Psalms 79–85; 1 Corinthians 5–6

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Psalms 79–85

How Long, O Lord?

A Psalm of yAsaph.

O God, zthe nations have come into your ainheritance;

they have defiled your bholy temple;

they have claid Jerusalem in ruins.

They have given dthe bodies of your servants

to the birds of the heavens for food,

the flesh of your efaithful to fthe beasts of the earth.

They have poured out their blood like water

all around Jerusalem,

and there was gno one to bury them.

We have become ha taunt to our neighbors,

hmocked and derided by those around us.

iHow long, O Lord? Will you be angry jforever?

Will your kjealousy lburn like fire?

mPour out your anger on the nations

that ndo not know you,

and on the kingdoms

that odo not call upon your name!

For they have devoured Jacob

and laid waste his habitation.

pDo not remember against us qour former iniquities;1

let your compassion come speedily to meet us,

for we are rbrought very low.

sHelp us, O God of our salvation,

for the glory of your name;

deliver us, and tatone for our sins,

for your uname’s sake!

10  vWhy should the nations say,

Where is their God?

Let wthe avenging of the outpoured blood of your servants

be known among the nations before our eyes!

11  Let xthe groans of the prisoners come before you;

according to your great power, preserve those ydoomed to die!

12  Return zsevenfold into the alap of our neighbors

the btaunts with which they have taunted you, O Lord!

13  But we your people, the csheep of your pasture,

will dgive thanks to you forever;

from generation to generation we will recount your praise.

Restore Us, O God

To the choirmaster: according to eLilies. A Testimony. Of fAsaph, a Psalm.

Give ear, O Shepherd of Israel,

you who lead gJoseph like ha flock.

You who are ienthroned upon the cherubim, jshine forth.

Before kEphraim and Benjamin and Manasseh,

lstir up your might

and mcome to save us!

nRestore us,2 O God;

olet your face shine, that we may be saved!

O pLord God of hosts,

qhow long will you be angry with your people’s prayers?

You have fed them with rthe bread of tears

and given them tears to drink in full measure.

sYou make us an object of contention for our sneighbors,

and our enemies laugh among themselves.

nRestore us, O God of hosts;

let your face shine, that we may be saved!

You brought ta vine out of Egypt;

you udrove out the nations and planted it.

You vcleared the ground for it;

it took deep root and filled the land.

10  The mountains were covered with its shade,

the mighty cedars with its branches.

11  It sent out its branches to wthe sea

and its shoots to wthe River.3

12  Why then have you xbroken down its walls,

so that all who pass along the way pluck its fruit?

13  yThe boar from the forest ravages it,

and all that move in the field feed on it.

14  Turn again, O God of hosts!

zLook down from heaven, and see;

have regard for this vine,

15  the stock that your right hand planted,

and for the son whom you made strong for yourself.

16  They have aburned it with fire; they have acut it down;

may they perish at bthe rebuke of your face!

17  But clet your hand be on the man of your right hand,

the son of man whom you have made strong for yourself!

18  Then we shall not turn back from you;

dgive us life, and we will call upon your name!

19  eRestore us, O Lord God of hosts!

Let your face shine, that we may be saved!

Oh, That My People Would Listen to Me

To the choirmaster: according to fThe Gittith.4 Of gAsaph.

hSing aloud to God our strength;

ishout for joy to the God of Jacob!

Raise a song; sound jthe tambourine,

kthe sweet lyre with kthe harp.

Blow the trumpet at lthe new moon,

at the full moon, on our feast day.

For it is a statute for Israel,

a rule5 of the God of Jacob.

He made it ma decree in nJoseph

when he owent out over6 the land of Egypt.

pI hear a language qI had not known:

I rrelieved your7 shoulder of sthe burden;

your hands were freed from the basket.

In distress you tcalled, and I delivered you;

I uanswered you in the secret place of thunder;

I vtested you at the waters of Meribah. Selah

wHear, O my people, while I admonish you!

O Israel, if you would but listen to me!

There shall be no xstrange god among you;

you shall not bow down to a yforeign god.

