Book of Common Prayer
Psalm 41
For the worship leader. A song of David.
The first four books of Psalms end with a variation of the doxology found in verse 13: “Blessed is the Eternal, the True God of Israel. Always and Eternal. Amen and Amen.” This declaration not only provides a natural break—a seam—between the five books, but it also summarizes an essential theme of the psalms. You see, the Book of Psalms is primarily a book of praise to God for His creation, mercy, and salvation. Even when life is hard, our enemies strong, and our health poor, God can be praised for life itself and the ultimate victory to come for those who trust Him.
1 Blessed are those who consider the helpless.
The Eternal will stay near them, leading them to safety in times of bitter struggle.
2 The Eternal defends them and preserves them,
and His blessing will find them in the land He gave them.
He moves ahead to frustrate their enemies’ plans.
3 When sickness comes, the Eternal is beside them—
to comfort them on their sickbeds and restore them to health.
4 And me? I cry out to Him,
“Heal my soul, O Eternal One, and show mercy
because I have sinned against You!”
5 My enemies are talking about me even now:
“When will death come for him and his name be forgotten?”
6 As they sit with me under my roof, their well wishes are empty lies.
They listen to my story
and then turn it around to tell their own version on the street.
7 Across the city, crowds whisper lies about me.
Their hate is strong, and they search for ways to harm me.
8 Some are saying: “Some vile disease has gotten hold of him.
The bed he lies in will be his deathbed.”
9 Even my best friend, my confidant
who has eaten my bread will stab me in the back.[a]
10 But You, Eternal One, show mercy to me.
Extend Your gracious hand, and help me up.
I need to pay them back for what they’ve done to me.
11 I realize now that Your favor has come to me,
for my enemies have yet to declare victory over me.
12 You know and uphold me—a man of honor.
You grant me strength and life forever in Your presence.
13 Blessed is the Eternal, the True God of Israel.
Always and Eternal. Amen and Amen.
Psalm 52
For the worship leader. A contemplative song[a] of David when the Edomite Doeg told Saul that David had received help from Ahimelech.
Psalm 52 recalls the callous way Doeg and Saul put to death the 85 priests of Nob (1 Samuel 22:6–19). The psalm ends with a memorable image: the one who keeps faith with God is like a lush olive tree cared for in His garden. While those who do not trust in Him are snatched up and torn away, those who do right will flourish under His care.
1 Why do you boast of all the trouble you stir up, O mighty one,
when the constant, unfailing love of God is what truly lasts?
2 Have you listened to yourself?
Your tongue is like a sharp razor,
full of lies that slash and tear right to the soul.
3 You’ve fallen in love with evil and have no interest in what He calls good.
You prefer your own lies to speaking what is true.
[pause][b]
4 You love words that destroy people, don’t you,
lying tongue?
5 You won’t be smiling
when the True God brings His justice and destroys you forever.
He will come into your home, snatch you away,
and pull you from the land of the living.
[pause]
6 Those who are just will see what happens to you and be afraid.
And some of them will laugh and say,
7 “Hey, look! Over there is the one who didn’t take
shelter in the True God;
Instead, he trusted in his great wealth
and got what he wanted by destroying others!”
8 But my life is abundant—like a lush olive tree
cared for at the house of the one True God.
I put my trust in His kind love
forever and ever; it will never fail.
9 Because of all You have done,
I will humble myself and thank You forever.
With Your faithful people at my side,
I will put my hope in Your good reputation.
Psalm 44
For the worship leader. A contemplative song[a] of the sons of Korah.
1 With our own ears, O God, we have heard the stories
our ancestors recited of Your deeds in their days, days long past—
how You saved the day.
2 With a powerful hand, You drove the nations from this land,
but then You planted our parents here.
You fought for us against people of this land;
You set our parents free to enjoy its goodness.
3 They did not win the land with their swords.
It wasn’t their strength that won them victory.
It was Your strength—Your right hand, Your arm,
and the light of Your presence that gave them success,
for You loved them.
4 You are my King, my God!
You ordained victories for Jacob and his people!
5 You are our victory, pushing back the enemy;
at the sound of Your name, we crush the opposition.
6 I don’t trust in my weapons
or in my strength to win me victory.
7 But You rescue us from our foes;
You shame our enemies.
8 We shout Your name all day long;
we will praise Your name forever!
[pause][b]
9 But wait, God, where have You gone? Why have You shamed us?
Why do our armies stand alone?
10 Without Your help we must retreat from our enemy,
and the very ones who despise us pillage us.
11 You have offered us up to our enemies,
like sheep to the slaughter, meat for their feast,
and You have dispersed us among the nations.
12 You sold Your people for mere pennies,
and You gained nothing from the deal.
