Book of Common Prayer
31 Lord, I trust in you alone. Don’t let my enemies defeat me. Rescue me because you are the God who always does what is right. 2 Answer quickly when I cry to you; bend low and hear my whispered plea.[a] Be for me a great Rock of safety from my foes. 3 Yes, you are my Rock and my fortress; honor your name by leading me out of this peril. 4 Pull me from the trap my enemies have set for me. For you alone are strong enough.[b] 5-6 Into your hand I commit my spirit.
You have rescued me, O God who keeps his promises. I worship only you; how you hate all those who worship idols, those imitation gods. 7 I am radiant with joy because of your mercy, for you have listened to my troubles and have seen the crisis in my soul. 8 You have not handed me over to my enemy but have given me open ground in which to maneuver.
9-10 O Lord, have mercy on me in my anguish. My eyes are red from weeping; my health is broken from sorrow. I am pining away with grief; my years are shortened, drained away because of sadness. My sins have sapped my strength; I stoop with sorrow and with shame.[c] 11 I am scorned by all my enemies and even more by my neighbors and friends. They dread meeting me and look the other way when I go by. 12 I am forgotten like a dead man, like a broken and discarded pot. 13 I heard the lies about me, the slanders of my enemies. Everywhere I looked I was afraid, for they were plotting against my life.
14-15 But I am trusting you, O Lord. I said, “You alone are my God; my times are in your hands. Rescue me from those who hunt me down relentlessly. 16 Let your favor shine again upon your servant; save me just because you are so kind! 17 Don’t disgrace me, Lord, by not replying when I call to you for aid. But let the wicked be shamed by what they trust in; let them lie silently in their graves, 18 their lying lips quieted at last—the lips of these arrogant men who are accusing honest men of evil deeds.”
19 Oh, how great is your goodness to those who publicly declare that you will rescue them. For you have stored up great blessings for those who trust and reverence you.
20 Hide your loved ones in the shelter of your presence, safe beneath your hand, safe from all conspiring men. 21 Blessed is the Lord, for he has shown me that his never-failing love protects me like the walls of a fort! 22 I spoke too hastily when I said, “The Lord has deserted me,” for you listened to my plea and answered me.
23 Oh, love the Lord, all of you who are his people; for the Lord protects those who are loyal to him, but harshly punishes all who haughtily reject him. 24 So cheer up! Take courage if you are depending on the Lord.
35 O Lord, fight those fighting me; declare war on them for their attacks on me. 2 Put on your armor, take your shield and protect me by standing in front. 3 Lift your spear in my defense, for my pursuers are getting very close. Let me hear you say that you will save me from them. 4 Dishonor those who are trying to kill me. Turn them back and confuse them. 5 Blow them away like chaff in the wind—wind sent by the Angel of the Lord. 6 Make their path dark and slippery before them, with the Angel of the Lord pursuing them. 7 For though I did them no wrong, yet they laid a trap for me and dug a pitfall in my path. 8 Let them be overtaken by sudden ruin, caught in their own net and destroyed.
9 But I will rejoice in the Lord. He shall rescue me! 10 From the bottom of my heart praise rises to him. Where is his equal in all of heaven and earth? Who else protects the weak and helpless from the strong, and the poor and needy from those who would rob them?
11 These evil men swear to a lie. They accuse me of things I have never even heard about. 12 I do them good, but they return me harm. I am sinking down to death. 13 When they were ill, I mourned before the Lord in sackcloth, asking him to make them well; I refused to eat; I prayed for them with utmost earnestness, but God did not listen. 14 I went about sadly as though it were my mother, friend, or brother who was sick and nearing death. 15 But now that I am in trouble they are glad; they come together in meetings filled with slander against me—I didn’t even know some of those who were there. 16 For they gather with the worthless fellows of the town and spend their time cursing me.
17 Lord, how long will you stand there, doing nothing? Act now and rescue me, for I have but one life and these young lions are out to get it. 18 Save me, and I will thank you publicly before the entire congregation, before the largest crowd I can find.
19 Don’t give victory to those who fight me without any reason! Don’t let them rejoice[a] at my fall—let them die. 20 They don’t talk of peace and doing good, but of plots against innocent men who are minding their own business. 21 They shout that they have seen me doing wrong! “Aha!” they say. “With our own eyes we saw him do it.” 22 Lord, you know all about it. Don’t stay silent! Don’t desert me now!
23 Rise up, O Lord my God; vindicate me. 24 Declare me “not guilty,” for you are just.[b] Don’t let my enemies rejoice over me in my troubles. 25 Don’t let them say, “Aha! Our dearest wish against him will soon be fulfilled!” and, “At last we have him!” 26 Shame them; let these who boast against me and who rejoice at my troubles be themselves overcome by misfortune that strips them bare of everything they own. Bare them to dishonor. 27 But give great joy to all who wish me well. Let them shout with delight, “Great is the Lord who enjoys helping his child!”[c] 28 And I will tell everyone how great and good you are; I will praise you all day long.
