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God’s Steadfast Love Endures

3I am one who has seen affliction
   under the rod of God’s ^* wrath;
² he has driven and brought me
   into darkness without any light;
³ against me alone he turns his hand,
   again and again, all day long.

⁴ He has made my flesh and my skin waste away,
   and broken my bones;
⁵ he has besieged and enveloped me
   with bitterness and tribulation;
⁶ he has made me sit in darkness
   like the dead of long ago.

⁷ He has walled me about so that I cannot escape;
   he has put heavy chains on me;
⁸ though I call and cry for help,
   he shuts out my prayer;
⁹ he has blocked my ways with hewn stones,
   he has made my paths crooked.

¹⁰ He is a bear lying in wait for me,
   a lion in hiding;
¹¹ he led me off my way and tore me to pieces;
   he has made me desolate;
¹² he bent his bow and set me
   as a mark for his arrow.

¹³ He shot into my vitals
   the arrows of his quiver;
¹⁴ I have become the laughing-stock of all my people,
   the object of their taunt-songs all day long.
¹⁵ He has filled me with bitterness,
   he has glutted me with wormwood.

¹⁶ He has made my teeth grind on gravel,
   and made me cower in ashes;
¹⁷ my soul is bereft of peace;
   I have forgotten what happiness is;
¹⁸ so I say, ‘Gone is my glory,
   and all that I had hoped for from the Lord.’

¹⁹ The thought of my affliction and my homelessness
   is wormwood and gall!
²⁰ My soul continually thinks of it
   and is bowed down within me.
²¹ But this I call to mind,
   and therefore I have hope:

²² The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases,^*
   his mercies never come to an end;
²³ they are new every morning;
   great is your faithfulness.
²⁴ ‘The Lord is my portion,’ says my soul,
   ‘therefore I will hope in him.’

³¹ For the Lord will not
   reject for ever.
³² Although he causes grief, he will have compassion
   according to the abundance of his steadfast love;
³³ for he does not willingly afflict
   or grieve anyone.