Book of Common Prayer
Psalm 51
To the Chief Musician. A Psalm of David; when Nathan the prophet came to him after he had sinned with Bathsheba.
1 Have mercy upon me, O God, according to Your steadfast love; according to the multitude of Your tender mercy and loving-kindness blot out my transgressions.
2 Wash me thoroughly [and repeatedly] from my iniquity and guilt and cleanse me and make me wholly pure from my sin!
3 For I am conscious of my transgressions and I acknowledge them; my sin is ever before me.
4 Against You, You only, have I sinned and done that which is evil in Your sight, so that You are justified in Your sentence and faultless in Your judgment.(A)
5 Behold, I was brought forth in [a state of] iniquity; my mother was sinful who conceived me [and I too am sinful].(B)
6 Behold, You desire truth in the inner being; make me therefore to know wisdom in my inmost heart.
7 Purify me with hyssop, and I shall be clean [ceremonially]; wash me, and I shall [in reality] be whiter than snow.
8 Make me to hear joy and gladness and be satisfied; let the bones which You have broken rejoice.
9 Hide Your face from my sins and blot out all my guilt and iniquities.
10 Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right, persevering, and steadfast spirit within me.
11 Cast me not away from Your presence and take not Your Holy Spirit from me.
12 Restore to me the joy of Your salvation and uphold me with a willing spirit.
13 Then will I teach transgressors Your ways, and sinners shall be converted and return to You.
14 Deliver me from bloodguiltiness and death, O God, the God of my salvation, and my tongue shall sing aloud of Your righteousness (Your rightness and Your justice).
15 O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth shall show forth Your praise.
16 For You delight not in sacrifice, or else would I give it; You find no pleasure in burnt offering.(C)
17 My sacrifice [the sacrifice acceptable] to God is a broken spirit; a broken and a contrite heart [broken down with sorrow for sin and humbly and thoroughly penitent], such, O God, You will not despise.
18 Do good in Your good pleasure to Zion; rebuild the walls of Jerusalem.
19 Then will You delight in the sacrifices of righteousness, justice, and right, with burnt offering and whole burnt offering; then bullocks will be offered upon Your altar.
Psalm 69
To the Chief Musician; [set to the tune of] “Lilies.” [A Psalm] of David.
1 Save me, O God, for the waters have come up to my neck [they threaten my life].
2 I sink in deep mire, where there is no foothold; I have come into deep waters, where the floods overwhelm me.
3 I am weary with my crying; my throat is parched; my eyes fail with waiting [hopefully] for my God.
4 Those who hate me without cause are more than the hairs of my head; those who would cut me off and destroy me, being my enemies wrongfully, are many and mighty. I am [forced] to restore what I did not steal.(A)
5 O God, You know my folly and blundering; my sins and my guilt are not hidden from You.
6 Let not those who wait and hope and look for You, O Lord of hosts, be put to shame through me; let not those who seek and inquire for and require You [as their vital necessity] be brought to confusion and dishonor through me, O God of Israel.
7 Because for Your sake I have borne taunt and reproach; confusion and shame have covered my face.
8 I have become a stranger to my brethren, and an alien to my mother’s children.(B)
9 For zeal for Your house has eaten me up, and the reproaches and insults of those who reproach and insult You have fallen upon me.(C)
10 When I wept and humbled myself with fasting, I was jeered at and humiliated;
11 When I made sackcloth my clothing, I became a byword (an object of scorn) to them.
12 They who sit in [the city’s] gate talk about me, and I am the song of the drunkards.
13 But as for me, my prayer is to You, O Lord. At an acceptable and opportune time, O God, in the multitude of Your mercy and the abundance of Your loving-kindness hear me, and in the truth and faithfulness of Your salvation answer me.
14 Rescue me out of the mire, and let me not sink; let me be delivered from those who hate me and from out of the deep waters.
15 Let not the floodwaters overflow and overwhelm me, neither let the deep swallow me up nor the [dug] pit [with water perhaps in the bottom] close its mouth over me.
16 Hear and answer me, O Lord, for Your loving-kindness is sweet and comforting; according to Your plenteous tender mercy and steadfast love turn to me.
17 Hide not Your face from Your servant, for I am in distress; O answer me speedily!
18 Draw close to me and redeem me; ransom and set me free because of my enemies [lest they glory in my prolonged distress]!
19 You know my reproach and my shame and my dishonor; my adversaries are all before You [fully known to You].
20 Insults and reproach have broken my heart; I am full of heaviness and I am distressingly sick. I looked for pity, but there was none, and for comforters, but I found none.
21 They gave me also gall [poisonous and bitter] for my food, and in my thirst they gave me vinegar (a soured wine) to drink.(D)
22 Let their own table [with all its abundance and luxury] become a snare to them; and when they are secure in peace [or at their sacrificial feasts, let it become] a trap to them.
23 Let their eyes be darkened so that they cannot see, and make their loins tremble continually [from terror, dismay, and feebleness].
