Book of Common Prayer
Psalm 106[a]
106 Praise the Lord.
Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good,
and his loyal love endures.[b]
2 Who can adequately recount the Lord’s mighty acts,
or relate all his praiseworthy deeds?[c]
3 How blessed are those who promote justice,
and do what is right all the time.
4 Remember me, O Lord, when you show favor to your people.
Pay attention to me, when you deliver,
5 so I may see the prosperity[d] of your chosen ones,
rejoice along with your nation,[e]
and boast along with the people who belong to you.[f]
6 We have sinned like[g] our ancestors;[h]
we have done wrong, we have done evil.
7 Our ancestors in Egypt failed to appreciate your miraculous deeds.
They failed to remember your many acts of loyal love,
and they rebelled at the sea, by the Red Sea.[i]
8 Yet he delivered them for the sake of his reputation,[j]
that he might reveal his power.
9 He shouted at[k] the Red Sea and it dried up;
he led them through the deep water as if it were a desert.
10 He delivered them from the power[l] of the one who hated them,
and rescued[m] them from the power[n] of the enemy.
11 The water covered their enemies;
not even one of them survived.[o]
12 They believed his promises;[p]
they sang praises to him.
13 They quickly forgot what he had done;[q]
they did not wait for his instructions.[r]
14 In the wilderness they had an insatiable craving[s] for meat;[t]
they challenged God[u] in the wastelands.
15 He granted their request,
then struck them with a disease.[v]
16 In the camp they resented[w] Moses,
and Aaron, the Lord’s holy priest.[x]
17 The earth opened up and swallowed Dathan;
it engulfed[y] the group led by Abiram.[z]
18 Fire burned their group;
the flames scorched the wicked.[aa]
19 They made an image of a calf at Horeb,
and worshiped a metal idol.
20 They traded their majestic God[ab]
for the image of an ox that eats grass.
21 They rejected[ac] the God who delivered them,
the one who performed great deeds in Egypt,
22 amazing feats in the land of Ham,
mighty acts[ad] by the Red Sea.
23 He threatened[ae] to destroy them,
but[af] Moses, his chosen one, interceded with him[ag]
and turned back his destructive anger.[ah]
24 They rejected the fruitful land;[ai]
they did not believe his promise.[aj]
25 They grumbled in their tents;[ak]
they did not obey[al] the Lord.
26 So he made a solemn vow[am]
that he would make them die[an] in the wilderness,
27 make their descendants[ao] die[ap] among the nations,
and scatter them among foreign lands.[aq]
28 They worshiped[ar] Baal of Peor,
and ate sacrifices offered to the dead.[as]
29 They made the Lord angry[at] by their actions,
and a plague broke out among them.
30 Phinehas took a stand and intervened,[au]
and the plague subsided.
31 This was credited to Phinehas as a righteous act
for all generations to come.[av]
32 They made him angry by the waters of Meribah,
and Moses suffered[aw] because of them,
33 for they aroused[ax] his temper,[ay]
and he spoke rashly.[az]
34 They did not destroy the nations,[ba]
as the Lord had commanded them to do.
35 They mixed in with the nations
and learned their ways.[bb]
36 They worshiped[bc] their idols,
which became a snare to them.[bd]
37 They sacrificed their sons and daughters to demons.[be]
38 They shed innocent blood—
the blood of their sons and daughters,
whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan.
The land was polluted by bloodshed.[bf]
39 They were defiled by their deeds,
and unfaithful in their actions.[bg]
40 So the Lord was angry with his people[bh]
and despised the people who belonged to him.[bi]
41 He handed them over to[bj] the nations,
and those who hated them ruled over them.
42 Their enemies oppressed them;
they were subject to their authority.[bk]
43 Many times he delivered[bl] them,
but they had a rebellious attitude,[bm]
and degraded themselves[bn] by their sin.
44 Yet he took notice of their distress,
when he heard their cry for help.
45 He remembered his covenant with them,
and relented[bo] because of his great loyal love.
46 He caused all their conquerors[bp]
to have pity on them.
47 Deliver us, O Lord, our God.
Gather us from among the nations.
