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Psalm 69

Prayer for Deliverance from Persecution

To the leader: according to Lilies. Of David.
¹ Save me, O God,
   for the waters have come up to my neck.
² I sink in deep mire,
   where there is no foothold;
I have come into deep waters,
   and the flood sweeps over me.
³ I am weary with my crying;
   my throat is parched.
My eyes grow dim
   with waiting for my God.

⁴ More in number than the hairs of my head
   are those who hate me without cause;
many are those who would destroy me,
   my enemies who accuse me falsely.
What I did not steal
   must I now restore?
⁵ O God, you know my folly;
   the wrongs I have done are not hidden from you.

⁶ Do not let those who hope in you be put to shame because of me,
   O Lord God of hosts;
do not let those who seek you be dishonoured because of me,
   O God of Israel.
⁷ It is for your sake that I have borne reproach,
   that shame has covered my face.
⁸ I have become a stranger to my kindred,
   an alien to my mother’s children.

⁹ It is zeal for your house that has consumed me;
   the insults of those who insult you have fallen on me.
¹⁰ When I humbled my soul with fasting,^*
   they insulted me for doing so.
¹¹ When I made sackcloth my clothing,
   I became a byword to them.
¹² I am the subject of gossip for those who sit in the gate,
   and the drunkards make songs about me.

¹³ But as for me, my prayer is to you, O Lord.
   At an acceptable time, O God,
   in the abundance of your steadfast love, answer me.
With your faithful help ¹⁴rescue me
   from sinking in the mire;
let me be delivered from my enemies
   and from the deep waters.
¹⁵ Do not let the flood sweep over me,
   or the deep swallow me up,
   or the Pit close its mouth over me.

¹⁶ Answer me, O Lord, for your steadfast love is good;
   according to your abundant mercy, turn to me.
¹⁷ Do not hide your face from your servant,
   for I am in distress—make haste to answer me.
¹⁸ Draw near to me, redeem me,
   set me free because of my enemies.

¹⁹ You know the insults I receive,
   and my shame and dishonour;
   my foes are all known to you.
²⁰ Insults have broken my heart,
   so that I am in despair.
I looked for pity, but there was none;
   and for comforters, but I found none.
²¹ They gave me poison for food,
   and for my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.

²² Let their table be a trap for them,
   a snare for their allies.
²³ Let their eyes be darkened so that they cannot see,
   and make their loins tremble continually.
²⁴ Pour out your indignation upon them,
   and let your burning anger overtake them.
²⁵ May their camp be a desolation;
   let no one live in their tents.
²⁶ For they persecute those whom you have struck down,
   and those whom you have wounded, they attack still more.^*
27 Add guilt to their guilt;
   may they have no acquittal from you.
²⁸ Let them be blotted out of the book of the living;
   let them not be enrolled among the righteous.
²⁹ But I am lowly and in pain;
   let your salvation, O God, protect me.

³⁰ I will praise the name of God with a song;
   I will magnify him with thanksgiving.
³¹ This will please the Lord more than an ox
   or a bull with horns and hoofs.
³² Let the oppressed see it and be glad;
   you who seek God, let your hearts revive.
³³ For the Lord hears the needy,
   and does not despise his own that are in bonds.

³⁴ Let heaven and earth praise him,
   the seas and everything that moves in them.
³⁵ For God will save Zion
   and rebuild the cities of Judah;
and his servants shall live^* there and possess it;
³⁶   the children of his servants shall inherit it,
   and those who love his name shall live in it.

The Marriage of Isaac and Rebekah

24Now Abraham was old, well advanced in years; and the Lord had blessed Abraham in all things. ²Abraham said to his servant, the oldest of his house, who had charge of all that he had, ‘Put your hand under my thigh ³and I will make you swear by the Lord, the God of heaven and earth, that you will not get a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom I live, ⁴but will go to my country and to my kindred and get a wife for my son Isaac.’ ⁵The servant said to him, ‘Perhaps the woman may not be willing to follow me to this land; must I then take your son back to the land from which you came?’ ⁶Abraham said to him, ‘See to it that you do not take my son back there. ⁷The Lord, the God of heaven, who took me from my father’s house and from the land of my birth, and who spoke to me and swore to me, “To your offspring I will give this land”, he will send his angel before you; you shall take a wife for my son from there. ⁸But if the woman is not willing to follow you, then you will be free from this oath of mine; only you must not take my son back there.’ ⁹So the servant put his hand under the thigh of Abraham his master and swore to him concerning this matter.

