Book of Common Prayer
33 He changed rivers into a desert
and springs of water into dry ground.
34 He made fertile land salty,
because the people there did evil.
35 He changed the desert into pools of water
and dry ground into springs of water.
36 He had the hungry settle there
so they could build a city in which to live.
37 They planted seeds in the fields and vineyards,
and they had a good harvest.
38 God blessed them, and they grew in number.
Their cattle did not become fewer.
39 Because of disaster, troubles, and sadness,
their families grew smaller and weaker.
40 He showed he was displeased with their leaders
and made them wander in a pathless desert.
41 But he lifted the poor out of their suffering
and made their families grow like flocks of sheep.
42 Good people see this and are happy,
but the wicked say nothing.
43 Whoever is wise will remember these things
and will think about the love of the Lord.
A Prayer for Victory
A song. A psalm of David.
108 God, my heart is steady.
I will sing and praise you with all my being.
2 Wake up, harp and lyre!
I will wake up the dawn.
3 Lord, I will praise you among the nations;
I will sing songs of praise about you to all the nations.
4 Your great love reaches to the skies,
your truth to the heavens.
5 God, you are supreme above the skies.
Let your glory be over all the earth.
6 Answer us and save us by your power
so the people you love will be rescued.
7 God has said from his Temple,
“When I win, I will divide Shechem
and measure off the Valley of Succoth.
8 Gilead and Manasseh are mine.
Ephraim is like my helmet.
Judah holds my royal scepter.
9 Moab is like my washbowl.
I throw my sandals at Edom.
I shout at Philistia.”
10 Who will bring me to the strong, walled city?
Who will lead me to Edom?
11 God, surely you have rejected us;
you do not go out with our armies.
12 Help us fight the enemy.
Human help is useless,
13 but we can win with God’s help.
He will defeat our enemies.
Praise God Who Creates and Saves
33 Sing to the Lord, you who do what is right;
honest people should praise him.
2 Praise the Lord on the harp;
make music for him on a ten-stringed lyre.
3 Sing a new song to him;
play well and joyfully.
4 God’s word is true,
and everything he does is right.
5 He loves what is right and fair;
the Lord’s love fills the earth.
6 The sky was made at the Lord’s command.
By the breath from his mouth, he made all the stars.
7 He gathered the water of the sea into a heap.
He made the great ocean stay in its place.
8 All the earth should worship the Lord;
the whole world should fear him.
9 He spoke, and it happened.
He commanded, and it appeared.
10 The Lord upsets the plans of nations;
he ruins all their plans.
11 But the Lord’s plans will stand forever;
his ideas will last from now on.
12 Happy is the nation whose God is the Lord,
the people he chose for his very own.
13 The Lord looks down from heaven
and sees every person.
14 From his throne he watches
all who live on earth.
15 He made their hearts
and understands everything they do.
16 No king is saved by his great army.
No warrior escapes by his great strength.
17 Horses can’t bring victory;
they can’t save by their strength.
18 But the Lord looks after those who fear him,
those who put their hope in his love.
19 He saves them from death
and spares their lives in times of hunger.
20 So our hope is in the Lord.
He is our help, our shield to protect us.
21 We rejoice in him,
because we trust his holy name.
22 Lord, show your love to us
as we put our hope in you.
Samson Goes to the City of Gaza
16 One day Samson went to Gaza and saw a prostitute there. He went in to spend the night with her. 2 When the people of Gaza heard, “Samson has come here!” they surrounded the place and waited for him near the city gate all night. They whispered to each other, “When dawn comes, we will kill Samson!”
3 But Samson only stayed with the prostitute until midnight. Then he got up and took hold of the doors and the two posts of the city gate and tore them loose, along with the bar. He put them on his shoulders and carried them to the top of the hill that faces the city of Hebron.
Samson and Delilah
4 After this, Samson fell in love with a woman named Delilah, who lived in the Valley of Sorek. 5 The Philistine rulers went to Delilah and said, “Find out what makes Samson so strong. Trick him into telling you how we can overpower him and capture him and tie him up. If you do this, each one of us will give you twenty-eight pounds of silver.”
6 So Delilah said to Samson, “Tell me why you are so strong. How can someone tie you up and capture you?”
7 Samson answered, “Someone would have to tie me up with seven new bowstrings that have not been dried. Then I would be as weak as any other man.”
8 The Philistine rulers brought Delilah seven new bowstrings that had not been dried, and she tied Samson with them. 9 Some men were hiding in another room. Delilah said to him, “Samson, the Philistines are here!” But Samson broke the bowstrings like pieces of burned string. So the Philistines did not find out the secret of Samson’s strength.