Then we will give thanks[bq] to your holy name,
and boast about your praiseworthy deeds.[br]
48 The Lord God of Israel deserves praise,[bs]
in the future and forevermore.[bt]
Let all the people say, “We agree![bu] Praise the Lord!”[bv]
Manasseh’s Reign over Judah
21 Manasseh was twelve years old when he became king, and he reigned for fifty-five years in Jerusalem. His mother[a] was Hephzibah. 2 He did evil in the sight of[b] the Lord and committed the same horrible sins practiced by the nations[c] whom the Lord drove out before the Israelites. 3 He rebuilt the high places that his father Hezekiah had destroyed; he set up altars for Baal and made an Asherah pole just as King Ahab of Israel had done. He bowed down to all the stars in the sky[d] and worshiped[e] them. 4 He built altars in the Lord’s temple, about which the Lord had said, “Jerusalem will be my home.”[f] 5 In the two courtyards of the Lord’s temple he built altars for all the stars in the sky. 6 He passed his son[g] through the fire[h] and practiced divination and omen reading. He set up a ritual pit to conjure up underworld spirits and appointed magicians to supervise it.[i] He did a great amount of evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking him to anger.[j] 7 He put an idol of Asherah he had made in the temple, about which the Lord had said to David and to his son Solomon, “This temple in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, will be my permanent home.[k] 8 I will not make Israel again leave the land I gave to their ancestors,[l] provided that they carefully obey all I commanded them, the whole law my servant Moses ordered them to obey.” 9 But they did not obey,[m] and Manasseh misled them so that they sinned more than the nations whom the Lord had destroyed from before the Israelites.
10 So the Lord announced through[n] his servants the prophets: 11 “King Manasseh of Judah has committed horrible sins.[o] He has sinned more than the Amorites before him and has encouraged Judah to sin by worshiping his disgusting idols.[p] 12 So this is what the Lord God of Israel has said, ‘I am about to bring disaster on Jerusalem and Judah. The news will reverberate in the ears of those who hear about it.[q] 13 I will destroy Jerusalem the same way I did Samaria and the dynasty of Ahab.[r] I will wipe Jerusalem clean, just as one wipes a plate on both sides.[s] 14 I will abandon this last remaining tribe among my people[t] and hand them over to their enemies; they will be plundered and robbed by all their enemies,[u] 15 because they have done evil in my sight[v] and have angered me from the time their ancestors left Egypt right up to this very day!’”
16 Furthermore Manasseh killed so many innocent people, he stained Jerusalem with their blood from end to end,[w] in addition to encouraging Judah to sin by doing evil in the sight of the Lord.[x]
17 The rest of the events of Manasseh’s reign and all his accomplishments, as well as the sinful acts he committed, are recorded in the scroll called the Annals of the Kings of Judah.[y] 18 Manasseh passed away[z] and was buried in his palace garden, the garden of Uzzah, and his son Amon replaced him as king.
Avoid Idol Feasts
14 So then, my dear friends, flee from idolatry. 15 I am speaking to thoughtful people. Consider what I say. 16 Is not the cup of blessing that we bless a sharing in the blood of Christ? Is not the bread that we break a sharing in the body of Christ? 17 Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all share the one bread. 18 Look at the people of Israel.[a] Are not those who eat the sacrifices partners in the altar? 19 Am I saying that idols or food sacrificed to them amount to anything? 20 No, I mean that what the pagans sacrifice[b] is to demons and not to God. I do not want you to be partners with demons. 21 You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. You cannot take part in the table of the Lord and the table of demons. 22 Or are we trying to provoke the Lord to jealousy? Are we really stronger than he is?[c]
Live to Glorify God
23 “Everything is lawful,” but not everything is beneficial. “Everything is lawful,”[d] but not everything builds others up.[e] 24 Do not seek your own good, but the good of the other person. 25 Eat anything that is sold in the marketplace without questions of conscience, 26 for the earth and its abundance are the Lord’s.[f] 27 If an unbeliever invites you to dinner and you want to go, eat whatever is served without asking questions of conscience. 28 But if someone says to you, “This is from a sacrifice,” do not eat, because of the one who told you and because of conscience[g]— 29 I do not mean yours but the other person’s. For why is my freedom being judged by another’s conscience? 30 If I partake with thankfulness, why am I blamed for the food[h] that I give thanks for? 31 So whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do everything for the glory of God. 32 Do not give offense to Jews or Greeks or to the church of God, 33 just as I also try to please everyone in all things. I do not seek my own benefit, but the benefit[i] of many, so that they may be saved. 11 1 Be imitators of me, just as I also am of Christ.
Healing the Gadarene Demoniacs
28 When he came to the other side, to the region of the Gadarenes,[a] two demon-possessed men coming from the tombs met him. They were extremely violent, so that no one was able to pass by that way.[b] 29 They[c] cried out, “Son of God, leave us alone![d] Have you come here to torment us before the time?”[e] 30 A[f] large herd of pigs[g] was feeding some distance from them. 31 Then the demons begged him,[h] “If you drive us out, send us into the herd of pigs.”[i] 32 And he said,[j] “Go!” So[k] they came out and went into the pigs, and the herd rushed down the steep slope into the lake and drowned in the water.[l] 33 The[m] herdsmen ran off, went into the town,[n] and told everything that had happened to the demon-possessed men. 34 Then[o] the entire town[p] came out to meet Jesus. And when they saw him, they begged him to leave their region.
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