10 Then the servant took ten of his master’s camels and departed, taking all kinds of choice gifts from his master; and he set out and went to Aram-naharaim, to the city of Nahor. ¹¹He made the camels kneel down outside the city by the well of water; it was towards evening, the time when women go out to draw water. ¹²And he said, ‘O Lord, God of my master Abraham, please grant me success today and show steadfast love to my master Abraham. ¹³I am standing here by the spring of water, and the daughters of the townspeople are coming out to draw water. ¹⁴Let the girl to whom I shall say, “Please offer your jar that I may drink”, and who shall say, “Drink, and I will water your camels”—let her be the one whom you have appointed for your servant Isaac. By this I shall know that you have shown steadfast love to my master.’

15 Before he had finished speaking, there was Rebekah, who was born to Bethuel son of Milcah, the wife of Nahor, Abraham’s brother, coming out with her water-jar on her shoulder. ¹⁶The girl was very fair to look upon, a virgin whom no man had known. She went down to the spring, filled her jar, and came up. ¹⁷Then the servant ran to meet her and said, ‘Please let me sip a little water from your jar.’ ¹⁸‘Drink, my lord,’ she said, and quickly lowered her jar upon her hand and gave him a drink. ¹⁹When she had finished giving him a drink, she said, ‘I will draw for your camels also, until they have finished drinking.’ ²⁰So she quickly emptied her jar into the trough and ran again to the well to draw, and she drew for all his camels. ²¹The man gazed at her in silence to learn whether or not the Lord had made his journey successful.

22 When the camels had finished drinking, the man took a gold nose-ring weighing a half-shekel, and two bracelets for her arms weighing ten gold shekels, ²³and said, ‘Tell me whose daughter you are. Is there room in your father’s house for us to spend the night?’ ²⁴She said to him, ‘I am the daughter of Bethuel son of Milcah, whom she bore to Nahor.’ ²⁵She added, ‘We have plenty of straw and fodder and a place to spend the night.’ ²⁶The man bowed his head and worshipped the Lord ²⁷and said, ‘Blessed be the Lord, the God of my master Abraham, who has not forsaken his steadfast love and his faithfulness towards my master. As for me, the Lord has led me on the way to the house of my master’s kin.’

3 Consider him who endured such hostility against himself from sinners,^* so that you may not grow weary or lose heart. ⁴In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. ⁵And you have forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as children—
‘My child, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord,
   or lose heart when you are punished by him;
⁶ for the Lord disciplines those whom he loves,
   and chastises every child whom he accepts.’
⁷Endure trials for the sake of discipline. God is treating you as children; for what child is there whom a parent does not discipline? ⁸If you do not have that discipline in which all children share, then you are illegitimate and not his children. ⁹Moreover, we had human parents to discipline us, and we respected them. Should we not be even more willing to be subject to the Father of spirits and live? ¹⁰For they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, in order that we may share his holiness. ¹¹Now, discipline always seems painful rather than pleasant at the time, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.

The Unbelief of Jesus’ Brothers

7After this Jesus went about in Galilee. He did not wish^* to go about in Judea because the Jews were looking for an opportunity to kill him. ²Now the Jewish festival of Booths^* was near. ³So his brothers said to him, ‘Leave here and go to Judea so that your disciples also may see the works you are doing; ⁴for no one who wants^* to be widely known acts in secret. If you do these things, show yourself to the world.’ ⁵(For not even his brothers believed in him.) ⁶Jesus said to them, ‘My time has not yet come, but your time is always here. ⁷The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify against it that its works are evil. ⁸Go to the festival yourselves. I am not^* going to this festival, for my time has not yet fully come.’ ⁹After saying this, he remained in Galilee.

Jesus at the Festival of Booths

10 But after his brothers had gone to the festival, then he also went, not publicly but as it were^* in secret. ¹¹The Jews were looking for him at the festival and saying, ‘Where is he?’ ¹²And there was considerable complaining about him among the crowds. While some were saying, ‘He is a good man’, others were saying, ‘No, he is deceiving the crowd.’ ¹³Yet no one would speak openly about him for fear of the Jews.