Readings for Lent and Easter

⁴ Those who hate me without cause
    are more than the hairs of my head.
My persecutors are mighty,
    and they want to destroy me.
        Must I be forced to return what I did not steal?
⁵ God, you know my sins,
    and my guilt is not hidden from you.
⁶ Do not let those who look up to you be ashamed
    because of me,
        Lord God of the Heavenly Armies.
Let not those who seek you be humiliated
    because of me,
        God of Israel.

⁷ I am being mocked because of you.
    Dishonor overwhelms me.
⁸ I am a stranger to my brothers,
    a foreigner to my mother’s sons.
⁹ Zeal for your house consumes me,
    and the mockeries of those who insult you fall on me.
¹⁰ I weep and fast,
    and I am mocked for it.

¹¹ When I dressed in sackcloth,
    I became an object of gossip among them.
¹² The prominent people mock me,
    composing drinking songs.