Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

144 Blessed be the LORD, my strength; Who teaches my hands to fight and my fingers to battle,

² my goodness and my fortress, my tower and my deliverer, my shield. I trust in Him Who subdues my people under me.

³ LORD, what is man that You regard him, the son of man that You think upon him?

⁴ Man is like vanity, his days like a shadow that vanishes.

⁵ Bow Your heavens, O LORD, and come down. Touch the mountains and they shall smoke.

⁶ Cast forth the lightning and scatter them. Shoot out Your arrows and consume them.

⁷ Send Your hand from above. Deliver me, and take me out of the great waters, and from the hand of strangers,

⁸ whose mouth talks vanity. And their right hand is a right hand of falsehood.

⁹ I will sing a new song to You, O God—sing to You upon a viol, an instrument of ten strings—

¹⁰ Who gives deliverance to kings, rescues David, His servant, from the hurtful sword.

¹¹ Rescue me and deliver me from the hand of strangers, whose mouth talks vanity; and their right hand is a right hand of falsehood,

¹² so that our sons may be as the plants (growing up in their youth) and our daughters as the cornerstones (sculpted in the likeness of a palace);

¹³ so that our corners may be full—abounding with diverse sorts — and that our sheep may bring forth thousands and ten thousand in our streets;

¹⁴ so that our oxen may be strong to labor; so that there is no invasion nor going out nor crying in our streets.

¹⁵ Blessed are the people who are so. Blessed are the people whose God is the LORD. A Psalm of David, of praise

¹⁰ ‘Your mother is like a vine in your blood, planted by the waters. She brought forth fruit and branches by the abundant waters,

¹¹ ‘and she had strong rods for the scepters of those who bear rule. And her stature was exalted among the branches, and she appeared in her height with the multitude of her branches.

¹² ‘But she was plucked up in wrath. She was cast down to the ground, and the East wind dried up her fruit. Her branches were broken and withered. The fire consumed the rod of her strength.

¹³ ‘And now she is planted in the wilderness, in a dry and thirsty ground.

¹⁴ ‘And fire has gone out of a rod of her branches, which has devoured her fruit, so that she has no strong rod, no ruling scepter.’” This is a lamentation and shall be a lamentation.

⁴ coming to Him as to a living stone, indeed rejected by man but chosen by God and precious.

⁵ You also, as living stones, are being built up into a spiritual house, a holy priesthood; to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.

⁶ Therefore it is also contained in the Scripture, “Behold, I put a Chief Cornerstone in Zion, elect and precious. And the one who believes in Him shall not be put to shame.”

⁷ Therefore, to you who believe, He is precious. But to those who are disobedient, “the Stone which the builders rejected, the same has become the Chief Cornerstone,”

⁸ and, “a Stone of stumbling and a Rock of offense,” to those who stumble at the Word, being disobedient. To this they were also appointed.

⁹ But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people who are a Possession; so that you would show forth the virtues of the One Who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.

¹⁰ In the past, you were not a people, yet are now the people of God, who in the past were not under mercy, but now have obtained mercy.