Book of Common Prayer
The World Should Praise the Lord
148 Praise the Lord!
Praise the Lord from the skies.
Praise him high above the earth.
2 Praise him, all you angels.
Praise him, all you armies of heaven.
3 Praise him, sun and moon.
Praise him, all you shining stars.
4 Praise him, highest heavens
and you waters above the sky.
5 Let them praise the Lord,
because they were created by his command.
6 He put them in place forever and ever;
he made a law that will never change.
7 Praise the Lord from the earth,
you large sea animals and all the oceans,
8 lightning and hail, snow and mist,
and stormy winds that obey him,
9 mountains and all hills,
fruit trees and all cedars,
10 wild animals and all cattle,
crawling animals and birds,
11 kings of the earth and all nations,
princes and all rulers of the earth,
12 young men and women,
old people and children.
13 Praise the Lord,
because he alone is great.
He is more wonderful than heaven and earth.
14 God has given his people a king.
He should be praised by all who belong to him;
he should be praised by the Israelites, the people closest to his heart.
Praise the Lord!
Praise the God of Israel
149 Praise the Lord!
Sing a new song to the Lord;
sing his praise in the meeting of his people.
2 Let the Israelites be happy because of God, their Maker.
Let the people of Jerusalem rejoice because of their King.
3 They should praise him with dancing.
They should sing praises to him with tambourines and harps.
4 The Lord is pleased with his people;
he saves the humble.
5 Let those who worship him rejoice in his glory.
Let them sing for joy even in bed!
6 Let them shout his praise
with their two-edged swords in their hands.
7 They will punish the nations
and defeat the people.
8 They will put those kings in chains
and those important men in iron bands.
9 They will punish them as God has written.
God is honored by all who worship him.
Praise the Lord!
Praise the Lord with Music
150 Praise the Lord!
Praise God in his Temple;
praise him in his mighty heaven.
2 Praise him for his strength;
praise him for his greatness.
3 Praise him with trumpet blasts;
praise him with harps and lyres.
4 Praise him with tambourines and dancing;
praise him with stringed instruments and flutes.
5 Praise him with loud cymbals;
praise him with crashing cymbals.
6 Let everything that breathes praise the Lord.
Praise the Lord!
God Brought Israel from Egypt
114 When the Israelites went out of Egypt,
the people of Jacob left that foreign country.
2 Then Judah became God’s holy place;
Israel became the land he ruled.
3 The Red Sea looked and ran away;
the Jordan River turned back.
4 The mountains danced like sheep
and the hills like little lambs.
5 Sea, why did you run away?
Jordan, why did you turn back?
6 Mountains, why did you dance like sheep?
Hills, why did you dance like little lambs?
7 Earth, shake with fear before the Lord,
before the God of Jacob.
8 He turned a rock into a pool of water,
a hard rock into a spring of water.
The One True God
115 It does not belong to us, Lord.
The glory belongs to you
because of your love and loyalty.
2 Why do the nations ask,
“Where is their God?”
3 Our God is in heaven.
He does what he pleases.
4 Their idols are made of silver and gold,
the work of human hands.
5 They have mouths, but they cannot speak.
They have eyes, but they cannot see.
6 They have ears, but they cannot hear.
They have noses, but they cannot smell.
7 They have hands, but they cannot feel.
They have feet, but they cannot walk.
No sounds come from their throats.
8 People who make idols will be like them,
and so will those who trust them.
9 Family of Israel, trust the Lord;
he is your helper and your protection.
10 Family of Aaron, trust the Lord;
he is your helper and your protection.
11 You who respect the Lord should trust him;
he is your helper and your protection.
12 The Lord remembers us and will bless us.
He will bless the family of Israel;
he will bless the family of Aaron.
13 The Lord will bless those who respect him,
from the smallest to the greatest.
14 May the Lord give you success,
and may he give you and your children success.
15 May you be blessed by the Lord,
who made heaven and earth.
16 Heaven belongs to the Lord,
but he gave the earth to people.
