Book of Common Prayer

16 Save me, O God, because I have come to you for refuge. ² I said to him, “You are my Lord; I have no other help but yours.” ³ I want the company of the godly men and women in the land; they are the true nobility. ⁴ Those choosing other gods shall all be filled with sorrow; I will not offer the sacrifices they do or even speak the names of their gods.

⁵ The Lord himself is my inheritance, my prize. He is my food and drink, my highest joy! He guards all that is mine. ⁶ He sees that I am given pleasant brooks and meadows as my share!^[a] What a wonderful inheritance! ⁷ I will bless the Lord who counsels me; he gives me wisdom in the night. He tells me what to do.

⁸ I am always thinking of the Lord; and because he is so near, I never need to stumble or fall.

⁹ Heart, body, and soul are filled with joy. ¹⁰ For you will not leave me among the dead; you will not allow your beloved one to rot in the grave. ¹¹ You have let me experience the joys of life and the exquisite pleasures of your own eternal presence.

17 I am pleading for your help, O Lord; for I have been honest and have done what is right, and you must listen to my earnest cry! ² Publicly acquit me, Lord, for you are always fair. ³ You have tested me and seen that I am good. You have come even in the night and found nothing amiss and know that I have told the truth. ⁴ I have followed your commands and have not gone along with cruel and evil men. ⁵ My feet have not slipped from your paths.

⁶ Why am I praying like this? Because I know you will answer me, O God! Yes, listen as I pray. ⁷ Show me your strong love in wonderful ways, O Savior of all those seeking your help against their foes. ⁸ Protect me as you would the pupil of your eye; hide me in the shadow of your wings as you hover over me.

⁹ My enemies encircle me with murder in their eyes. ¹⁰ They are pitiless and arrogant. Listen to their boasting. ¹¹ They close in upon me and are ready to throw me to the ground. ¹² They are like lions eager to tear me apart, like young lions hiding and waiting their chance.

^13-14 Lord, arise and stand against them. Push them back! Come and save me from these men of the world whose only concern is earthly gain—these men whom you have filled with your treasures so that their children and grandchildren are rich and prosperous.

¹⁵ But as for me, my contentment is not in wealth but in seeing you and knowing all is well between us. And when I awake in heaven, I will be fully satisfied, for I will see you face-to-face.

134 Oh, bless the Lord, you who serve him as watchmen in the Temple every night. ² Lift your hands in holiness and bless the Lord.

³ The Lord bless you from Zion—the Lord who made heaven and earth.

135 Hallelujah! ² Yes, let his people praise him as they stand in his Temple courts. ³ Praise the Lord because he is so good; sing to his wonderful name. ⁴ For the Lord has chosen Israel as his personal possession.

⁵ I know the greatness of the Lord—that he is greater far than any other god. ⁶ He does whatever pleases him throughout all of heaven and earth and in the deepest seas. ⁷ He makes mists rise throughout the earth; he sends the lightning to bring down the rain and sends the winds from his treasuries. ⁸ He destroyed the eldest child in each Egyptian home, along with the firstborn of the flocks. ⁹ He did great miracles in Egypt before Pharaoh and all his people. ¹⁰ He smote great nations, slaying mighty kings— ¹¹ Sihon, king of Amorites; and Og, the king of Bashan; and the kings of Canaan— ¹² and gave their land as an eternal gift to his people Israel.

¹³ O Jehovah, your name endures forever; your fame is known to every generation. ¹⁴ For Jehovah will vindicate his people and have compassion on his servants.

¹⁵ The heathen worship idols of gold and silver made by men— ¹⁶ idols with speechless mouths, sightless eyes, ¹⁷ and ears that cannot hear; they cannot even breathe. ¹⁸ Those who make them become like them! And so do all who trust in them!

¹⁹ O Israel, bless Jehovah! High Priests of Aaron, bless his name. ²⁰ O Levite priests, bless the Lord Jehovah! Oh, bless his name, all of you who trust and reverence him. ²¹ All people of Jerusalem, praise the Lord,^[a] for he lives here in Jerusalem. Hallelujah!