5 Moses continued speaking to the people of Israel and said, “Listen carefully now to all these laws God has given you; learn them, and be sure to obey them!
2-3 “The Lord our God made a contract with you at Mount Horeb—not with your ancestors, but with you who are here alive today. 4 He spoke with you face to face from the center of the fire, there at the mountain. 5 I stood as an intermediary between you and Jehovah, for you were afraid of the fire and did not go up to him on the mountain. He spoke to me and I passed on his laws to you. This is what he said:
6 “‘I am Jehovah your God who rescued you from slavery in Egypt.
7 “‘Never worship any god but me.
8 “‘Never make idols; don’t worship images, whether of birds, animals, or fish. 9-10 You shall not bow down to any images nor worship them in any way, for I am the Lord your God. I am a jealous God, and I will bring the curse of a father’s sins upon even the third and fourth generation of the children of those who hate me; but I will show kindness to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.
11 “‘You must never use my name to make a vow you don’t intend to keep.[a] I will not overlook that.
12 “‘Keep the Sabbath day holy. This is my command. 13 Work the other six days, 14 but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God; no work shall be done that day by you or by any of your household—your sons, daughters, servants, oxen, donkeys, or cattle; even foreigners living among you must obey this law. Everybody must rest as you do. 15 Why should you keep the Sabbath? It is because you were slaves in Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out with a great display of miracles.
16 “‘Honor your father and mother (remember, this is a commandment of the Lord your God); if you do so, you shall have a long, prosperous life in the land he is giving you.
17 “‘You must not murder.
18 “‘You must not commit adultery.
19 “‘You must not steal.
20 “‘You must not tell lies.
21 “‘You must not burn with desire for another man’s wife, nor envy him for his home, land, servants, oxen, donkeys, nor anything else he owns.’
22 “The Lord has given these laws to each one of you from the heart of the fire, surrounded by the clouds and thick darkness that engulfed Mount Sinai. Those were the only commandments he gave you at that time,[b] and he wrote them out on two stone tablets and gave them to me.
4 It is God himself, in his mercy, who has given us this wonderful work of telling his Good News to others,[a] and so we never give up. 2 We do not try to trick people into believing—we are not interested in fooling anyone. We never try to get anyone to believe that the Bible teaches what it doesn’t. All such shameful methods we forego. We stand in the presence of God as we speak and so we tell the truth, as all who know us will agree.
3 If the Good News we preach is hidden to anyone, it is hidden from the one who is on the road to eternal death. 4 Satan, who is the god of this evil world, has made him blind, unable to see the glorious light of the Gospel that is shining upon him or to understand the amazing message we preach about the glory of Christ, who is God.[b] 5 We don’t go around preaching about ourselves but about Christ Jesus as Lord. All we say of ourselves is that we are your slaves because of what Jesus has done for us. 6 For God, who said, “Let there be light in the darkness,” has made us understand that it is the brightness of his glory that is seen in the face of Jesus Christ.
7 But this precious treasure—this light and power that now shine within us[c]—is held in a perishable container, that is, in our weak bodies. Everyone can see that the glorious power within must be from God and is not our own.
8 We are pressed on every side by troubles, but not crushed and broken. We are perplexed because we don’t know why things happen as they do, but we don’t give up and quit. 9 We are hunted down, but God never abandons us. We get knocked down, but we get up again and keep going. 10 These bodies of ours are constantly facing death just as Jesus did; so it is clear to all that it is only the living Christ within who keeps us safe.[d]
11 Yes, we live under constant danger to our lives because we serve the Lord, but this gives us constant opportunities to show forth the power of Jesus Christ within our dying bodies. 12 Because of our preaching we face death, but it has resulted in eternal life for you.
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13 “For neither you nor anyone else can serve two masters. You will hate one and show loyalty to the other, or else the other way around—you will be enthusiastic about one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.”
14 The Pharisees, who dearly loved their money, naturally scoffed at all this.
15 Then he said to them, “You wear a noble, pious expression in public, but God knows your evil hearts. Your pretense brings you honor from the people, but it is an abomination in the sight of God. 16 Until John the Baptist began to preach, the laws of Moses and the messages of the prophets were your guides. But John introduced the Good News that the Kingdom of God would come soon. And now eager multitudes are pressing in. 17 But that doesn’t mean that the Law has lost its force in even the smallest point. It is as strong and unshakable as heaven and earth.
18 “So anyone who divorces his wife and marries someone else commits adultery, and anyone who marries a divorced woman commits adultery.”
The Living Bible copyright © 1971 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.