13 You have made us a joke to our friends and neighbors,
mocked and ridiculed by all those around us.
14 You have brought us infamy among the nations
and made us an object of scorn and laughter to our neighbors.
15 Disgrace follows me everywhere I go; I am constantly embarrassed.
Shame is written across my face
16 Because of the taunting and berating of those who are against me,
because the enemy seeks revenge against me.
17 All this has happened to us,
yet we have never forgotten You;
we have not broken Your covenant with us.
18 Our hearts stayed true to You;
we have never left Your path;
we follow on.
19 Yet You have tested us, left us defeated in a land of jackals,
and shrouded us with the veil of death.
20 Even if we had forgotten the name of our God
or offered praise to another god,
21 Would not the True God have known it?
For He can see the hidden places of our hearts.
22 On Your behalf, our lives are endangered constantly;
we are like sheep awaiting slaughter.[c]
23 Wake up, Lord! Why do You slumber?
Get up! Do not reject us any longer!
24 Why are You still hiding from us?
Why are You still ignoring our suffering and trouble?
25 Look and You will see our souls now dwell in the dust;
our bodies hug the earth.
26 Rise up and help us;
restore us for the sake of Your boundless love.
48 Listen closely, you descendants of Jacob who are called Israel!
Hear this, you who trace your ancestors back to Judah,
Who take oaths in the name of the Eternal, and call on the God of Israel,
but do so dishonestly and inappropriately:
2 Your identity is wrapped up in the holy city,
and you claim to rely on the God of Israel,
The One who is called the Eternal, Commander of heavenly armies.
3 Eternal One: In times long past, I determined
and announced the things that would come.
Then suddenly I acted, and they indeed happened.
4 Long ago, I figured that you’d resist
(after all, you are a hard-headed and stubborn lot).
5 Way back then, I told you what would happen so that you wouldn’t claim
that some other god was responsible—that some figurine you crafted
From wood and molded metal commanded and accomplished it.
6 You’ve heard what I foretold; now you’ve seen what has happened—
do you agree that I’m God?
Well, from this moment, I am telling you new things,
secrets hidden that no one has known.
7 They are created now—brand new, never before announced, never before heard.
So you can’t claim, “Look, I already knew them.”
8 There’s no way you could have heard or known
because, even from long ago, you have never listened.
For I’ve always known that you are a conniving lot;
you’ve been a troublesome rebel from birth.
9 On account of My reputation, I hold back my anger;
for My own weighty grandeur, I am patient with you,
So that I don’t make an absolute break with you.
10 I have refined you, but not in the way silver is refined.
Instead, I try you in the furnace of suffering.
For God, suffering is not an end in itself. God uses suffering and hardship to purge the bad and foster the good in His covenant people.
11 But it is all on account of Me, not of you, that I act,
that I retain honor, that My glory is Mine alone, and not sullied.
1 Paul, an emissary[a] commissioned directly by Jesus the Anointed One and God the Father (who raised Him from the dead)—not (as some claim) an agent of men or any person— 2 and all the brothers and sisters with me to you, the churches of Galatia.
3 May the grace and peace of God the Father and the Lord Jesus the Anointed live in you; 4 He is the very Savior who rescues us from this present, perverse age dominated by evil by giving His life according to our Father’s will to deal with our sins. 5 May God’s glorious name forever receive honor. Amen.
From the opening address, it is clear that Paul is angry with what is going on among the churches of Galatia. He feels compelled to defend himself from opponents who are attacking his call as Jesus’ emissary. Paul counters the attack by distancing himself from any human institution: he was not called by any church or committee. God the Father and the Lord Jesus commissioned Paul directly to be the emissary to the nations.
6 Frankly I am stunned. I cannot believe that you have abandoned God so quickly—even after He called you through the grace of the Anointed One—and have fallen for a different gospel. 7 Actually there is only one true gospel of the Anointed, and you—because of divisive prodding by others—are accepting a distorted version which is not the gospel at all!
People are being deceived with an imitation of the true gospel, and they have bought into it. The words are nothing but twisted lies.
8 No matter the source of the false gospel, even if it is preached by us or a heavenly messenger, ignore it. May those who add to or subtract from the gospel of Jesus be eternally cursed! 9 Listen again: if anyone preaches to you a gospel other than what you have accepted, may he find himself cursed!
10 Do you think I care about the approval of men or about the approval of God? Do you think I am on a mission to please people? If I am still spinning my wheels trying to please men, then there is no way I can be a servant of the Anointed One, the Liberating King.
