The Daily Audio Bible
12 Listen to me, O Jacob,
and Israel, whom I called:
I am he; I am the first,
and I am the last.(A)
13 My hand laid the foundation of the earth,
and my right hand spread out the heavens;
when I summon them,
they stand at attention.(B)
14 Assemble, all of you, and hear!
Who among them has declared these things?
The one the Lord loves shall perform his purpose against Babylon,
and his arm shall be against the Chaldeans.(C)
15 I, even I, have spoken and called him;
I have brought him, and he will prosper in his way.(D)
16 Draw near to me; hear this!
From the beginning I have not spoken in secret;
from the time it came to be I have been there.
And now the Lord God has sent me and his spirit.(E)
17 Thus says the Lord,
your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel:
I am the Lord your God,
who teaches you how to succeed,
who leads you in the way you should go.(F)
18 O that you had paid attention to my commandments!
Then your prosperity would have been like a river
and your success like the waves of the sea;(G)
19 your offspring would have been like the sand
and your descendants like its grains;
their name would never be cut off
or destroyed from before me.(H)
20 Go out from Babylon; flee from Chaldea;
declare this with a shout of joy; proclaim it;
send it forth to the end of the earth;
say, “The Lord has redeemed his servant Jacob!”(I)
21 They did not thirst when he led them through the deserts;
he made water flow for them from the rock;
he split open the rock, and the water gushed out.(J)
22 “There is no peace,” says the Lord, “for the wicked.”(K)
The Servant’s Mission
49 Listen to me, O coastlands;
pay attention, you peoples from far away!
The Lord called me before I was born;
while I was in my mother’s womb he named me.(L)
2 He made my mouth like a sharp sword;
in the shadow of his hand he hid me;
he made me a polished arrow;
in his quiver he hid me away.(M)
3 And he said to me, “You are my servant,
Israel, in whom I will be glorified.”(N)
4 But I said, “I have labored in vain;
I have spent my strength for nothing and vanity;
yet surely my cause is with the Lord
and my reward with my God.”(O)
5 And now the Lord says,
who formed me in the womb to be his servant,
to bring Jacob back to him,
and that Israel might be gathered to him,
for I am honored in the sight of the Lord,
and my God has become my strength—(P)
6 he says,
“It is too light a thing that you should be my servant
to raise up the tribes of Jacob
and to restore the survivors of Israel;
I will give you as a light to the nations,
that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.”(Q)
7 Thus says the Lord,
the Redeemer of Israel and his Holy One,
to one deeply despised, abhorred by the nations,
the slave of rulers,
“Kings shall see and stand up;
princes, and they shall prostrate themselves,
because of the Lord, who is faithful,
the Holy One of Israel, who has chosen you.”(R)
Zion’s Children to Be Brought Home
8 Thus says the Lord:
In a time of favor I have answered you;
on a day of salvation I have helped you;
I have kept you and given you
as a covenant to the people,[a]
to establish the land,
to apportion the desolate heritages,(S)
9 saying to the prisoners, “Come out,”
to those who are in darkness, “Show yourselves.”
They shall feed along the ways;
on all the bare heights[b] shall be their pasture;(T)
10 they shall not hunger or thirst,
neither scorching wind nor sun shall strike them down,
for he who has pity on them will lead them
and by springs of water will guide them.(U)
11 And I will turn all my mountains into a road,
and my highways shall be raised up.(V)
12 Look, some shall come from far away,
some from the north and from the west,
and some from the land of Syene.[c](W)
13 Sing for joy, O heavens, and exult, O earth;
break forth, O mountains, into singing!
For the Lord has comforted his people
and will have compassion on his suffering ones.(X)
14 But Zion said, “The Lord has forsaken me;
my Lord has forgotten me.”(Y)
15 Can a woman forget her nursing child
or show no compassion for the child of her womb?
Even these might forget,
yet I will not forget you.(Z)
16 See, I have inscribed you on the palms of my hands;
your walls are continually before me.(AA)
17 Your builders outdo your destroyers,[d]
and those who laid you waste go away from you.(AB)
18 Lift up your eyes all around and see;
they all gather; they come to you.
As I live, says the Lord,
you shall put all of them on like an ornament,
and like a bride you shall bind them on.(AC)
19 For your wastelands, your desolate places,
and your devastated land—
now you will be too crowded for your inhabitants,
and those who swallowed you up will be far away.(AD)
20 The children born in the time of your bereavement
will yet say in your hearing:
“The place is too crowded for me;
make room for me to settle.”(AE)
21 Then you will say in your heart,
“Who has borne me these?
I was bereaved and barren,
exiled and put away—
so who has reared these?
I was left all alone—
where, then, have these come from?”(AF)
22 Thus says the Lord God:
I will soon lift up my hand to the nations
and raise my signal to the peoples,
and they shall bring your sons in their bosom,
and your daughters shall be carried on their shoulders.(AG)
23 Kings shall be your foster fathers
and their queens your nursing mothers.
With their faces to the ground they shall bow down to you
and lick the dust of your feet.
Then you will know that I am the Lord;
those who wait for me shall not be put to shame.(AH)
24 Can the prey be taken from the mighty
or the captives of a tyrant[e] be rescued?
