Book of Common Prayer
By David, when he pretended to be insane before Abimelech, who drove him away. So David[a] left.
Learning about God’s Deliverance
34 [b]I will bless the Lord at all times;
his praise will be in my mouth continuously.
2 My soul will glorify the Lord;
the humble will hear about it and rejoice.
3 Magnify the Lord with me!
Let us lift up his name together!
4 I sought the Lord and he answered me;
he delivered me from all of my fears.
5 Look to him and be radiant;
and you[c] will not be ashamed.
6 This poor man cried out, and the Lord heard
and delivered him from all of his distress.
7 The angel of the Lord surrounds those who fear him,
and he delivers them.
8 Taste and see that the Lord is good!
How blessed is the person who trusts in him!
9 Fear the Lord, you holy ones of his;
for those who fear him lack nothing.
10 Young lions lack and go hungry,
but those who seek the Lord will never lack any good thing.
11 Come, children, listen to me,
and I will teach you the fear of the Lord.
12 Who among you[d] desires life,
and wants long life in order to see good?
13 Then keep your tongue from doing evil
and your lips from spreading lies.
14 Avoid evil and do good!
Seek peace and pursue it!
15 The[e] Lord looks on the righteous,
and he listens to their cries.
16 The face of the Lord is set against those who do evil,
and he will remove people’s recollection of them from the earth.
17 The Lord hears those who cry out,
and he delivers them from all their distress.
18 The Lord is close to the brokenhearted,
and he delivers those whose spirit has been crushed.
19 A righteous person will have many troubles,
but the Lord will deliver him from them all.
20 God[f] protects all his bones;
not one of them will be broken.
21 Evil will kill the wicked;
those who hate the righteous will be held guilty.
22 The Lord redeems the lives of his servants;
and none of those who trust in him will be held guilty.
Praise to the Creator and Deliverer
33 Rejoice in the Lord, righteous ones;
for the praise of the upright is beautiful.
2 With the lyre, give thanks to the Lord;
with the ten stringed harp, play music to him;
3 with a new song, sing to him;
with shouts of joy, play skillfully.
4 For the word of the Lord is upright;
and all his works are done in faithfulness.
5 He loves righteousness and justice;
the world is filled with the gracious love of the Lord.
6 By the word of the Lord the heavens were made;
all the heavenly bodies[a] by the breath of his mouth.
7 He gathered the oceans into a single place;
he put the deep water into storehouses.
8 Let all the world fear the Lord;
let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him;
9 because he spoke and it came to be,
because he commanded, it stood firm.
10 The Lord makes void the counsel of nations;
he frustrates the plans of peoples.
11 But the Lord’s counsel stands firm forever,
the plans in his mind for all generations.
12 How blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord,
the people he has chosen as his own inheritance.
13 When the Lord looks down from heaven,
he observes every human being.
14 From his dwelling place,
he looks down on all the inhabitants of the earth.
15 He formed the hearts of them all;
he understands everything they do.
16 A king is not saved by a large army;
a mighty soldier is not delivered by his great strength.
17 It is vain to trust in a horse for deliverance,
even with its great strength, it cannot deliver.
18 Indeed, the Lord watches those who fear him;
those who trust in his gracious love
19 to deliver them from death;
to keep them alive in times of famine.
20 We wait on the Lord;
he is our help and our shield.
21 Indeed, our heart will rejoice in him,
because we have placed our trust in his holy name.
22 Lord, may your gracious love be upon us,
even as we hope in you.
Elijah Runs from Jezebel
19 Ahab complained to Jezebel about everything that Elijah had done, especially the part about him killing all the prophets of Baal with a sword. 2 Jezebel sent a messenger to tell Elijah, “May the gods do the same to me and even more if tomorrow about this time I haven’t made you like one of those prophets you had killed.”[a]
3 Elijah was terrified, so he got up and ran for his life to Beer-sheba, which is part of Judah, and left his servant there 4 and ran for a day’s journey deep into the wilderness. He found a juniper tree, sat down under it, and prayed that he could die. He asked God, “Enough! Lord! Take my life, because I’m not better than my ancestors!” 5 Then he lay down and went to sleep under the juniper tree. All of a sudden, there was an angel, who kept grabbing him and telling him, “Get up! Eat!”
6 So he looked around, and there near his head was a muffin sitting on top of some heated stones, along with a jar of water. Elijah ate and drank and then lay down again. 7 Later, the angel of the Lord came a second time, grabbed him, and said “Get up! Eat! The journey ahead[b] is too difficult for you!” 8 So Elijah[c] got up, ate and drank, and survived on that one meal for 40 days and nights as he set out on his journey to Horeb, God’s mountain.
The Messiah’s Gifts to the Church
4 I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, urge you to live in a way that is worthy of the calling to which you have been called, 2 demonstrating all expressions of humility, gentleness, and patience, accepting one another in love. 3 Do your best to maintain the unity of the Spirit by means of the bond of peace. 4 There is one body and one Spirit. Likewise, you were called to the one hope of your calling.
5 There is one Lord, one faith, one baptism,
6 one God and Father of all,
who is above all, through all, and in all.
7 Now to each one of us grace has been given proportionate to the measure of the Messiah’s[a] gift. 8 That is why God[b] says,
“When he went up to the highest place,
he led captives into captivity
and gave gifts to people.”[c]
9 Now what does this “he went up” mean except that he also had gone[d] down into the lower parts of the earth?[e] 10 The one who went down is the same one who went up above all the heavens so that all things would be fulfilled. 11 And it is he who gifted some to be apostles, others to be prophets, others to be evangelists, and still others to be pastors and teachers, 12 to equip[f] the saints, to do the work of ministry, and to build up the body of the Messiah[g] 13 until all of us are united in the faith and in the full knowledge of God’s Son, and until we attain mature adulthood and the full standard of development in the Messiah.[h] 14 Then we will no longer be little children, tossed like waves and blown about by every wind of doctrine, by people’s trickery, or by clever strategies that would lead us astray. 15 Instead, by speaking the truth in love, we will grow up completely and become one with the head, that is, one with the Messiah,[i] 16 in whom the whole body is united and held together by every ligament with which it is supplied. As each individual part does its job, the body builds itself up in love.
Jesus Feeds More than Five Thousand(A)
6 After this, Jesus went away to the other side of the Sea of Galilee (that is, to Tiberias). 2 A large crowd kept following him because they had seen the signs that he was performing by healing the sick. 3 But Jesus went up on a hillside and sat down there with his disciples.
4 Now the Passover, the festival of the Jews, was near. 5 When Jesus looked up and saw that a large crowd was coming toward him, he asked Philip, “Where can we buy bread for these people to eat?” 6 Jesus[a] said this to test him, because he himself knew what he was going to do.
7 Philip answered him, “Two hundred denarii[b] worth of bread isn’t enough for each of them to have a little.”
8 One of his disciples, Andrew, who was Simon Peter’s brother, told him, 9 “There’s a little boy here who has five barley loaves and two small fish. But what are these among so many people?”
10 Jesus said, “Have the people sit down.” Now there was plenty of grass in that area, so they sat down, numbering about 5,000 men.
11 Then Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks, and distributed them to those who were seated. He also distributed[c] as much fish as they wanted. 12 When they were completely satisfied, Jesus[d] told his disciples, “Collect the pieces that are left over so that nothing is wasted.” 13 So they collected and filled twelve baskets full of pieces of the five barley loaves left over by those who had eaten.
14 When the people saw the sign[e] that he had done, they kept saying, “Truly this is the Prophet who was to come into the world!”
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