Book of Common Prayer

87 ^1-2 High on his holy mountain stands Jerusalem,^[a] the city of God, the city he loves more than any other!

³ O city of God, what wondrous tales are told of you! ⁴ Nowadays when I mention among my friends the names of Egypt and Babylonia, Philistia and Tyre, or even distant Ethiopia, someone boasts that he was born in one or another of those countries. ⁵ But someday the highest honor will be to be a native of Jerusalem! For the God above all gods will personally bless this city. ⁶ When he registers her citizens, he will place a check mark beside the names of those who were born here. ⁷ And in the festivals they’ll sing, “All my heart is in Jerusalem.”

90 A prayer of Moses, the man of God.

Lord, through all the generations you have been our home! ² Before the mountains were created, before the earth was formed, you are God without beginning or end.

³ You speak, and man turns back to dust. ⁴ A thousand years are but as yesterday to you! They are like a single hour!^{[a] 5-6} We glide along the tides of time as swiftly as a racing river and vanish as quickly as a dream. We are like grass that is green in the morning but mowed down and withered before the evening shadows fall. ⁷ We die beneath your anger; we are overwhelmed by your wrath. ⁸ You spread out our sins before you—our secret sins—and see them all. ⁹ No wonder the years are long and heavy here beneath your wrath. All our days are filled with sighing.

¹⁰ Seventy years are given us! And some may even live to eighty. But even the best of these years are often empty and filled with pain; soon they disappear, and we are gone. ¹¹ Who can realize the terrors of your anger? Which of us can fear you as he should?

¹² Teach us to number our days and recognize how few they are; help us to spend them as we should.

¹³ O Jehovah, come and bless us! How long will you delay? Turn away your anger from us. ¹⁴ Satisfy us in our earliest^[b] youth with your loving-kindness, giving us constant joy to the end of our lives. ¹⁵ Give us gladness in proportion to our former misery! Replace the evil years with good. ¹⁶ Let us see your miracles again; let our children see glorious things, the kind you used to do, ¹⁷ and let the Lord our God favor us and give us success. May he give permanence to all we do.

136 Oh, give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his loving-kindness continues forever.

² Give thanks to the God of gods, for his loving-kindness continues forever. ³ Give thanks to the Lord of lords, for his loving-kindness continues forever. ⁴ Praise him who alone does mighty miracles, for his loving-kindness continues forever. ⁵ Praise him who made the heavens, for his loving-kindness continues forever. ⁶ Praise him who planted the water within the earth,^[a] for his loving-kindness continues forever. ⁷ Praise him who made the heavenly lights, for his loving-kindness continues forever: ⁸ the sun to rule the day, for his loving-kindness continues forever; ⁹ and the moon and stars at night, for his loving-kindness continues forever. ¹⁰ Praise the God who smote the firstborn of Egypt, for his loving-kindness to Israel^[b] continues forever.

^11-12 He brought them out with mighty power and upraised fist to strike their enemies, for his loving-kindness to Israel continues forever. ¹³ Praise the Lord who opened the Red Sea to make a path before them, for his loving-kindness continues forever, ¹⁴ and led them safely through, for his loving-kindness continues forever— ¹⁵ but drowned Pharaoh’s army in the sea, for his loving-kindness to Israel continues forever.

¹⁶ Praise him who led his people through the wilderness, for his loving-kindness continues forever. ¹⁷ Praise him who saved his people from the power of mighty kings, for his loving-kindness continues forever, ¹⁸ and killed famous kings who were their enemies, for his loving-kindness to Israel continues forever: ¹⁹ Sihon, king of Amorites—for God’s loving-kindness to Israel continues forever— ²⁰ and Og, king of Bashan—for his loving-kindness to Israel continues forever. ²¹ God gave the land of these kings to Israel as a gift forever, for his loving-kindness to Israel continues forever; ²² yes, a permanent gift to his servant Israel, for his loving-kindness continues forever.

²³ He remembered our utter weakness, for his loving-kindness continues forever. ²⁴ And saved us from our foes, for his loving-kindness continues forever.

²⁵ He gives food to every living thing, for his loving-kindness continues forever. ²⁶ Oh, give thanks to the God of heaven, for his loving-kindness continues forever.

⁹ Announce this far and wide: Get ready for war! Conscript your best soldiers; collect all your armies. ¹⁰ Melt your plowshares into swords, and beat your pruning hooks into spears. Let the weak be strong. ¹¹ Gather together and come, all nations everywhere. And now, O Lord, bring down your warriors!

¹² “Collect the nations; bring them to the valley of Jehoshaphat, for there I will sit to pronounce judgment on them all. ¹³ Now let the sickle do its work; the harvest is ripe and waiting. Tread the winepress, for it is full to overflowing with the wickedness of these men.”

¹⁴ Multitudes, multitudes waiting in the valley for the verdict of their doom! For the Day of the Lord is near, in the Valley of Judgment. ¹⁵ The sun and moon will be darkened and the stars withdraw their light. ¹⁶ The Lord shouts from his Temple in Jerusalem, and the earth and sky begin to shake. But to his people Israel, the Lord will be very gentle. He is their Refuge and Strength.

¹⁷ “Then you shall know at last that I am the Lord your God in Zion, my holy mountain. Jerusalem shall be mine forever; the time will come when no foreign armies will pass through her anymore.

2 Dear brothers, how can you claim that you belong to the Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, if you show favoritism to rich people and look down on poor people?

² If a man comes into your church dressed in expensive clothes and with valuable gold rings on his fingers, and at the same moment another man comes in who is poor and dressed in threadbare clothes, ³ and you make a lot of fuss over the rich man and give him the best seat in the house and say to the poor man, “You can stand over there if you like or else sit on the floor”—well, ⁴ judging a man by his wealth shows that you are guided by wrong motives.

⁵ Listen to me, dear brothers: God has chosen poor people to be rich in faith, and the Kingdom of Heaven is theirs, for that is the gift God has promised to all those who love him. ⁶ And yet, of the two strangers, you have despised the poor man. Don’t you realize that it is usually the rich men who pick on you and drag you into court? ⁷ And all too often they are the ones who laugh at Jesus Christ, whose noble name you bear.

⁸ Yes indeed, it is good when you truly obey our Lord’s command, “You must love and help your neighbors just as much as you love and take care of yourself.” ⁹ But you are breaking this law of our Lord’s when you favor the rich and fawn over them; it is sin.

¹⁰ And the person who keeps every law of God but makes one little slip is just as guilty as the person who has broken every law there is. ¹¹ For the God who said you must not marry a woman who already has a husband also said you must not murder, so even though you have not broken the marriage laws by committing adultery, but have murdered someone, you have entirely broken God’s laws and stand utterly guilty before him.

¹² You will be judged on whether or not you are doing what Christ wants you to. So watch what you do and what you think; ¹³ for there will be no mercy to those who have shown no mercy. But if you have been merciful, then God’s mercy toward you will win out over his judgment against you.

¹⁰ No! For unless you are honest in small matters, you won’t be in large ones. If you cheat even a little, you won’t be honest with greater responsibilities. ¹¹ And if you are untrustworthy about worldly wealth, who will trust you with the true riches of heaven? ¹² And if you are not faithful with other people’s money, why should you be entrusted with money of your own?

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.”