10 Then Delilah said to Samson, “You made a fool of me. You lied to me. Now tell me how someone can tie you up.”
11 Samson said, “They would have to tie me with new ropes that have not been used before. Then I would become as weak as any other man.”
12 So Delilah took new ropes and tied Samson. Some men were hiding in another room. She called out to him, “Samson, the Philistines are here!” But he broke the ropes as easily as if they were threads.
13 Then Delilah said to Samson, “Again you have made a fool of me. You lied to me. Tell me how someone can tie you up.”
He said, “Using the loom,[a] weave the seven braids of my hair into the cloth, and tighten it with a pin. Then I will be as weak as any other man.”
While Samson slept, Delilah wove the seven braids of his hair into the cloth. 14 Then she fastened it with a pin.
Again she said to him, “Samson, the Philistines are here!” Samson woke up and pulled out the pin and the loom with the cloth.
30 “Forty years later an angel appeared to Moses in the flames of a burning bush as he was in the desert near Mount Sinai. 31 When Moses saw this, he was amazed and went near to look closer. Moses heard the Lord’s voice say, 32 ‘I am the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.’[a] Moses began to shake with fear and was afraid to look. 33 The Lord said to him, ‘Take off your sandals, because you are standing on holy ground. 34 I have seen the troubles my people have suffered in Egypt. I have heard their cries and have come down to save them. And now, Moses, I am sending you back to Egypt.’[b]
35 “This Moses was the same man the two men of Israel rejected, saying, ‘Who made you a ruler and judge?’[c] Moses is the same man God sent to be a ruler and savior, with the help of the angel that Moses saw in the burning bush. 36 So Moses led the people out of Egypt. He worked miracles and signs in Egypt, at the Red Sea, and then in the desert for forty years. 37 This is the same Moses that said to the people of Israel, ‘God will give you a prophet like me, who is one of your own people.’[d] 38 This is the Moses who was with the gathering of the Israelites in the desert. He was with the angel that spoke to him at Mount Sinai, and he was with our ancestors. He received commands from God that give life, and he gave those commands to us.
39 “But our ancestors did not want to obey Moses. They rejected him and wanted to go back to Egypt. 40 They said to Aaron, ‘Make us gods who will lead us. Moses led us out of Egypt, but we don’t know what has happened to him.’[e] 41 So the people made an idol that looked like a calf. Then they brought sacrifices to it and were proud of what they had made with their own hands. 42 But God turned against them and did not try to stop them from worshiping the sun, moon, and stars. This is what is written in the book of the prophets: God says,
‘People of Israel, you did not bring me sacrifices and offerings
while you traveled in the desert for forty years.
43 You have carried with you
the tent to worship Molech
and the idols of the star god Rephan that you made to worship.
So I will send you away beyond Babylon.’ Amos 5:25–27
Jesus Heals a Man at a Pool
5 Later Jesus went to Jerusalem for a special feast. 2 In Jerusalem there is a pool with five covered porches, which is called Bethesda[a] in the Hebrew language.[b] This pool is near the Sheep Gate. 3 Many sick people were lying on the porches beside the pool. Some were blind, some were crippled, and some were paralyzed [, and they waited for the water to move. 4 Sometimes an angel of the Lord came down to the pool and stirred up the water. After the angel did this, the first person to go into the pool was healed from any sickness he had].[c] 5 A man was lying there who had been sick for thirty-eight years. 6 When Jesus saw the man and knew that he had been sick for such a long time, Jesus asked him, “Do you want to be well?”
7 The sick man answered, “Sir, there is no one to help me get into the pool when the water starts moving. While I am coming to the water, someone else always gets in before me.”
8 Then Jesus said, “Stand up. Pick up your mat and walk.” 9 And immediately the man was well; he picked up his mat and began to walk.
The day this happened was a Sabbath day. 10 So the Jews said to the man who had been healed, “Today is the Sabbath. It is against our law for you to carry your mat on the Sabbath day.”
11 But he answered, “The man who made me well told me, ‘Pick up your mat and walk.’ ”
12 Then they asked him, “Who is the man who told you to pick up your mat and walk?”
13 But the man who had been healed did not know who it was, because there were many people in that place, and Jesus had left.
14 Later, Jesus found the man at the Temple and said to him, “See, you are well now. Stop sinning so that something worse does not happen to you.”
15 Then the man left and told his people that Jesus was the one who had made him well.
16 Because Jesus was doing this on the Sabbath day, some evil people began to persecute him. 17 But Jesus said to them, “My Father never stops working, and so I keep working, too.”
18 This made them try still harder to kill him. They said, “First Jesus was breaking the law about the Sabbath day. Now he says that God is his own Father, making himself equal with God!”
The Holy Bible, New Century Version®. Copyright © 2005 by Thomas Nelson, Inc.