3 King Nebuchadnezzar made a gold statue ninety feet high and nine feet wide and set it up on the plain of Dura, in the province of Babylon; ² then he sent messages to all the princes, governors, captains, judges, treasurers, counselors, sheriffs, and rulers of all the provinces of his empire, to come to the dedication of his statue. ³ When they had all arrived and were standing before the monument, ⁴ a herald shouted out, “O people of all nations and languages, this is the king’s command:

⁵ “When the band^[a] strikes up, you are to fall flat on the ground to worship King Nebuchadnezzar’s gold statue; ⁶ anyone who refuses to obey will immediately be thrown into a flaming furnace.”

⁷ So when the band began to play, everyone—whatever his nation, language, or religion^[b]—fell to the ground and worshiped the statue.

⁸ But some officials went to the king and accused some of the Jews of refusing to worship!

⁹ “Your Majesty,” they said to him, ¹⁰ “you made a law that everyone must fall down and worship the gold statue when the band begins to play, ¹¹ and that anyone who refuses will be thrown into a flaming furnace. ¹² But there are some Jews out there—Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, whom you have put in charge of Babylonian affairs—who have defied you, refusing to serve your gods or to worship the gold statue you set up.”

¹³ Then Nebuchadnezzar, in a terrible rage, ordered Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego to be brought in before him.

¹⁴ “Is it true, O Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego,” he demanded, “that you are refusing to serve my gods or to worship the gold statue I set up? ¹⁵ I’ll give you one more chance. When the music plays, if you fall down and worship the statue, all will be well. But if you refuse, you will be thrown into a flaming furnace within the hour. And what god can deliver you out of my hands then?”

¹⁶ Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego replied, “O Nebuchadnezzar, we are not worried about what will happen to us. ¹⁷ If we are thrown into the flaming furnace, our God is able to deliver us; and he will deliver us out of your hand, Your Majesty. ¹⁸ But if he doesn’t, please understand, sir, that even then we will never under any circumstance serve your gods or worship the gold statue you have erected.”

3 See how very much our heavenly Father loves us, for he allows us to be called his children—think of it—and we really are! But since most people don’t know God, naturally they don’t understand that we are his children. ² Yes, dear friends, we are already God’s children, right now, and we can’t even imagine what it is going to be like later on. But we do know this, that when he comes we will be like him, as a result of seeing him as he really is. ³ And everyone who really believes this will try to stay pure because Christ is pure.

⁴ But those who keep on sinning are against God, for every sin is done against the will of God. ⁵ And you know that he became a man so that he could take away our sins, and that there is no sin in him, no missing of God’s will at any time in any way. ⁶ So if we stay close to him, obedient to him, we won’t be sinning either; but as for those who keep on sinning, they should realize this: They sin because they have never really known him or become his.

⁷ Oh, dear children, don’t let anyone deceive you about this: if you are constantly doing what is good, it is because you are good, even as he is. ⁸ But if you keep on sinning, it shows that you belong to Satan, who since he first began to sin has kept steadily at it. But the Son of God came to destroy these works of the devil. ⁹ The person who has been born into God’s family does not make a practice of sinning because now God’s life is in him; so he can’t keep on sinning, for this new life has been born into him and controls him—he has been born again.

¹⁰ So now we can tell who is a child of God and who belongs to Satan. Whoever is living a life of sin and doesn’t love his brother shows that he is not in God’s family;

¹⁵ Everyone was expecting the Messiah to come soon, and eager to know whether or not John was he. This was the question of the hour and was being discussed everywhere.

¹⁶ John answered the question by saying, “I baptize only with water; but someone is coming soon who has far higher authority than mine; in fact, I am not even worthy of being his slave.^[a] He will baptize you with fire—with the Holy Spirit. ¹⁷ He will separate chaff from grain, and burn up the chaff with eternal fire and store away the grain.” ¹⁸ He used many such warnings as he announced the Good News to the people.

^19-20 (But after John had publicly criticized Herod, governor of Galilee, for marrying Herodias, his brother’s wife, and for many other wrongs he had done, Herod put John in prison, thus adding this sin to all his many others.)

²¹ Then one day, after the crowds had been baptized, Jesus himself was baptized; and as he was praying, the heavens opened, ²² and the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove settled upon him, and a voice from heaven said, “You are my much loved Son, yes, my delight.”