Book of Common Prayer

To the Overcomer, A Psalm of David.

¹ ¶ Blessed is he that understands regarding the poor; the LORD will deliver him in the day of evil.

² The LORD will preserve him and keep him alive, and he shall be blessed upon the earth, and thou wilt not deliver him unto the will of his enemies.

³ The LORD will strengthen him upon the bed of languishing; thou wilt soften all his bed in his sickness.

⁴ I said, LORD, be merciful unto me; heal my soul; for I have sinned against thee.

⁵ ¶ My enemies speak evil of me, When shall he die and his name perish?

⁶ And if he came to see me, he spoke lies: his heart gathered iniquity to itself, and when he goes out, he tells it.

⁷ All that hate me congregate together and murmur against me; against me do they devise my hurt.

⁸ A disease of Belial, they say, cleaves fast unto him, and now that he lies he shall rise up no more.

⁹ Even the man of my peace, in whom I trusted, who ate of my bread, has lifted up his heel against me.

¹⁰ But thou, O LORD, be merciful unto me and raise me up that I may requite them.

¹¹ In this I shall know that I have pleased thee, that my enemy does not triumph over me.

¹² And as for me, thou sustained me in my integrity and hast seated me before thy face for ever.

¹³ Blessed be the LORD God of Israel from everlasting and to everlasting. Amen, and Amen.

To the Overcomer, Maschil, A Psalm of David, when Doeg the Edomite came and told Saul, and said unto him, David is come to the house of Ahimelech.

¹ ¶ Why dost thou boast of evil, O strong man? The mercy of God is day by day.

² Thy tongue devises wickedness like a sharp razor, working deceitfully.

³ Thou dost love evil more than good; and lying rather than to speak righteousness. Selah.

⁴ Thou dost love all devouring words, O thou deceitful tongue.

⁵ God shall likewise cast thee down for ever; he shall cut thee off and pluck thee out of thy dwelling place and root thee out of the land of the living. Selah.

⁶ ¶ The righteous also shall see and fear and shall laugh at him, saying:

⁷ Behold, this is the man that did not make God his strength, but trusted in the abundance of his riches and strengthened himself in his wickedness.

⁸ But I am like a green olive tree in the house of God; I trust in the eternal mercy of God for ever.

⁹ I will praise thee for ever because thou hast done it, and I will wait on thy name, for it is good before thy merciful ones.

To the Overcomer for the sons of Korah, Maschil.

¹ ¶ We have heard with our ears, O God, our fathers have told us, what work thou didst in their days in the times of old.

² How thou didst drive out the Gentiles with thy hand and plant them in their place; how thou didst afflict the peoples and cast them out.

³ For they did not get the land in inheritance by their own sword, neither did their own arm save them, but thy right hand and thine arm, and the light of thy countenance because thy delight was in them.

⁴ Thou art my King, O God; command saving health unto Jacob.

⁵ Through thee will we push down our enemies; through thy name will we tread under those that rise up against us.

⁶ For I will not trust in my bow, neither shall my sword save me.

⁷ But thou hast saved us from our enemies and hast put to shame those that hated us.

⁸ In God we boast all the day long and praise thy name for ever. Selah.

⁹ ¶ But thou hast cast us off and put us to shame and doth not go forth with our armies.

¹⁰ Thou makest us to turn back from the enemy, and we are spoiled by those who hate us.

¹¹ Thou hast given us over like sheep appointed for food and hast scattered us among the Gentiles.

¹² Thou hast sold thy people for nothing and dost not increase thy wealth by their price.

¹³ Thou makest us a reproach to our neighbours, a scorn and a derision to those that are round about us.

¹⁴ Thou makest us a byword among the Gentiles, a shaking of the head among the people.

¹⁵ My confusion is continually before me, and the shame of my face has covered me,

¹⁶ for the voice of him that reproaches and blasphemes by reason of the enemy and of the avenger.

¹⁷ ¶ All this is come upon us; yet we have not forgotten thee, neither have we dealt falsely in thy covenant.

