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Psalm 5

1  Give ear to my words, O Lord; ♦︎
   consider my lamentation.
2  Hearken to the voice of my crying, my King and my God, ♦︎
   for to you I make my prayer.
3  In the morning, Lord, you will hear my voice; ♦︎
   early in the morning I make my appeal to you, and look up.
4  For you are the God who takes no pleasure in wickedness; ♦︎
   no evil can dwell with you.
5  The boastful cannot stand in your sight; ♦︎
   you hate all those that work wickedness.
6  You destroy those who speak lies; ♦︎
   the bloodthirsty and deceitful the Lord will abhor.
7  But as for me, through the greatness of your mercy,
      I will come into your house; ♦︎
   I will bow down towards your holy temple in awe of you.
8  Lead me, Lord, in your righteousness,
      because of my enemies; ♦︎
   make your way straight before my face.
9  For there is no truth in their mouth,
      in their heart is destruction, ♦︎
   their throat is an open sepulchre,
      and they flatter with their tongue.
10  Punish them, O God; ♦︎
   let them fall through their own devices.
11  Because of their many transgressions cast them out, ♦︎
   for they have rebelled against you.
12  But let all who take refuge in you be glad; ♦︎
   let them sing out their joy for ever.
13  You will shelter them, ♦︎
   so that those who love your name may exult in you.
14  For you, O Lord, will bless the righteous; ♦︎
   and with your favour you will defend them as with a shield.

18 But even in those days, says the Lord, I will not make a full end of you. ¹⁹And when your people say, ‘Why has the Lord our God done all these things to us?’ you shall say to them, ‘As you have forsaken me and served foreign gods in your land, so you shall serve strangers in a land that is not yours.’

²⁰ Declare this in the house of Jacob,
   proclaim it in Judah:
²¹ Hear this, O foolish and senseless people,
   who have eyes, but do not see,
   who have ears, but do not hear.
²² Do you not fear me? says the Lord;
   Do you not tremble before me?
I placed the sand as a boundary for the sea,
   a perpetual barrier that it cannot pass;
though the waves toss, they cannot prevail,
   though they roar, they cannot pass over it.
²³ But this people has a stubborn and rebellious heart;
   they have turned aside and gone away.
²⁴ They do not say in their hearts,
   ‘Let us fear the Lord our God,
who gives the rain in its season,
   the autumn rain and the spring rain,
and keeps for us
   the weeks appointed for the harvest.’
²⁵ Your iniquities have turned these away,
   and your sins have deprived you of good.
²⁶ For scoundrels are found among my people;
   they take over the goods of others.
Like fowlers they set a trap;^*
   they catch human beings.
²⁷ Like a cage full of birds,
   their houses are full of treachery;
therefore they have become great and rich,
²⁸   they have grown fat and sleek.
They know no limits in deeds of wickedness;
   they do not judge with justice
the cause of the orphan, to make it prosper,
   and they do not defend the rights of the needy.
²⁹ Shall I not punish them for these things?

says the Lord,
   and shall I not bring retribution
   on a nation such as this?

³⁰ An appalling and horrible thing
   has happened in the land:
³¹ the prophets prophesy falsely,
   and the priests rule as the prophets direct;^*
my people love to have it so,
   but what will you do when the end comes?

13 We also constantly give thanks to God for this, that when you received the word of God that you heard from us, you accepted it not as a human word but as what it really is, God’s word, which is also at work in you believers. ¹⁴For you, brothers and sisters,^* became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus that are in Judea, for you suffered the same things from your own compatriots as they did from the Jews, ¹⁵who killed both the Lord Jesus and the prophets,^* and drove us out; they displease God and oppose everyone ¹⁶by hindering us from speaking to the Gentiles so that they may be saved. Thus they have constantly been filling up the measure of their sins; but God’s wrath has overtaken them at last.^*

Paul’s Desire to Visit the Thessalonians Again

17 As for us, brothers and sisters,^* when, for a short time, we were made orphans by being separated from you—in person, not in heart—we longed with great eagerness to see you face to face. ¹⁸For we wanted to come to you—certainly I, Paul, wanted to again and again—but Satan blocked our way. ¹⁹For what is our hope or joy or crown of boasting before our Lord Jesus at his coming? Is it not you? ²⁰Yes, you are our glory and joy!