Book of Common Prayer
37 Never envy the wicked! 2 Soon they fade away like grass and disappear. 3 Trust in the Lord instead. Be kind and good to others; then you will live safely here in the land and prosper, feeding in safety.
4 Be delighted with the Lord. Then he will give you all your heart’s desires. 5 Commit everything you do to the Lord. Trust him to help you do it, and he will. 6 Your innocence will be clear to everyone. He will vindicate you with the blazing light of justice shining down as from the noonday sun.
7 Rest in the Lord; wait patiently for him to act. Don’t be envious of evil men who prosper.
8 Stop your anger! Turn off your wrath. Don’t fret and worry—it only leads to harm. 9 For the wicked shall be destroyed, but those who trust the Lord shall be given every blessing. 10 Only a little while and the wicked shall disappear. You will look for them in vain. 11 But all who humble themselves before the Lord shall be given every blessing and shall have wonderful peace.
12-13 The Lord is laughing at those who plot against the godly, for he knows their judgment day is coming. 14 Evil men take aim to slay the poor; they are ready to butcher those who do right. 15 But their swords will be plunged into their own hearts, and all their weapons will be broken.
16 It is better to have little and be godly than to own an evil man’s wealth; 17 for the strength of evil men shall be broken, but the Lord takes care of those he has forgiven.[a]
18 Day by day the Lord observes the good deeds done by godly men,[b] and gives them eternal rewards. 19 He cares for them when times are hard; even in famine, they will have enough. 20 But evil men shall perish. These enemies of God will wither like grass and disappear like smoke. 21 Evil men borrow and “cannot pay it back”! But the good man returns what he owes with some extra besides. 22 Those blessed by the Lord shall inherit the earth, but those cursed by him shall die.
23 The steps of good men are directed by the Lord. He delights in each step they take. 24 If they fall, it isn’t fatal, for the Lord holds them with his hand.
25 I have been young and now I am old. And in all my years I have never seen the Lord forsake a man who loves him; nor have I seen the children of the godly go hungry. 26 Instead, the godly are able to be generous with their gifts and loans to others, and their children are a blessing.
27 So if you want an eternal home, leave your evil, low-down ways and live good lives. 28 For the Lord loves justice and fairness; he will never abandon his people. They will be kept safe forever; but all who love wickedness shall perish.
29 The godly shall be firmly planted in the land and live there forever. 30-31 The godly man is a good counselor because he is just and fair and knows right from wrong.
32 Evil men spy on the godly, waiting for an excuse to accuse them and then demanding their death. 33 But the Lord will not let these evil men succeed, nor let the godly be condemned when they are brought before the judge.
34 Don’t be impatient for the Lord to act! Keep traveling steadily along his pathway and in due season he will honor you with every blessing,[c] and you will see the wicked destroyed. 35-36 I myself have seen it happen: a proud and evil man, towering like a cedar of Lebanon, but when I looked again, he was gone! I searched but could not find him! 37 But the good man—what a different story! For the good man—the blameless, the upright, the man of peace—he has a wonderful future ahead of him. For him there is a happy ending. 38 But evil men shall be destroyed, and their posterity shall be cut off.
39 The Lord saves the godly! He is their salvation and their refuge when trouble comes. 40 Because they trust in him, he helps them and delivers them from the plots of evil men.
6 “For you are a holy people, dedicated to the Lord your God. He has chosen you from all the people on the face of the whole earth to be his own chosen ones. 7 He didn’t choose you and pour out his love upon you because you were a larger nation than any other, for you were the smallest of all! 8 It was just because he loves you, and because he kept his promise to your ancestors. That is why he brought you out of slavery in Egypt with such amazing power and mighty miracles.
9 “Understand, therefore, that the Lord your God is the faithful God who for a thousand generations keeps his promises and constantly loves those who love him and who obey his commands. 10 But those who hate him shall be punished publicly and destroyed. He will deal with them personally. 11 Therefore, obey all these commandments I am giving you today.
1 1-2 From: Paul, the slave of God and the messenger of Jesus Christ.
I have been sent to bring faith to those God has chosen and to teach them to know God’s truth—the kind of truth that changes lives—so that they can have eternal life, which God promised them before the world began—and he cannot lie. 3 And now in his own good time he has revealed this Good News and permits me to tell it to everyone. By command of God our Savior, I have been trusted to do this work for him.
4 To: Titus, who is truly my son in the affairs of the Lord.
May God the Father and Christ Jesus our Savior give you his blessings and his peace.
5 I left you there on the island of Crete so that you could do whatever was needed to help strengthen each of its churches, and I asked you to appoint pastors[a] in every city who would follow the instructions I gave you. 6 The men you choose must be well thought of for their good lives; they must have only one wife and their children must love the Lord and not have a reputation for being wild or disobedient to their parents.
7 These pastors must be men of blameless lives because they are God’s ministers. They must not be proud or impatient; they must not be drunkards or fighters or greedy for money. 8 They must enjoy having guests in their homes and must love all that is good. They must be sensible men, and fair. They must be clean minded and level headed. 9 Their belief in the truth that they have been taught must be strong and steadfast so that they will be able to teach it to others and show those who disagree with them where they are wrong.
10 For there are many who refuse to obey; this is especially true among those who say that all Christians must obey the Jewish laws. But this is foolish talk; it blinds people to the truth, 11 and it must be stopped. Already whole families have been turned away from the grace of God. Such teachers are only after your money. 12 One of their own men, a prophet from Crete, has said about them, “These men of Crete are all liars; they are like lazy animals, living only to satisfy their stomachs.” 13 And this is true. So speak to the Christians there as sternly as necessary to make them strong in the faith 14 and to stop them from listening to Jewish folk tales and the demands of men who have turned their backs on the truth.
15 A person who is pure of heart sees goodness and purity in everything; but a person whose own heart is evil and untrusting finds evil in everything, for his dirty mind and rebellious heart color all he sees and hears. 16 Such persons claim they know God, but from seeing the way they act, one knows they don’t. They are rotten and disobedient, worthless so far as doing anything good is concerned.
29 The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, “Look! There is the Lamb of God who takes away the world’s sin! 30 He is the one I was talking about when I said, ‘Soon a man far greater than I am is coming, who existed long before me!’ 31 I didn’t know he was the one, but I am here baptizing with water in order to point him out to the nation of Israel.”
32 Then John told about seeing the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove descending from heaven and resting upon Jesus.
33 “I didn’t know he was the one,” John said again, “but at the time God sent me to baptize he told me, ‘When you see the Holy Spirit descending and resting upon someone—he is the one you are looking for. He is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’ 34 I saw it happen to this man, and I therefore testify that he is the Son of God.”
The Living Bible copyright © 1971 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.