10  zI am the Lord your God,

who brought you up out of the land of Egypt.

aOpen your mouth wide, and I will fill it.

11  But my people did not listen to my voice;

Israel bwould not submit to me.

12  So I cgave them over to their dstubborn hearts,

to follow their own ecounsels.

13  fOh, that my people would listen to me,

that Israel would gwalk in my ways!

14  I would soon subdue their enemies

and hturn my hand against their foes.

15  Those who hate the Lord would icringe toward him,

and their fate would last forever.

16  But he would feed you8 with jthe finest of the wheat,

and with khoney from the rock I would satisfy you.

Rescue the Weak and Needy

A Psalm of lAsaph.

mGod nhas taken his place in the divine council;

in the midst of pthe gods he qholds judgment:

How long will you judge unjustly

and rshow partiality to sthe wicked? Selah

tGive justice to uthe weak and the fatherless;

vmaintain the right of the afflicted and the destitute.

wRescue the weak and the needy;

xdeliver them from the hand of the wicked.

yThey have neither knowledge nor understanding,

zthey walk about in darkness;

aall the foundations of the earth are bshaken.

cI said, You are gods,

sons of the Most High, all of you;

nevertheless, like men dyou shall die,

and fall like any prince.9

eArise, O God, judge the earth;

for you shall finherit all the nations!

O God, Do Not Keep Silence

A Song. A Psalm of gAsaph.

O God, do not keep silence;

hdo not hold your peace or be still, O God!

For behold, your enemies imake an uproar;

those who hate you have jraised their heads.

They lay kcrafty plans against your people;

they consult together against your ltreasured ones.

They say, Come, mlet us wipe them out as a nation;

let the name of Israel be remembered no more!

For they conspire with one accord;

against you they make a covenant

the tents of nEdom and othe Ishmaelites,

pMoab and qthe Hagrites,

rGebal and pAmmon and sAmalek,

tPhilistia with the inhabitants of uTyre;

vAsshur also has joined them;

they are the strong arm of wthe children of Lot. Selah

Do to them as you did to xMidian,

as to ySisera and Jabin at zthe river Kishon,

10  who were destroyed at aEn-dor,

who became bdung for the ground.

11  Make their nobles like cOreb and Zeeb,

all their princes like dZebah and Zalmunna,

12  who said, eLet us take possession for ourselves

of the pastures of God.

13  O my God, make them like fwhirling dust,10

like gchaff before the wind.

14  As hfire consumes the forest,

as the flame isets the mountains ablaze,

15  so may you pursue them jwith your tempest

and terrify them with your hurricane!

16  kFill their faces with shame,

that they may seek your name, O Lord.

17  Let them be lput to shame and dismayed forever;

let them perish in disgrace,

18  that they may mknow that you alone,

nwhose name is the Lord,

are othe Most High over all the earth.

My Soul Longs for the Courts of the Lord

To the choirmaster: according to pThe Gittith.11 A Psalm of qthe Sons of Korah.

How rlovely is your sdwelling place,

O Lord of hosts!

My soul tlongs, yes, ufaints

for the courts of the Lord;

my heart and flesh sing for joy

to vthe living God.

Even the sparrow finds a home,

and the swallow a nest for herself,

where she may lay her young,

at your altars, O Lord of hosts,

wmy King and my God.

xBlessed are those who dwell in your house,

ever ysinging your praise! Selah

Blessed are those whose strength is in you,

zin whose heart are the highways to Zion.12

As they go through the Valley of Baca

they make it a place of springs;

athe early rain also covers it with bpools.

They go cfrom strength to strength;

each one dappears before God in Zion.

O eLord God of hosts, hear my prayer;

give ear, O God of Jacob! Selah

fBehold our gshield, O God;

look on the face of your anointed!

10  For a day hin your courts is better

than a thousand elsewhere.

I would rather be ia doorkeeper in the house of my God

than dwell in the tents of wickedness.

11  For the Lord God is ja sun and gshield;

the Lord bestows favor and honor.

kNo good thing does he withhold

from those who lwalk uprightly.

12  O Lord of hosts,

mblessed is the one who trusts in you!