¹⁸ Our heart is not turned back, neither have our steps declined from thy way

¹⁹ though thou hast sore broken us in the place of dragons and covered us with the shadow of death.

²⁰ If we have forgotten the name of our God or stretched out our hands to a strange god,

²¹ shall not God search this out? For he knows the secrets of the heart.

²² Yea, for thy sake are we killed all the day long; we are counted as sheep for the slaughter.

²³ Awake, why sleepest thou, O Lord? Arise, do not cast us off for ever.

²⁴ Why dost thou hide thy face and forget our affliction and our oppression?

²⁵ For our soul is bowed down to the dust; our belly cleaves unto the earth.

²⁶ Arise for our help and ransom us for thy mercies’ sake.

¹³ And it shall come to pass, if ye shall hearken diligently unto my commandments which I command you this day: to love the LORD your God and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul

¹⁴ that I will give you the rain of your land in its due season, the early rain and the latter rain, and thou shalt gather in thy grain and thy wine and thine oil.

¹⁵ And I will send grass in thy fields for thy beasts, and thou shalt eat and be full.

¹⁶ Keep yourselves, therefore, that your heart not be deceived and ye turn aside and serve other gods and worship them;

¹⁷ and then the LORD’s wrath be kindled against you and he shut up the heavens, that there be no rain and that the land yield not her fruit, and lest ye perish quickly from off the good land which the LORD gives you.

¹⁸ ¶ Therefore, ye shall lay up these my words in your heart and in your soul and bind them for a sign upon your hand that they may be as frontlets between your eyes.

¹⁹ And ye shall teach them to your children that ye may think of them sitting in thy house and walking by the way, lying down in bed, and rising up.

¹¹ Therefore being certain of that terror of the Lord, we persuade men; but we are made manifest unto God, and I trust also are made manifest in your consciences.

¹² ¶ For we do not commend ourselves again unto you, but give you occasion to glory on our behalf that ye may have something to answer those who glory in appearance, and not in heart.

¹³ For whether we are fools, it is unto God; or whether we are sane, it is for your cause.

¹⁴ For the charity of the Christ constrains us because we judge thus: that if one died for all, then all are dead:

¹⁵ And that he died for all that those who live should not live from now on unto themselves, but unto him who died and rose again for them.

¹⁶ ¶ Therefore from now on we know no one according to the flesh: and even if we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know him no longer.

¹⁷ Therefore if anyone is in Christ, they are a new creation: old things are passed away; behold, all things are made new.

¹⁸ And all this by God, who reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and gave us the ministry of reconciliation;

¹⁹ for certainly God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them and having placed in us the word of reconciliation.

²⁰ Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did exhort you by us; we beseech you in Christ’s name, be ye reconciled to God.

²¹ For he has made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.

6 ¶ We then, as workers together with him, exhort you also that ye have not received the grace of God in vain.

² (For he saith, I have heard thee in an acceptable time, and in the day of saving health I have succoured thee; behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of saving health.)

17 ¶ Then he said unto the disciples, It is impossible that offenses will not come, but woe unto the one through whom they come!

² It would be better for him if a millstone turned by an ass were placed around his neck and he were cast into the sea than that he should cause one of these little ones to stumble.

³ Take heed to yourselves: If thy brother should trespass against thee, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him.

⁴ And if he trespasses against thee seven times in a day and seven times in a day turns again to thee, saying, I repent, thou shalt forgive him.

⁵ And the apostles said unto the Lord, Increase our faith.

⁶ And the Lord said, If ye had faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye might say unto this sycamore tree, Pluck thyself up by the root, and plant thyself in the sea, and it would obey you.

⁷ But which of you, having a slave plowing or feeding cattle, will say unto him by and by when he is come from the field, Go and sit down at the table?

⁸ And will not rather say unto him, Make ready wherewith I may sup and gird thyself and serve me until I have eaten and drunken, and afterward thou shalt eat and drink?

⁹ Does he thank that slave because he did the things that were commanded him? I think not.

¹⁰ So likewise ye, when ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable slaves: we have done that which was our duty to do.