17 Dead people do not praise the Lord;
those in the grave are silent.
18 But we will praise the Lord
now and forever.
Praise the Lord!
Israel Will Be Destroyed
6 How terrible it will be for those who have an easy life in Jerusalem,
for those who feel safe living on Mount Samaria.
You think you are the important people of the best nation in the world;
the Israelites come to you for help.
2 Go look at the city of Calneh,
and from there go to the great city Hamath;
then go down to Gath of the Philistines.
You are no better than these kingdoms.
Your land is no larger than theirs.
3 You put off the day of punishment,
but you bring near the day when you can do evil to others.
4 You lie on beds decorated with ivory
and stretch out on your couches.
You eat tender lambs
and fattened calves.
5 You make up songs on your harps,
and, like David, you compose songs on musical instruments.
6 You drink wine by the bowlful
and use the best perfumed lotions.
But you are not sad over the ruin of Israel,
7 so you will be some of the first ones taken as slaves.
Your feasting and lying around will come to an end.
8 The Lord God made this promise; the Lord God All-Powerful says:
“I hate the pride of the Israelites,
and I hate their strong buildings,
so I will let the enemy take the city
and everything in it.”
9 At that time there might be only ten people left alive in just one house, but they will also die. 10 When the relatives come to get the bodies to take them outside, one of them will call to the other and ask, “Are there any other dead bodies with you?”
That person will answer, “No.”
Then the one who asked will say, “Hush! We must not say the name of the Lord.”
11 The Lord has given the command;
the large house will be broken into pieces,
and the small house into bits.
12 Horses do not run on rocks,
and people do not plow rocks with oxen.
But you have changed fairness into poison;
you have changed what is right into a bitter taste.
13 You are happy that the town of Lo Debar was captured,
and you say, “We have taken Karnaim[a] by our own strength.”
14 The Lord God All-Powerful says,
“Israel, I will bring a nation against you
that will make your people suffer from Lebo Hamath in the north
to the valley south of the Dead Sea.”
5 This is proof that God is right in his judgment. He wants you to be counted worthy of his kingdom for which you are suffering. 6 God will do what is right. He will give trouble to those who trouble you. 7 And he will give rest to you who are troubled and to us also when the Lord Jesus appears with burning fire from heaven with his powerful angels. 8 Then he will punish those who do not know God and who do not obey the Good News about our Lord Jesus Christ. 9 Those people will be punished with a destruction that continues forever. They will be kept away from the Lord and from his great power. 10 This will happen on the day when the Lord Jesus comes to receive glory because of his holy people. And all the people who have believed will be amazed at Jesus. You will be in that group, because you believed what we told you.
11 That is why we always pray for you, asking our God to help you live the kind of life he called you to live. We pray that with his power God will help you do the good things you want and perform the works that come from your faith. 12 We pray all this so that the name of our Lord Jesus Christ will have glory in you, and you will have glory in him. That glory comes from the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.
The Birth of John
57 When it was time for Elizabeth to give birth, she had a boy. 58 Her neighbors and relatives heard how good the Lord was to her, and they rejoiced with her.
59 When the baby was eight days old, they came to circumcise him. They wanted to name him Zechariah because this was his father’s name, 60 but his mother said, “No! He will be named John.”
61 The people said to Elizabeth, “But no one in your family has this name.” 62 Then they made signs to his father to find out what he would like to name him.
63 Zechariah asked for a writing tablet and wrote, “His name is John,” and everyone was surprised. 64 Immediately Zechariah could talk again, and he began praising God. 65 All their neighbors became alarmed, and in all the mountains of Judea people continued talking about all these things. 66 The people who heard about them wondered, saying, “What will this child be?” because the Lord was with him.
Zechariah Praises God
67 Then Zechariah, John’s father, was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied:
68 “Let us praise the Lord, the God of Israel,
because he has come to help his people and has given them freedom.
The Holy Bible, New Century Version®. Copyright © 2005 by Thomas Nelson, Inc.