Book of Common Prayer
Psalm 25[a]
Confident Prayer for Forgiveness and Guidance
1 Of David.
I
To you, O Lord, I lift up my soul,
2 (A)my God, in you I trust;
do not let me be disgraced;(B)
do not let my enemies gloat over me.
3 No one is disgraced who waits for you,(C)
but only those who are treacherous without cause.
4 Make known to me your ways, Lord;
teach me your paths.(D)
5 Guide me by your fidelity and teach me,
for you are God my savior,
for you I wait all the day long.
6 Remember your compassion and your mercy, O Lord,
for they are ages old.(E)
7 Remember no more the sins of my youth;(F)
remember me according to your mercy,
because of your goodness, Lord.
II
8 Good and upright is the Lord,
therefore he shows sinners the way,
9 He guides the humble in righteousness,
and teaches the humble his way.
10 All the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth
toward those who honor his covenant and decrees.
11 For the sake of your name, Lord,
pardon my guilt, though it is great.
12 Who is the one who fears the Lord?
God shows him the way he should choose.(G)
13 He will abide in prosperity,
and his descendants will inherit the land.(H)
14 The counsel of the Lord belongs to those who fear him;
and his covenant instructs them.
15 My eyes are ever upon the Lord,
who frees my feet from the snare.(I)
III
16 Look upon me, have pity on me,
for I am alone and afflicted.(J)
17 Relieve the troubles of my heart;
bring me out of my distress.
18 Look upon my affliction and suffering;
take away all my sins.
19 See how many are my enemies,
see how fiercely they hate me.
20 Preserve my soul and rescue me;
do not let me be disgraced, for in you I seek refuge.
21 Let integrity and uprightness preserve me;
I wait for you, O Lord.
22 [b]Redeem Israel, O God,
from all its distress!
Psalm 9[a]
Thanksgiving for Victory and Prayer for Justice
1 For the leader; according to Muth Labben.[b] A psalm of David.
I
2 I will praise you, Lord, with all my heart;
I will declare all your wondrous deeds.
3 I will delight and rejoice in you;
I will sing hymns to your name, Most High.
4 When my enemies turn back,
they stumble and perish before you.
II
5 For you upheld my right and my cause,
seated on your throne, judging justly.
6 You rebuked the nations, you destroyed the wicked;
their name you blotted out for all time.(A)
7 The enemies have been ruined forever;
you destroyed their cities;
their memory has perished.
III
8 The Lord rules forever,
has set up his throne for judgment.
9 It is he who judges the world with justice,(B)
who judges the peoples with fairness.
10 The Lord is a stronghold for the oppressed,
a stronghold in times of trouble.(C)
11 Those who know your name trust in you;
you never forsake those who seek you, Lord.
IV
12 Sing hymns to the Lord enthroned on Zion;
proclaim his deeds among the nations!
13 For the avenger of bloodshed remembers,
does not forget the cry of the afflicted.(D)
V
14 Be gracious to me, Lord;
see how my foes afflict me!
You alone can raise me from the gates of death.(E)
15 Then I will declare all your praises,
sing joyously of your salvation
in the gates of daughter Zion.[c]
VI
16 The nations fall into the pit they dig;
in the snare they hide, their own foot is caught.
17 [d]The Lord is revealed in making judgments:
by the deeds they do the wicked are trapped.(F)
Higgaion. Selah
VII
18 To Sheol the wicked will depart,
all the nations that forget God.
19 For the needy will never be forgotten,
nor will the hope of the afflicted ever fade.(G)
20 Arise, Lord, let no mortal prevail;
let the nations be judged in your presence.
21 Strike them with terror, Lord;
show the nations they are only human.
Selah
Psalm 15[a]
The Righteous Israelite
1 (A)A psalm of David.
I
Lord, who may abide in your tent?[b]
Who may dwell on your holy mountain?
II
2 Whoever walks without blame,(B)
doing what is right,
speaking truth from the heart;
3 Who does not slander with his tongue,
does no harm to a friend,
never defames a neighbor;
4 Who disdains the wicked,
but honors those who fear the Lord;
Who keeps an oath despite the cost,
5 lends no money at interest,[c]
accepts no bribe against the innocent.(C)
III
Whoever acts like this
shall never be shaken.
Revelation at Horeb. 9 However, be on your guard and be very careful not to forget the things your own eyes have seen, nor let them slip from your heart as long as you live, but make them known to your children(A) and to your children’s children, 10 that day you stood before the Lord, your God, at Horeb, when the Lord said to me: Assemble the people for me, that I may let them hear my words, that they may learn to fear[a] me as long as they live in the land and may so teach their children. 11 (B)You came near and stood at the foot of the mountain, while the mountain blazed to the heart of the heavens with fire and was enveloped in a dense black cloud. 12 Then the Lord spoke to you from the midst of the fire.(C) You heard the sound of the words, but saw no form; there was only a voice. 13 He proclaimed to you his covenant, which he commanded you to keep: the ten words,[b] which he wrote on two stone tablets.(D) 14 At that time the Lord charged me to teach you the statutes and ordinances for you to observe in the land you are about to cross into and possess.
I. Address
Chapter 1
Greeting. 1 [a]Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother, to the church of God that is in Corinth, with all the holy ones throughout Achaia:(A) 2 grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Thanksgiving. 3 (B)Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and God of all encouragement,[b] 4 who encourages us in our every affliction, so that we may be able to encourage those who are in any affliction with the encouragement with which we ourselves are encouraged by God.(C) 5 For as Christ’s sufferings overflow to us, so through Christ[c] does our encouragement also overflow. 6 If we are afflicted, it is for your encouragement and salvation; if we are encouraged, it is for your encouragement, which enables you to endure the same sufferings that we suffer. 7 Our hope for you is firm, for we know that as you share in the sufferings, you also share in the encouragement.[d]
8 We do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the affliction that came to us in the province of Asia;[e] we were utterly weighed down beyond our strength, so that we despaired even of life.(D) 9 Indeed, we had accepted within ourselves the sentence of death,[f] that we might trust not in ourselves but in God who raises the dead.(E) 10 He rescued us from such great danger of death, and he will continue to rescue us; in him we have put our hope [that] he will also rescue us again,(F) 11 as you help us with prayer, so that thanks may be given by many on our behalf for the gift granted us through the prayers of many.(G)
25 Great crowds were traveling with him, and he turned and addressed them, 26 (A)“If any one comes to me without hating his father[a] and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.(B) 27 Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.(C) 28 Which of you wishing to construct a tower does not first sit down and calculate the cost to see if there is enough for its completion? 29 Otherwise, after laying the foundation and finding himself unable to finish the work the onlookers should laugh at him 30 and say, ‘This one began to build but did not have the resources to finish.’ 31 Or what king marching into battle would not first sit down and decide whether with ten thousand troops he can successfully oppose another king advancing upon him with twenty thousand troops? 32 But if not, while he is still far away, he will send a delegation to ask for peace terms. 33 In the same way, everyone of you who does not renounce all his possessions cannot be my disciple.(D)
The Simile of Salt.[b] 34 “Salt is good, but if salt itself loses its taste, with what can its flavor be restored?(E) 35 It is fit neither for the soil nor for the manure pile; it is thrown out. Whoever has ears to hear ought to hear.”(F)
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