Book of Common Prayer
A Psalm of David.
1 ¶ I will sing of mercy and judgment; unto thee, O LORD, will I sing.
2 When thou shalt come unto me, I will walk in the way of perfection and understand. I will walk in the midst of my house in the perfection of my heart.
3 I will set nothing of Belial before my eyes: I hate the work of those that betray; it shall not cleave to me.
4 A perverse heart shall depart from me; I will not know a wicked person.
5 Whosoever secretly slanders his neighbour, I will cut off; he that has a high look and a proud heart I will not suffer.
6 My eyes shall be upon the faithful of the land, that they may dwell with me; he that walks in the way of perfection, he shall serve me.
7 He that works deceit shall not dwell within my house; he that tells lies shall not tarry in my sight.
8 I will early destroy all the wicked of the land, that I may cut off all the workers of iniquity from the city of the LORD.
To the Overcomer, A Psalm of David.
1 ¶ Do not hold thy peace, O God of my praise;
2 for the mouth of the wicked and the mouth of the deceitful are opened against me; they have spoken of me with a lying tongue.
3 They compassed me about with words of hatred and fought against me without a cause.
4 They have responded to my love by becoming my adversaries, but I give myself unto prayer.
5 And they have rewarded me evil for good, and hatred for my love.
6 ¶ Set thou the wicked man over him, and let Satan stand at his right hand.
7 When he shall be judged, let him be condemned, and let his prayer become sin.
8 Let his days be few, and let another take his office.
9 Let his children be fatherless and his wife a widow.
10 Let his children be continually vagabonds and beg; let them seek their bread out of their desolate places.
11 Let the extortioner catch all that he has, and let the strangers spoil his labour.
12 Let there be no one to extend mercy unto him: neither let there be any to favour his fatherless children.
13 Let his posterity be cut off, and in the generation following let their name be blotted out.
14 Let the iniquity of his fathers be remembered with the LORD, and let not the sin of his mother be blotted out.
15 Let them be before the LORD continually, that he may cut off the memory of them from the earth.
16 Because he did not remember to show mercy but persecuted the man who is poor in spirit and destitute and broken in heart, that he might slay him.
17 As he loved the curse, so let it come unto him; as he delighted not in the blessing, so let it be far from him.
18 As he clothed himself with the curse like as with his garment, and it entered into his bowels like water and like oil into his bones.
19 Let it be unto him as the garment which covers him and for a girdle wherewith he is girded continually.
20 Let this be the reward from the LORD of those who spoke falsely against me and of those that speak evil against my soul.
21 ¶ And thou, O GOD the Lord, do unto me for thy name’s sake; because thy mercy is good, deliver me.
22 For I am poor and needy, and my heart is wounded within me.
23 I am gone like the shadow when it declines; I am tossed up and down by the wind as the locust.
24 My knees are weak through fasting, and my flesh fails for lack of fatness.
25 I have become a reproach unto them; when they looked upon me they shook their heads.
26 Help me, O LORD my God; O save me according to thy mercy,
27 that they may know that this is thy hand, that thou, O LORD, hast done it.
28 Let them curse, but bless thou; when they arise, let them be ashamed, but let thy slave rejoice.
29 Let those who speak evil against me falsely be clothed with shame, and let them cover themselves with their own confusion as with a mantle.
30 I will greatly praise the LORD with my mouth; yea, I will praise him among the multitude.
AIN.
121 ¶ I have complied with judgment and righteousness; do not leave me to my oppressors.
122 Be surety for thy slave for good; do not let the proud do violence unto me.
123 ¶ Mine eyes fail for thy saving health and for the spoken word of thy righteousness.
124 ¶ Deal with thy slave according to thy mercy, and teach me thy statutes.
125 I am thy slave; give me understanding, that I may know thy testimonies.
126 ¶ It is time for thee, O LORD, to act; for they have dissipated thy law.
127 ¶ Therefore I have loved thy commandments above gold, yea, above fine gold.
128 Therefore I have esteemed all thy precepts concerning all things to be right and I have hated every false way.
PE.
129 ¶ Thy testimonies are wonderful; therefore does my soul keep them.
130 ¶ The exposition of thy words gives light; it gives understanding unto the simple.
131 ¶ I opened my mouth and panted; for I longed for thy commandments.
132 ¶ Look thou upon me and be merciful unto me, as thou didst use to do unto those that love thy name.
133 ¶ Order my steps with thy word; and let not any iniquity have dominion over me.
134 ¶ Ransom me from the violence of men, and I will keep thy precepts.
135 ¶ Make thy face to shine upon thy slave and teach me thy statutes.
136 ¶ Rivers of waters ran down my eyes because they did not keep thy law.
TZADDI.
137 ¶ Righteous art thou, O LORD, and upright are thy judgments.
138 Thou hast commanded righteousness, which consists of thy testimonies and thy truth.
139 ¶ My zeal has consumed me, because my enemies have forgotten thy words.
140 ¶ Thy word is very pure; therefore thy slave loves it.
141 ¶ I am small and despised; yet I have not forgotten thy precepts.
142 ¶ Thy righteousness is eternal righteousness, and thy law is the truth.
143 ¶ Trouble and anguish found me; but thy commandments were my delights.
