I Cry Out Day and Night Before You
A Song. A Psalm of zthe Sons of Korah. To the choirmaster: according to aMahalath Leannoth. A Maskil1 of bHeman the Ezrahite.
1 O Lord, cGod of my salvation,
I dcry out day and night before you.
2 Let my prayer come before you;
eincline your ear to my cry!
3 For my soul is full of troubles,
and fmy life draws near to gSheol.
4 I am counted among those who hgo down to the pit;
I am a man who has no strength,
5 like one set loose among the dead,
like the slain that lie in the grave,
like those whom iyou remember no more,
for they are jcut off from your hand.
6 You have put me in kthe depths of the pit,
in the lregions dark and mdeep.
7 Your wrath nlies heavy upon me,
and you overwhelm me with oall your waves. Selah
8 You have caused pmy companions to shun me;
you have made me qa horror2 to them.
I am rshut in so that I cannot escape;
9 smy eye grows dim through sorrow.
Every day I call upon you, O Lord;
I tspread out my hands to you.
10 Do you work wonders for the dead?
uDo the departed rise up to praise you? Selah
11 Is your steadfast love declared in the grave,
or your faithfulness in Abaddon?
12 Are your vwonders known in wthe darkness,
or your righteousness in the land of xforgetfulness?
13 But I, O Lord, cry yto you;
zin the morning my prayer comes before you.
14 O Lord, why ado you cast my soul away?
Why bdo you hide your face from me?
15 Afflicted and close to death from my youth up,
I suffer your terrors; I am helpless.3
16 Your wrath has swept over me;
your cdreadful assaults destroy me.
17 They dsurround me like a flood eall day long;
they fclose in on me together.
18 You have caused gmy beloved and my friend to shun me;
my companions have become darkness.4
Released from the Law
1 Or do you not know, brothers1—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law is binding on a person only as long as he lives? 2 For ea married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives, but if her husband dies she is released from the law of marriage.2 3 Accordingly, fshe will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law, and if she marries another man she is not an adulteress.
4 Likewise, my brothers, gyou also have died hto the law ithrough the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, jin order that we may bear fruit for God. 5 For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work kin our members lto bear fruit for death. 6 But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the mnew way of nthe Spirit and not in the old way of the written code.3
The Law and Sin
7 What then shall we say? That the law is sin? By no means! Yet if it had not been for the law, oI would not have known sin. For I would not have known what it is to covet if pthe law had not said, “You shall not covet.” 8 But sin, qseizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. rFor apart from the law, sin lies dead. 9 I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died. 10 The very commandment sthat promised life proved to be death to me. 11 For sin, tseizing an opportunity through the commandment, udeceived me and through it killed me. 12 So vthe law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.
13 Did that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, producing death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure. 14 For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, wsold under sin. 15 For I do not understand my own actions. For xI do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. 16 Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with ythe law, that it is good. 17 So now zit is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. 18 For I know that nothing good dwells ain me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. 19 bFor I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. 20 Now if I do what I do not want, cit is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.
21 So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. 22 For dI delight in the law of God, ein my inner being, 23 but I see in my members fanother law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from gthis body of death? 25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.
