Book of Common Prayer
Psalm 118
The Stone the Builders Rejected
Introduction
1 Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good,
for his mercy endures forever.
2 Let Israel say now: Yes, his mercy endures forever.
3 Let the house of Aaron say now: Yes, his mercy endures forever.
4 Let those who fear the Lord say now: Yes, his mercy endures forever.
Trust During Distress
5 Under pressure I cried to the Lord.[a]
The Lord answered me.
He set me in a wide-open space.
6 The Lord is with me.
I will not be afraid.
What can people do to me?
7 The Lord, who is with me, is my helper,
so I will look in triumph on my enemies.
8 It is better to take refuge in the Lord
than to trust in people.
9 It is better to take refuge in the Lord
than to trust in human benefactors.[b]
10 All the nations surrounded me,
but in the name of the Lord I cut them off.[c]
11 They surrounded me, yes, they surrounded me,
but in the name of the Lord I cut them off.
12 They surrounded me like bees,
but they were extinguished as quickly as a fire of thorns.
In the name of the Lord I cut them off.
13 You pushed me hard to make me fall,
but the Lord helped me.
The Messiah’s Joy in Victory
14 My strength and song is the Lord,
and he has become salvation for me.
15 Loud shouts of victory are heard in the tents of the righteous:
“The right hand of the Lord has done a mighty deed!
16 The right hand of the Lord is lifted high!
The right hand of the Lord has done a mighty deed!”
17 I will not die. No, I will live,
and I will proclaim the works of the Lord.
18 The Lord has chastened me severely,
but he has not handed me over to death.
19 Open for me the gates of righteousness.
I will enter them. I will give thanks to the Lord.
20 This is the gate to the Lord.
The righteous enter it.
21 I will give you thanks,
because you answered me,
and you have become salvation for me.
The Joy in Victory of Messiah’s Followers
22 The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.[d]
23 This is from the Lord.
It is marvelous in our eyes.
24 This is the day the Lord has made.
Let us rejoice and be glad in it.
25 O Lord, please save us now.[e]
O Lord, grant us success.
26 Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.
We bless you from the house of the Lord.
27 The Lord is God,
and he makes light shine on us.
Bind the festival with branches as far as the horns of the altar.[f]
28 You are my God, and I will give you thanks.
You are my God, and I will exalt you.
Conclusion
29 Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good,
for his mercy endures forever.
Psalm 145
The Lord Is Worthy of Praise
Heading
A song of praise. By David.
Praise
1 I will exalt you, my God, the King,
and I will bless your name forever and ever.
2 Every day I will bless you,
and I will praise your name forever and ever.
Proclamation of His Greatness
3 Great is the Lord and worthy of great praise,
and there are no limits to the extent of his greatness.
Praise
4 One generation will praise your deeds to another,
and they will declare your mighty acts.
5 I will contemplate the glorious splendor of your majesty
and the accounts of your wonderful works.
6 Then they will speak about the power of your awesome works,
and I will tell about your great deeds.
7 They will pour forth the memory of your abundant goodness
and sing loudly about your righteousness.
Proclamation of His Grace
8 The Lord is gracious and compassionate,
slow to anger and great in mercy.
9 The Lord is good to all.
His compassion extends over all he has made.
Praise
10 Everyone you have made will thank you, O Lord,
and the ones you favor will bless you.
11 They will tell about the glory of your kingdom,
and they will speak about your might,
12 to make known his might to the children of Adam,
to make known the glorious splendor of his kingdom.
Proclamation of His Kingdom
13 Your kingdom is a kingdom for all ages,
and your dominion endures through all generations.
The Lord is faithful to all his words
and merciful toward all he has made.[a]
14 The Lord lifts up all who fall,
and he supports all who are bowed down.
15 The eyes of all look eagerly to you,
and you give them their food at the proper time.
16 He opens his hand,
and he satisfies the desire of every living thing.[b]
17 The Lord is righteous in all his ways
and merciful toward all that he has made.
18 The Lord is near to all who call on him,
to all who call on him in truth.
19 He grants the desire of those who fear him.
He hears their cry and saves them.
20 The Lord watches over all who love him,
but he will destroy all the wicked.
Praise
21 My mouth will speak the praise of the Lord.
Let all flesh bless his holy name forever and ever.
The Bronze Snake
4 They set out from Mount Hor along the road to the Red Sea to go around the land of Edom, but the people became very impatient along the way. 5 The people spoke against God and against Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? Look, there is no food! There is no water! And we are disgusted by this worthless food!”[a]
6 The Lord sent venomous[b] snakes among the people, and the snakes bit the people. As a result many people from Israel died. 7 The people went to Moses and said, “We have sinned, because we have spoken against the Lord and against you. Pray to the Lord to take the snakes away from us.” So Moses prayed on behalf of the people.
8 The Lord said to Moses, “Make a venomous snake and put it on a pole. If anyone who is bitten looks at it, he will live.” 9 Moses made a bronze snake and put it on the pole. If a snake had bitten anyone, if that person looked at the bronze snake, he lived.
The Defeat of Sihon and Og
21 Israel sent messengers to Sihon king of the Amorites to say, 22 “Permit us to pass through your land. We will not turn aside into any field or vineyard. We will not drink the water from any well. We will stay on the King’s Highway until we have passed through your territory.”