25 But thus says the Lord:
Even the captives of the mighty will be taken,
and the prey of the tyrant will be rescued,
for I will contend with those who contend with you,
and I will save your children.(AI)
26 I will make your oppressors eat their own flesh,
and they shall be drunk with their own blood as with wine.
Then all flesh shall know
that I am the Lord your Savior
and your Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob.(AJ)
50 Thus says the Lord:
Where is your mother’s bill of divorce
with which I dismissed her?
Or which of my creditors is it
to whom I have sold you?
No, because of your sins you were sold,
and for your transgressions your mother was dismissed.(AK)
2 Why was no one there when I came?
Why did no one answer when I called?
Is my arm powerless to redeem?
Or have I no strength to deliver?
By my rebuke I dry up the sea;
I make the rivers a desert,
so that their fish stink for lack of water
and die of thirst.[f](AL)
3 I clothe the heavens with blackness
and make sackcloth their covering.(AM)
The Servant’s Humiliation and Vindication
4 The Lord God has given me
a trained tongue,[g]
that I may know how to sustain
the weary with a word.
Morning by morning he wakens,
wakens my ear
to listen as those who are taught.(AN)
5 The Lord God has opened my ear,
and I was not rebellious;
I did not turn backward.(AO)
6 I gave my back to those who struck me
and my cheeks to those who pulled out the beard;
I did not hide my face
from insult and spitting.(AP)
7 The Lord God helps me;
therefore I have not been disgraced;
therefore I have set my face like flint,
and I know that I shall not be put to shame;(AQ)
8 he who vindicates me is near.
Who will contend with me?
Let us stand in court together.
Who are my adversaries?
Let them confront me.(AR)
9 It is the Lord God who helps me;
who will declare me guilty?
All of them will wear out like a garment;
the moth will eat them up.(AS)
10 Who among you fears the Lord
and obeys the voice of his servant,
who walks in darkness
and has no light,
yet trusts in the name of the Lord
and relies upon his God?(AT)
11 But all of you are kindlers of fire,
lighters of firebrands.[h]
Walk in the flame of your fire
and among the brands that you have kindled!
This is what you shall have from my hand:
you shall lie down in torment.(AU)
The Old Life and the New
17 Now this I affirm and insist on in the Lord: you must no longer walk as the[a] gentiles walk, in the futility of their minds;(A) 18 they are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of their ignorance and hardness of heart.(B) 19 They have lost all sensitivity and have abandoned themselves to licentiousness, greedy to practice every kind of impurity. 20 That is not the way you learned Christ! 21 For surely you have heard about him and were taught in him, as truth is in Jesus, 22 to put away your former way of life, your old self, corrupt and deluded by its lusts,(C) 23 and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, 24 and to clothe yourselves with the new self, created according to the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.(D)
Rules for the New Life
25 So then, putting away falsehood, let each of you speak the truth with your neighbor, for we are members of one another.(E) 26 Be angry but do not sin;[b] do not let the sun go down on your anger, 27 and do not make room for the devil. 28 Those who steal must give up stealing; rather, let them labor, doing good work with their own hands, so as to have something to share with the needy. 29 Let no evil talk come out of your mouths but only what is good for building up,[c] as there is need, so that your words may give grace to those who hear. 30 And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with which you were marked with a seal for the day of redemption.(F) 31 Put away from you all bitterness and wrath and anger and wrangling and slander, together with all malice.(G) 32 Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ has forgiven you.[d](H)
Psalm 69
Prayer for Deliverance from Persecution
To the leader: according to Lilies. Of David.
1 Save me, O God,
for the waters have come up to my neck.(A)
2 I sink in deep mire,
where there is no foothold;
I have come into deep waters,
and the flood sweeps over me.(B)
3 I am weary with my crying;
my throat is parched.
My eyes grow dim
with waiting for my God.(C)
4 More in number than the hairs of my head
are those who hate me without cause;
many are those who would destroy me,
my enemies who accuse me falsely.
What I did not steal,
must I now restore?(D)
5 O God, you know my folly;
the wrongs I have done are not hidden from you.(E)
6 Do not let those who hope in you be put to shame because of me,
O Lord God of hosts;
do not let those who seek you be dishonored because of me,
O God of Israel.
7 It is for your sake that I have borne reproach,
that shame has covered my face.(F)
8 I have become a stranger to my kindred,
an alien to my mother’s children.(G)
9 It is zeal for your house that has consumed me;
the insults of those who insult you have fallen on me.(H)
10 When I humbled my soul with fasting,[a]
they insulted me for doing so.(I)
11 When I made sackcloth my clothing,
I became a byword to them.(J)
12 I am the subject of gossip for those who sit in the gate,
and the drunkards make songs about me.(K)
13 But as for me, my prayer is to you, O Lord.
At an acceptable time, O God,
in the abundance of your steadfast love, answer me.
With your faithful help(L) 14 rescue me
from sinking in the mire;
let me be delivered from my enemies
and from the deep waters.(M)
15 Do not let the flood sweep over me
or the deep swallow me up
or the Pit close its mouth over me.(N)
New Revised Standard Version, Updated Edition. Copyright © 2021 National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.