Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

87 A canticle of a psalm for the sons of Core: unto the end, for Maheleth, to answer understanding of Eman the Ezrahite.

² O Lord, the God of my salvation: I have cried in the day, and in the night before thee.

³ Let my prayer come in before thee: incline thy ear to my petition.

⁴ For my soul is filled with evils: and my life hath drawn nigh to hell.

⁵ I am counted among them that go down to the pit: I am become as a man without help,

⁶ Free among the dead. Like the slain sleeping in the sepulchres, whom thou rememberest no more: and they are cast off from thy hand.

⁷ They have laid me in the lower pit: in the dark places, and in the shadow of death.

⁸ Thy wrath is strong over me: and all thy waves thou hast brought in upon me.

⁹ Thou hast put away my acquaintance far from me: they have set me an abomination to themselves. I was delivered up, and came not forth:

¹⁰ My eyes languished through poverty. All the day I cried to thee, O Lord: I stretched out my hands to thee.

¹¹ Wilt thou shew wonders to the dead? or shall physicians raise to life, and give praise to thee?

¹² Shall any one in the sepulchre declare thy mercy: and thy truth in destruction?

¹³ Shall thy wonders be known in the dark; and thy justice in the land of forgetfulness?

¹⁴ But I, O Lord, have cried to thee: and in the morning my prayer shall prevent thee.

¹⁵ Lord, why castest thou off my prayer: why turnest thou away thy face from me?

¹⁶ I am poor, and in labours from my youth: and being exalted have been humbled and troubled.

¹⁷ Thy wrath hath come upon me: and thy terrors have troubled me.

¹⁸ They have come round about me like water all the day: they have compassed me about together.

¹⁹ Friend and neighbour thou hast put far from me: and my acquaintance, because of misery.

3 For behold in those days, and in that time when I shall bring back the captivity of Juda and Jerusalem:

² I will gather together all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Josaphat: and I will plead with them there for my people, and for my inheritance Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations, and have parted my land.

³ And they have cast lots upon my people: and the boy they have put in the stews, and the girl they have sold for wine, that they might drink.

⁴ But what have you to do with me, O Tyre, and Sidon, and all the coast of the Philistines? will you revenge yourselves on me? and if you revenge yourselves on me, I will very soon return you a recompense upon your own head.

⁵ For you have taken away my silver and my gold: and my desirable and most beautiful things you have carried into your temples.

⁶ And the children of Juda, and the children of Jerusalem you have sold to the children of the Greeks, that you might remove them far off from their own country.

⁷ Behold, I will raise them up out of the place wherein you have sold them: and I will return your recompense upon your own heads.

⁸ And I will sell your sons, and your daughters by the hands of the children of Juda, and they shall sell them to the Sabeans, a nation far off, for the Lord hath spoken it.

¹² Dearly beloved, think not strange the burning heat which is to try you, as if some new thing happened to you;

¹³ But if you partake of the sufferings of Christ, rejoice that when his glory shall be revealed, you may also be glad with exceeding joy.

¹⁴ If you be reproached for the name of Christ, you shall be blessed: for that which is of the honour, glory, and power of God, and that which is his Spirit, resteth upon you.

¹⁵ But let none of you suffer as a murderer, or a thief, or a railer, or a coveter of other men's things.

¹⁶ But if as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in that name.

¹⁷ For the time is, that judgment should begin at the house of God. And if first at us, what shall be the end of them that believe not the gospel of God?

¹⁸ And if the just man shall scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?

¹⁹ Wherefore let them also that suffer according to the will of God, commend their souls in good deeds to the faithful Creator.