Revive Us Again

To the choirmaster. A Psalm of nthe Sons of Korah.

Lord, you were ofavorable to your land;

you prestored the fortunes of Jacob.

You qforgave the iniquity of your people;

you qcovered all their sin. Selah

You withdrew all your wrath;

you rturned from your hot anger.

sRestore us again, O God of our salvation,

and put away your indignation toward us!

tWill you be angry with us forever?

Will you prolong your anger to all generations?

Will you not urevive us again,

that your people may vrejoice in you?

Show us your steadfast love, O Lord,

and grant us your salvation.

wLet me hear what God the Lord will speak,

for he will xspeak peace to his people, to his ysaints;

but let them not zturn back to afolly.

Surely his bsalvation is near to those who fear him,

that cglory may dwell in our land.

10  dSteadfast love and faithfulness meet;

erighteousness and peace kiss each other.

11  Faithfulness springs up from the ground,

and righteousness looks down from the sky.

12  Yes, fthe Lord will give what is good,

and our land gwill yield its increase.

13  hRighteousness will go before him

and make his footsteps a way.


1 Corinthians 5–6

Sexual Immorality Defiles the Church

It is actually reported that there is wsexual immorality among you, and of a kind that is not tolerated even among pagans, xfor a man has his father’s wife. And yyou are arrogant! Ought you znot rather to mourn? Let him who has done this be removed from among you.

For though aabsent in body, I am present in spirit; and as if present, I have already pronounced judgment on the one who did such a thing. When you are assembled bin the name of the Lord Jesus and my spirit is present, with the power of our Lord Jesus, you are cto deliver this man to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, so dthat his spirit may be saved ein the day of the Lord.1

fYour boasting is not good. Do you not know that ga little leaven leavens the whole lump? Cleanse out the old leaven that you may be a new lump, as you really are unleavened. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. Let us therefore celebrate the festival, hnot with the old leaven, ithe leaven of malice and evil, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

I wrote to you in my letter jnot to associate with sexually immoral people 10 knot at all meaning lthe sexually immoral of this world, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters, msince then you would need to go out of the world. 11 But now I am writing to you not to associate with anyone nwho bears the name of brother if he is guilty of sexual immorality or greed, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or swindlernot even to eat with such a one. 12 For what have I to do with judging ooutsiders? pIs it not those inside the church2 whom you are to judge? 13 God judges3 those outside. qPurge the evil person from among you.

Lawsuits Against Believers

When one of you has a grievance against another, does he dare go to law before the unrighteous rinstead of the saints? Or do you not know that sthe saints will judge the world? And if the world is to be judged by you, are you incompetent to try trivial cases? Do you not know that we are to judge angels? How much more, then, matters pertaining to this life! So if you have such cases, twhy do you lay them before those who have no standing in the church? uI say this to your shame. Can it be that there is no one among you wise enough to settle a dispute between the brothers, but brother goes to law against brother, and that before unbelievers? To have lawsuits at all with one another is already a defeat for you. vWhy not rather suffer wrong? Why not rather be defrauded? But you yourselves wrong and defraudeven wyour own brothers!4

Or do you not know that the unrighteous5 will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: xneither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality,6 10 nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And ysuch were some of you. But zyou were washed, ayou were sanctified, byou were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.

Flee Sexual Immorality

12 cAll things are lawful for me, but not all things are helpful. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be dominated by anything. 13 dFood is meant for the stomach and the stomach for foodand God will destroy both one eand the other. The body is not meant for sexual immorality, but ffor the Lord, and gthe Lord for the body. 14 And hGod raised the Lord and iwill also raise us up jby his power. 15 Do you not know that kyour bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? Never! 16 Or do you not know that he who is joined7 to a prostitute becomes one body with her? For, as it is written, lThe two will become one flesh. 17 But he who is joined to the Lord mbecomes one spirit with him. 18 nFlee from sexual immorality. Every other sin8 a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person osins against his own body. 19 Or pdo you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? qYou are not your own, 20 rfor you were bought with a price. sSo glorify God in your body.