Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

To the Overcomer, A Psalm of David.

¹ ¶ O LORD, thou hast searched me and known me.

² Thou knowest my sitting down and my rising up, thou dost understand my thoughts from afar.

³ Thou hast girded my walk and my rest, and hast prepared all my ways.

⁴ For the word is not even upon my tongue, and, behold, O LORD, thou dost know it altogether.

⁵ Thou hast formed my face and my insides and laid thine hand upon me.

⁶ Thy knowledge is wonderful beyond my ability to comprehend; it is high, I cannot understand it.

¹³ For thou hast possessed my kidneys: thou hast covered me in my mother’s womb.

¹⁴ I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; marvellous are thy works, and that, my soul knows right well.

¹⁵ My body was not hid from thee, even though I was made in secret and brought together in the lowest parts of the earth.

¹⁶ Thine eyes did see my substance yet being imperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which were then formed, without lacking one of them.

¹⁷ ¶ Therefore, how precious are thy thoughts unto me, O God! How great is the sum of them!

¹⁸ If I should count them, they are more in number than the sand; when I awake, I am still with thee.

¹⁰ ¶ Woe is me, my mother, that thou hast borne me a man of strife and a man of contention to the whole earth! I have neither lent on usury, nor men have lent to me on usury; yet every one of them curses me.

¹¹ The LORD said, Verily it shall be well with thy remnant; verily I will cause the enemy to entreat thee well in the time of evil and in the time of affliction.

¹² Shall iron break the iron from the place of the north wind and the bronze?

¹³ Thy riches and thy treasures I will give to the spoil without price, and that for all thy sins, even in all thy borders.

¹⁴ And I will make thee to serve thine enemies in a land which thou dost not know; for a fire is kindled in my anger, which shall burn upon you.

¹⁵ ¶ O LORD, thou knowest: remember me and visit me and revenge me of my enemies; do not take me away in the prolongation of thy anger, know that for thy sake I have suffered rebuke.

¹⁶ Thy words were found, and I ate them; and thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of my heart: for thy name was called upon me, O LORD God of the hosts.

¹⁷ I did not sit in the assembly of the mockers, nor did I become puffed up by reason of thy prophecy; I sat alone because thou hast filled me with indignation.

¹⁸ Why was my pain perpetual and my wound incurable, which refuses to be healed? Wilt thou be altogether unto me as a liar and as waters that fail?

¹⁹ Therefore thus hath the LORD said, If thou wilt return, then I will bring thee again, and thou shalt stand before me; and if thou wilt take forth the precious from the vile, thou shalt be as my mouth; let them return unto thee, but return not thou unto them.

²⁰ And I will give thee unto this people as a fenced brazen wall, and they shall fight against thee but they shall not prevail against thee: for I am with thee to keep thee and to defend thee, said the LORD.

²¹ And I will deliver thee out of the hand of the wicked, and I will ransom thee out of the hand of the strong.

²⁵ Yet I supposed it necessary to send to you Epaphroditus, my brother and companion in labour and fellowsoldier, but your messenger and he that ministered to my needs.

²⁶ For he longed after you all and was full of heaviness, because ye had heard that he had been sick

²⁷ For indeed he was sick near unto death, but God had mercy on him and not on him only, but on me also, lest I should have sorrow upon sorrow.

²⁸ I sent him, therefore, the more carefully, that when ye see him again, ye may rejoice and that I may be the less sorrowful.

²⁹ Receive him therefore in the Lord with all gladness and esteem such

³⁰ because for the work of the Christ he was near unto death, not regarding his life, to supply your lack of service toward me.