1 How solitary and lonely sits the city [Jerusalem] that was [once] full of people! How like a widow has she become! She who was [a]great among the nations and princess among the provinces has become a tributary [in servitude]!
2 She weeps bitterly in the night, and her tears are [constantly] on her cheeks. Among all her lovers (allies) she has no one to comfort her. All her friends have dealt treacherously with her; they have become her enemies.(A)
6 From the Daughter of Zion all her beauty and majesty have departed. Her princes have become like harts that find no pasture; they have fled without strength before the pursuer.
7 Jerusalem [earnestly] remembers in the days of her affliction, in the days of her [compulsory] wanderings and her bitterness, all the pleasant and precious things that she had from the days of old. When her people fell into and at the hands of the adversary, and there was none to help her, the enemy [gloated as they] looked at her, and they mocked at her desolations and downfall.
8 Jerusalem has grievously sinned; therefore she has become an unclean thing and has been removed. All who honored her despise her, because they have seen her nakedness; yes, she herself groans and sighs and turns [her face] away.
9 Her filthiness was in and on her skirts; she did not [seriously and earnestly] consider her final end. Therefore she has come down [from throne to slavery] singularly and astonishingly; she has no comforter. O Lord [cries Jerusalem], look at my affliction, for the enemy has magnified himself [in triumph]!
10 The adversary has spread out his hand upon all her precious and desirable things; for she has seen the nations enter her sanctuary [of the temple]—[a]when You commanded that they should not even enter Your congregation [in the outer courts].(A)
11 All her people groan and sigh, seeking for bread; they have given their desirable and precious things [in exchange] for food to revive their strength and bring back life. See, O Lord, and consider how wretched and lightly esteemed, how vile and abominable, I have become!
12 Is it nothing to you, all you who pass by? Look and see if there is any sorrow like my sorrow which was dealt out to me, with which the Lord has afflicted me in the day of His fierce anger!
1 Paul, an apostle (a special messenger) of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy [our] brother, to the church (assembly) of God which is at Corinth, and to all the saints (the people of God) throughout Achaia (most of Greece):
2 Grace (favor and spiritual blessing) to you and [heart] peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed One).
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of sympathy (pity and mercy) and the God [Who is the Source] of every comfort (consolation and encouragement),
4 Who comforts (consoles and encourages) us in every trouble (calamity and affliction), so that we may also be able to comfort (console and encourage) those who are in any kind of trouble or distress, with the comfort (consolation and encouragement) with which we ourselves are comforted (consoled and encouraged) by God.
5 For just as Christ’s [[a]own] sufferings fall to our lot [b][as they overflow upon His disciples, and we share and experience them] abundantly, so through Christ comfort (consolation and encouragement) is also [shared and experienced] abundantly by us.
6 But if we are troubled (afflicted and distressed), it is for your comfort (consolation and encouragement) and [for your] salvation; and if we are comforted (consoled and encouraged), it is for your comfort (consolation and encouragement), which works [in you] when you patiently endure the same evils (misfortunes and calamities) that we also suffer and undergo.
7 And our hope for you [our joyful and confident expectation of good for you] is ever unwavering (assured and unshaken); for we know that just as you share and are partners in [our] sufferings and calamities, you also share and are partners in [our] comfort (consolation and encouragement).
12 On the day following, when they had come away from Bethany, He was hungry.
13 And seeing in the distance a fig tree [covered] with leaves, He went to see if He could find any [fruit] on it [[a]for in the fig tree the fruit appears at the same time as the leaves]. But when He came up to it, He found nothing but leaves, for the fig season had not yet come.
14 And He said to it, No one ever again shall eat fruit from you. And His disciples were listening [to what He said].
15 And they came to Jerusalem. And He went into the temple [area, the [b]porches and courts] and began to drive out those who sold and bought in the temple area, and He overturned the [[c]four-footed] tables of the money changers and the seats of those who dealt in doves;
16 And He would not permit anyone to carry any household equipment through the temple enclosure [thus making the temple area a short-cut traffic lane].
17 And He taught and said to them, Is it not written, My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations? But you have turned it into a den of robbers.(A)
18 And the chief priests and the scribes heard [of this] and kept seeking some way to destroy Him, for they feared Him, because the entire multitude was struck with astonishment at His teaching.
19 And when evening came on, He and [d]His disciples, as accustomed, went out of the city.
20 In the morning, when they were passing along, they noticed that the fig tree was withered [completely] away to its roots.
21 And Peter remembered and said to Him, Master, look! The fig tree which You doomed has withered away!
22 And Jesus, replying, said to them, Have faith in God [constantly].
23 Truly I tell you, whoever says to this mountain, Be lifted up and thrown into the sea! and does not doubt at all in his heart but believes that what he says will take place, it will be done for him.
24 For this reason I am telling you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe (trust and be confident) that it is granted to you, and you will [get it].
25 And whenever you stand praying, if you have anything against anyone, forgive him and [e]let it drop (leave it, let it go), in order that your Father Who is in heaven may also forgive you your [own] failings and shortcomings and let them drop.
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