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Psalm 144

1  Blessed be the Lord my rock, ♦︎
   who teaches my hands for war and my fingers for battle;
2  My steadfast help and my fortress,
      my stronghold and my deliverer,
      my shield in whom I trust, ♦︎
   who subdues the peoples under me.
3  O Lord, what are mortals that you should consider them; ♦︎
   mere human beings, that you should take thought for them?
4  They are like a breath of wind; ♦︎
   their days pass away like a shadow.
5  Bow your heavens, O Lord, and come down; ♦︎
   touch the mountains and they shall smoke.
6  Cast down your lightnings and scatter them; ♦︎
   shoot out your arrows and let thunder roar.
7  Reach down your hand from on high; ♦︎
   deliver me and take me out of the great waters,
      from the hand of foreign enemies,
8  Whose mouth speaks wickedness ♦︎
   and their right hand is the hand of falsehood.
9  O God, I will sing to you a new song; ♦︎
   I will play to you on a ten-stringed harp,
10  You that give salvation to kings ♦︎
   and have delivered David your servant.
11  Save me from the peril of the sword ♦︎
   and deliver me from the hand of foreign enemies,
12  Whose mouth speaks wickedness ♦︎
   and whose right hand is the hand of falsehood;
13  So that our sons in their youth
      may be like well-nurtured plants, ♦︎
   and our daughters like pillars
      carved for the corners of the temple;
14  Our barns be filled with all manner of store; ♦︎
   our flocks bearing thousands,
      and ten thousands in our fields;
15  Our cattle be heavy with young: ♦︎
   may there be no miscarriage or untimely birth,
      no cry of distress in our streets.
16  Happy are the people whose blessing this is. ♦︎
   Happy are the people who have the Lord for their God.

Fifth Vision: The Lampstand and Olive Trees

4The angel who talked with me came again, and wakened me, as one is wakened from sleep. ²He said to me, ‘What do you see?’ And I said, ‘I see a lampstand all of gold, with a bowl on the top of it; there are seven lamps on it, with seven lips on each of the lamps that are on the top of it. ³And by it there are two olive trees, one on the right of the bowl and the other on its left.’ ⁴I said to the angel who talked with me, ‘What are these, my lord?’ ⁵Then the angel who talked with me answered me, ‘Do you not know what these are?’ I said, ‘No, my lord.’ ⁶He said to me, ‘This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel: Not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit, says the Lord of hosts. ⁷What are you, O great mountain? Before Zerubbabel you shall become a plain; and he shall bring out the top stone amid shouts of “Grace, grace to it!” ’

8 Moreover, the word of the Lord came to me, saying, ⁹‘The hands of Zerubbabel have laid the foundation of this house; his hands shall also complete it. Then you will know that the Lord of hosts has sent me to you. ¹⁰For whoever has despised the day of small things shall rejoice, and shall see the plummet in the hand of Zerubbabel.

‘These seven are the eyes of the Lord, which range through the whole earth.’ ¹¹Then I said to him, ‘What are these two olive trees on the right and the left of the lampstand?’ ¹²And a second time I said to him, ‘What are these two branches of the olive trees, which pour out the oil^* through the two golden pipes?’ ¹³He said to me, ‘Do you not know what these are?’ I said, ‘No, my lord.’ ¹⁴Then he said, ‘These are the two anointed ones who stand by the Lord of the whole earth.’

The Old Life and the New

17 Now this I affirm and insist on in the Lord: you must no longer live as the Gentiles live, in the futility of their minds. ¹⁸They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of their ignorance and hardness of heart. ¹⁹They have lost all sensitivity and have abandoned themselves to licentiousness, greedy to practise every kind of impurity. ²⁰That is not the way you learned Christ! ²¹For surely you have heard about him and were taught in him, as truth is in Jesus. ²²You were taught to put away your former way of life, your old self, corrupt and deluded by its lusts, ²³and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, ²⁴and to clothe yourselves with the new self, created according to the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.

Rules for the New Life

25 So then, putting away falsehood, let all of us speak the truth to our neighbours, for we are members of one another. ²⁶Be angry but do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, ²⁷and do not make room for the devil. ²⁸Thieves must give up stealing; rather let them labour and work honestly with their own hands, so as to have something to share with the needy. ²⁹Let no evil talk come out of your mouths, but only what is useful for building up,^* as there is need, so that your words may give grace to those who hear. ³⁰And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with which you were marked with a seal for the day of redemption. ³¹Put away from you all bitterness and wrath and anger and wrangling and slander, together with all malice, ³²and be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ has forgiven you.^*