes of the Lord, as was decreed and as a testimony for Israel, to give thanks to the name of the Lord.
5 For there the thrones of judgment were set, the thrones of the house of David.
6 Pray for the peace of Jerusalem! May they prosper who love you [the Holy City]!
7 May peace be within your walls and prosperity within your palaces!
8 For my brethren and companions’ sake, I will now say, Peace be within you!
9 For the sake of the house of the Lord our God, I will seek, inquire for, and require your good.
Psalm 123
A Song of [c]Ascents.
1 Unto You do I lift up my eyes, O You Who are enthroned in heaven.
2 Behold, as the eyes of servants look to the hand of their master, and as the eyes of a maid to the hand of her mistress, so our eyes look to the Lord our God, until He has mercy and loving-kindness for us.
3 Have mercy on us, O Lord, have mercy on and loving-kindness for us, for we are exceedingly satiated with contempt.
4 Our life is exceedingly filled with the scorning and scoffing of those who are at ease and with the contempt of the proud (irresponsible tyrants who disregard God’s law).
Psalm 131
A Song of [a]Ascents. Of David.
1 Lord, my heart is not haughty, nor my eyes lofty; neither do I exercise myself in matters too great or in things too wonderful for me.
2 Surely I have calmed and quieted my soul; like a weaned child with his mother, like a weaned child is my soul within me [ceased from fretting].
3 O Israel, hope in the Lord from this time forth and forever.
Psalm 132
A Song of [b]Ascents.
1 Lord, [earnestly] remember to David’s credit all his humiliations and hardships and endurance—
2 How he swore to the Lord and vowed to the Mighty One of Jacob:
3 Surely I will not enter my dwelling house or get into my bed—
4 I will not permit my eyes to sleep or my eyelids to slumber,
5 Until I have found a place for the Lord, a habitation for the Mighty One of Jacob.(A)
6 Behold, at Ephratah we [first] heard of [the discovered ark]; we found it in the fields of the wood [at Kiriath-jearim].(B)
7 Let us go into His tabernacle; let us worship at His footstool.
8 Arise, O Lord, to Your resting-place, You and the ark [the symbol] of Your strength.
9 Let Your priests be clothed with righteousness (right living and right standing with God); and let Your saints shout for joy!
10 For Your servant David’s sake, turn not away the face of Your anointed and reject not Your own king.
11 The Lord swore to David in truth; He will not turn back from it: One of the fruit of your body I will set upon your throne.(C)
12 If your children will keep My covenant and My testimony that I shall teach them, their children also shall sit upon your throne forever.
13 For the Lord has chosen Zion, He has desired it for His habitation:
14 This is My resting-place forever [says the Lord]; here will I dwell, for I have desired it.
15 I will surely and abundantly bless her provision; I will satisfy her poor with bread.
16 Her priests also will I clothe with salvation, and her saints shall shout aloud for joy.
17 There will I make a horn spring forth and bud for David; I have ordained and prepared a lamp for My anointed [fulfilling the promises of old].(D)
18 His enemies will I clothe with shame, but upon himself shall his crown flourish.
63 Who is this Who comes from Edom, with crimson-stained garments from Bozrah [in Edom]? This One Who is glorious in His apparel, striding triumphantly in the greatness of His might? It is I, [the One] Who speaks in righteousness [proclaiming vindication], mighty to save!
2 Why is Your apparel splashed with red, and Your garments like the one who treads in the winepress?
3 I have trodden the winepress alone, and of the peoples there was no one with Me. I trod them in My anger and trampled them in My wrath; and their lifeblood is sprinkled upon My garments, and I stained all My raiment.
4 For the day of vengeance was in My heart, and My year of redemption [the year of My redeemed] has come.
5 And I looked, but there was no one to help; I was amazed and appalled that there was no one to uphold [truth and right]. So My own arm brought Me victory, and My wrath upheld Me.
18 And to the angel (messenger) of the assembly (church) in Thyatira write: These are the words of the Son of God, Who has eyes that flash like a flame of fire, and Whose feet glow like bright and burnished and white-hot bronze:(A)
19 I know your record and what you are doing, your love and faith and service and patient endurance, and that your recent works are more numerous and greater than your first ones.
20 But I have this against you: that you tolerate the woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess [claiming to be inspired], and who is teaching and leading astray my servants and beguiling them into practicing sexual vice and eating food sacrificed to idols.(B)
21 I gave her time to repent, but she has no desire to repent of her immorality [symbolic of idolatry] and refuses to do so.
22 Take note: I will throw her on a bed [[a]of anguish], and those who commit adultery with her [her paramours] I will bring down to [b]pressing distress and severe affliction, unless they turn away their minds from conduct [such as] hers and repent of [c]their doings.
23 And I will strike her children (her proper followers) dead [thoroughly exterminating them]. And all the assemblies (churches) shall recognize and understand that I am He Who searches minds (the thoughts, feelings, and purposes) and the [inmost] hearts, and I will give to each of you [the reward for what you have done] as your work deserves.(C)
24 But to the rest of you in Thyatira, who do not hold this teaching, who have not explored and known the depths of Satan, as they say—I tell you that I do not lay upon you any other [fresh] burden:
25 Only hold fast to what you have until I come.
26 And he who overcomes (is victorious) and who obeys My commands to the [very] end [doing the works that please Me], I will give him authority and power over the nations;
27 And he shall rule them with a sceptre (rod) of iron, as when earthen pots are broken in pieces, and [his power over them shall be] like that which I Myself have received from My Father;(D)
28 And I will give him the Morning Star.
29 He who is able to hear, let him listen to and heed what the [Holy] Spirit says to the assemblies (churches).
5 Later on there was a Jewish festival (feast) for which Jesus went up to Jerusalem.
2 Now there is in Jerusalem a pool near the Sheep Gate. This pool in the Hebrew is called Bethesda, having five porches (alcoves, colonnades, doorways).
3 In these lay a great number of sick folk—some blind, some crippled, and some paralyzed (shriveled up)—[a]waiting for the bubbling up of the water.
4 For an angel of the Lord went down at appointed seasons into the pool and moved and stirred up the water; whoever then first, after the stirring up of the water, stepped in was cured of whatever disease with which he was afflicted.
5 There was a certain man there who had suffered with a deep-seated and lingering disorder for thirty-eight years.
6 When Jesus noticed him lying there [helpless], knowing that he had already been a long time in that condition, He said to him, Do you want to become well? [Are you really in earnest about getting well?]
7 The invalid answered, Sir, I have nobody when the water is moving to put me into the pool; but while I am trying to come [into it] myself, somebody else steps down ahead of me.
8 Jesus said to him, Get up! Pick up your bed (sleeping pad) and walk!
9 Instantly the man became well and recovered his strength and picked up his bed and walked. But that happened on the Sabbath.
10 So the Jews kept saying to the man who had been healed, It is the Sabbath, and you have no right to pick up your bed [it is not lawful].
11 He answered them, The [b]Man Who healed me and gave me back my strength, He Himself said to me, Pick up your bed and walk!
12 They asked him, Who is the Man Who told you, Pick up your bed and walk?
13 Now the invalid who had been healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had quietly gone away [had passed on unnoticed], since there was a crowd in the place.
14 Afterward, when Jesus found him in the temple, He said to him, See, you are well! Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you.
15 The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus Who had made him well.
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