23 Sihon would not allow Israel to pass through his territory. Instead Sihon gathered all his people together and went out into the wilderness to confront Israel. When he came to Jahaz, he fought against Israel. 24 Israel struck him with the sword and took possession of his land from the Arnon to the Jabbok, but only as far as the Ammonites, because the Ammonite border was strong. 25 Israel took all these cities. Israel began living in all the cities of the Amorites, in Heshbon and in all its villages. 26 Because Heshbon had been the city of Sihon, the king of the Amorites, who had fought against the former king of Moab and taken from him all his land as far as the Arnon, 27 therefore the poets[a] say,
Come to Heshbon.
Let the city of Sihon be built and established,
28 for a fire has gone out of Heshbon,
a flame from the town of Sihon.
It has consumed Ar of Moab
and engulfed the heights of the Arnon.[b]
29 Woe to you, Moab!
You are destroyed, people of Chemosh!
He has given up his sons as refugees,
and his daughters go into captivity
to Sihon king of the Amorites.
30 We overthrew them.
Heshbon is destroyed as far as Dibon.
We have laid waste as far as Nophah.
Fire reaches as far as Medeba.
31 So Israel lived in the land of the Amorites. 32 Moses sent spies to Jazer. They took its towns and drove out the Amorites who were there. 33 They turned and went up on the road to Bashan. Og king of Bashan came out with all his people to confront Israel in battle at Edrei.
34 The Lord said to Moses, “Do not be afraid of him, for I have delivered him into your hand along with all his people and his land. You will do to him just as you did to Sihon king of the Amorites, who lived at Heshbon.”
35 So they struck him down along with his sons and all his people until there were no survivors. Then they took possession of his land.
12 Many of them believed, along with more than a few prominent Greek women and men.
13 But when the Jews in Thessalonica learned that the word of God was being proclaimed by Paul in Berea, they also went there to agitate and stir up the crowds. 14 Then the brothers immediately sent Paul away to the seacoast, but Silas and Timothy stayed there. 15 Those who escorted Paul brought him all the way to Athens. When they left, they received instructions for Silas and Timothy to join Paul as soon as possible.
In Athens
16 While Paul was waiting for them in Athens, he was very distressed to see that the city was full of idols. 17 So he led a discussion in the synagogue with the Jews and those who feared God, as well as with those who happened to be in the marketplace every day.
18 Some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers also debated with him. Some said, “What is this seed picker[a] trying to say?” Others said, “He seems to be someone who is proclaiming foreign gods.” They said this because Paul was preaching the good news about Jesus and the resurrection.
19 They took him and brought him to the council of the Areopagus, saying, “May we know what this new teaching is that you are talking about? 20 You seem to be bringing in some ideas that are strange to our ears, so we want to know what these things mean.” 21 (All the Athenians and the foreigners who lived there enjoyed doing nothing more than telling or listening to something new.)
22 Then Paul stood up in front of the council of the Areopagus and said, “Men of Athens, I see that you are very religious in every way. 23 For as I was walking around and carefully observing your objects of worship, I even found an altar on which had been inscribed, ‘To an unknown god.’ Now what you worship as unknown—this is what I am going to proclaim to you.
24 “The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples made with hands. 25 Neither is he served by human hands, as if he needed anything, since he himself gives all people life and breath and everything they have. 26 From one man,[b] he made every nation of mankind to live over the entire face of the earth. He determined the appointed times and the boundaries where they would live. 27 He did this so they would seek God[c] and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. 28 ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’[d] As some of your own poets have said, ‘Indeed, we are also his offspring.’[e]
29 “Therefore, since we are God’s offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by human skill and planning. 30 Although God overlooked the times of ignorance, he is now commanding all people everywhere to repent, 31 because he has set a day on which he is going to judge the world in righteousness by the man he appointed. He provided proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead.”
32 When they heard about the resurrection from the dead, some of them started to scoff. But others said, “We want to hear you again on this subject.” 33 So Paul left the council. 34 However, some men became followers of Paul and believed. Among them were Dionysius (a member of the council of the Areopagus) and a woman named Damaris, as well as others with them.
Jesus Heals a Crippled Woman
10 Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues on the Sabbath. 11 And a woman was there who had a spirit that had disabled her for eighteen years. She was bent over and could not stand up straight. 12 When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said, “Woman, you are freed from your disability.” 13 He placed his hands on her, and immediately she stood up straight and began to glorify God.
14 But the ruler of the synagogue was indignant that Jesus had healed on the Sabbath. He said to the crowd in response, “There are six days to do work. So come to be healed on those days and not on the Sabbath day!”
15 The Lord answered him, “Hypocrites! Doesn’t each of you untie his ox or his donkey from the manger on the Sabbath and lead it to water? 16 Here is this daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has bound for eighteen years! Shouldn’t she be set free from this bondage on the Sabbath day?”
17 As he said these things, all his adversaries were put to shame. But the entire crowd was rejoicing over all the glorious things he was doing.
The Holy Bible, Evangelical Heritage Version®, EHV®, © 2019 Wartburg Project, Inc. All rights reserved.