11 Know this, dear brothers and sisters: the good news I brought to you isn’t the latest in fiction or the product of some creative mind. 12 It is not a legend I learned or one that has been passed down from person to person, ear to ear. I was gifted with this message as Jesus the Anointed revealed Himself miraculously to me. 13 Surely you are familiar with my personal history, with my dedication to the teachings and traditions of Judaism. I persecuted the church of God—in fact, I meant to destroy it. 14 I excelled in the teachings of Judaism far above other Jewish leaders, and I was zealous to practice the ways of our ancestors. 15 But God—who set me apart even before birth and called me by His grace—chose, to His great delight, 16 to reveal His Son in me so I could tell His story among the outsider nations. I didn’t confer with anyone right away, 17 nor did I go to those who were already emissaries[b] in Jerusalem. I went straight to Arabia and later returned to Damascus.
This is the only time in the Gospels when Jesus seems to listen to the pleading of a demon or a demon-possessed person. The demons immediately acknowledge Jesus as all-powerful; the possessed man’s first reaction on seeing Jesus is to fall at His feet and call Him the “Son of the Most High.” Although we can’t know why Jesus listens to their pleading, the effect is clear: the people in that region see firsthand the power of evil and its ultimate destiny, namely, destruction.
Instead of being pleased that they are now free from the terror of the demon-possessed man, the people in the town ask Jesus to leave. After all, the local economy takes a pretty big hit when 2,000 of their choicest pigs rush into the sea.
21 After Jesus returned across the sea, a large crowd quickly found Him, so He stayed by the sea. 22 One of the leaders of the synagogue—a man named Jairus—came and fell at Jesus’ feet, 23 begging Him to heal his daughter.
Jairus: My daughter is dying, and she’s only 12 years old. Please come to my house. Just place Your hands on her. I know that if You do, she will live.
24 Jesus began traveling with Jairus toward his home.
In the crowd pressing around Jesus, 25 there was a woman who had suffered continuous bleeding for 12 years, bleeding that made her ritually unclean and an outcast according to the purity laws. 26 She had suffered greatly; and although she spent all her money on her medical care, she had only gotten worse. 27 She had heard of this Miracle-Man, Jesus, so she snuck up behind Him in the crowd and reached out her hand to touch His cloak.
Woman (to herself): 28 Even if all I touch are His clothes, I know I will be healed.
29 As soon as her fingers brushed His cloak, the bleeding stopped. She could feel that she was whole again.
30 Lots of people were pressed against Jesus at that moment, but He immediately felt her touch; He felt healing power flow out of Him.
He stopped. Everyone stopped. He looked around.
Jesus: Who just touched My robe?
31 His disciples broke the uneasy silence.
Disciples: Jesus, the crowd is so thick that everyone is touching You. Why do You ask, “Who touched Me?”
32 But Jesus waited. His gaze swept across the crowd to see who had done it. 33 At last, the woman—knowing He was talking about her—pushed forward and dropped to her knees. She was shaking with fear and amazement.
Woman: I touched You.
Then she told Him the reason why. 34 Jesus listened to her story.
Jesus: Daughter, you are well because you dared to believe. Go in peace, and stay well.
Jesus occasionally instigates His own miracles: He goes up to someone, such as a paralyzed man, and offers to heal him. More often, as in the case of Jairus’s daughter, people come to Jesus and ask for healings. But the woman in this story is unique because she receives her healing without asking for it—simply by touching Jesus in faith. He is surrounded by crowds pressing in on every side, but Jesus feels that one person’s touch is different, in a way that only He can perceive: one woman is touching Him deliberately, in hope and faith, knowing He has the power to heal her.
35 While He was speaking, some members of Jairus’s household pushed through the crowd.
Jairus’s Servants (to Jairus): Your daughter is dead. There’s no need to drag the Teacher any farther.
36 Jesus overheard their words. Then He turned to look at Jairus.
Jesus: It’s all right. Don’t be afraid; just believe.
37-38 Jesus asked everyone but Peter, James, and John (James’s brother) to remain outside when they reached Jairus’s home. Inside the synagogue leader’s house, the mourning had already begun; the weeping and wailing carried out into the street.
39 Jesus and His three disciples went inside.
Jesus: Why are you making all this sorrowful noise? The child isn’t dead. She’s just sleeping.
40 The mourners laughed a horrible, bitter laugh and went back to their wailing. Jesus cleared the house so that only His three disciples, Jairus, and Jairus’s wife were left inside with Him. They all went to where the child lay. 41 Then He took the child’s hand.
Jesus: Little girl, it’s time to wake up.
42 Immediately the 12-year-old girl opened her eyes, arose, and began to walk. Her parents could not believe their eyes.
Jesus (to the parents): 43 Don’t tell anybody what you’ve just seen. Why don’t you give her something to eat? I know she is hungry.
The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.