144 Thy testimonies are eternal righteousness; give me understanding, and I shall live.
25 ¶ Then Laban overtook Jacob. Now Jacob had pitched his tent in the mount; and Laban with his brethren pitched in Mount Gilead.
26 And Laban said to Jacob, What hast thou done, that thou hast stolen away my heart and carried away my daughters as captives taken with the sword?
27 Why didst thou flee away secretly and steal away from me and didst not tell me that I might have sent thee away with mirth and with songs with tambourine and with harp?
28 And hast not suffered me to kiss my sons and my daughters? Thou hast now done foolishly in so doing.
29 It is in the power of my hand to do you hurt, but the God of your father spoke unto me last night, saying, Take thou heed that thou speak not to Jacob either good or bad.
30 And now, that thou art leaving, because thy desire is after thy father’s house, yet why hast thou stolen my gods?
31 And Jacob answered and said to Laban, Because I was afraid; for I said, Peradventure thou would take by force thy daughters from me.
32 With whomsoever thou findest thy gods, let them not live; before our brethren discern what is thine with me and take it to thee. For Jacob did not know that Rachel had stolen them.
33 And Laban went into Jacob’s tent and into Leah’s tent, and into the two maidservants’ tents, but he did not find them. Then he went out of Leah’s tent and came to Rachel’s tent.
34 Now Rachel took the images and put them in a camel’s saddle and sat upon them. And Laban searched all the tent but did not find them.
35 And she said to her father, Let it not displease my lord that I cannot rise up before thee; for the custom of women is upon me. And he searched, but did not find the images.
36 ¶ Then Jacob was wroth and contended with Laban, and Jacob answered and said to Laban, What is my trespass? What is my sin that thou hast so hotly pursued after me?
37 Whereas thou hast searched all my stuff, what hast thou found of all thy household stuff? Set it here before my brethren and thy brethren that they may judge between us both.
38 These twenty years I have been with thee; thy ewes and thy she goats have not aborted their young, and I have not eaten the rams of thy flock.
39 That which was torn of beasts I did not bring unto thee; I bore the sin; thou didst require of my hand that which was stolen, whether by day or by night.
40 By day the drought consumed me, and by night, the frost; and my sleep departed from mine eyes.
41 Thus have I been twenty years in thy house; I served thee fourteen years for thy two daughters and six years for thy flock; and thou hast changed my wages ten times.
42 If the God of my father, the God of Abraham, and the fear of Isaac, were not with me, surely thou would send me away now empty. God has seen my affliction and the work of my hands and rebuked thee last night.
43 ¶ And Laban answered and said unto Jacob, These daughters are my daughters, and these sons are my sons, and these sheep are my sheep, and all that thou seest is mine; and what can I do this day unto these my daughters, or unto their sons unto whom they have given birth?
44 Now therefore come thou, let us make a covenant, I and thou, and let it be for a witness between me and thee.
45 Then Jacob took a stone and set it up for a pillar.
46 And Jacob said unto his brethren, Gather stones; and they took stones and made a heap; and they ate there upon the heap.
47 And Laban called it Jegarsahadutha, but Jacob called it Galeed.
48 And Laban said, This heap is a witness between me and thee this day. Therefore was the name of it called Galeed;
49 and Mizpah; for he said, The LORD watch between me and thee when we are absent one from another.
50 If thou shalt afflict my daughters, or if thou shalt take other wives beside my daughters, no man is with us; see, God is witness between me and thee.
12 ¶ I write unto you, little children, that your sins are forgiven you for his name’s sake.
13 I write unto you, fathers, that ye have known him that is from the beginning. I write unto you, young men, that ye have overcome the wicked one. I write unto you, little children, that ye have known the Father.
14 I have written unto you, fathers, that ye have known him that is from the beginning. I have written unto you, young men, that ye are strong and the word of God abides in you, and ye have overcome the wicked one.
15 Love not the world neither the things that are in the world. If anyone loves the world, the charity of the Father is not in him.
16 For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.
17 And the world passes away and the lust thereof, but he that does the will of God abides for ever.
10 ¶ Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that enters not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbs up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber.
2 But he that enters in by the door is the shepherd of the sheep.
3 To him the porter opens, and the sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.
4 And when he puts forth his own sheep, he goes before them; and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice.
5 And they will not follow a stranger, but will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers.
6 Jesus spoke this parable unto them, but they did not understand what it was that he spoke unto them.
7 Then said Jesus unto them again, Verily, verily, I say unto you, I AM the door of the sheep.
8 All that ever came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not hear them.
9 I AM the door; whosoever enters in by me shall be saved and shall go in and out and find pasture.
10 The thief comes not but for to steal and to kill and to destroy the sheep; I am come that they might have life and that they might have it in abundance.
11 I AM the good shepherd; the good shepherd gives his life for the sheep.
12 But the hireling, who is not a shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees; and the wolf catches them and scatters the sheep.
13 The hireling flees because he is a hireling, and the sheep do not belong to him.
14 I AM the good shepherd, and know my sheep and am known of mine.
15 As the Father knows me, even so I know the Father, and I lay down my soul for the sheep.
16 And I have other sheep which are not of this fold; it is expedient that I bring them also, and they shall hear my voice, and there shall be one fold and one shepherd.
17 Therefore does my Father love me, because I lay down my soul that I might take it again.
18 No man takes it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment I have received of my Father.
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