Day 171 of 364

^38:1A Psalm by David, for a memorial. LORD, don’t rebuke me in your wrath, neither chasten me in your hot displeasure. ^38:2For your arrows have pierced me, your hand presses hard on me. ^38:3There is no soundness in my flesh because of your indignation, neither is there any health in my bones because of my sin. ^38:4For my iniquities have gone over my head. As a heavy burden, they are too heavy for me. ^38:5My wounds are loathsome and corrupt because of my foolishness. ^38:6I am in pain and bowed down greatly. I go mourning all day long. ^38:7For my waist is filled with burning. There is no soundness in my flesh. ^38:8I am faint and severely bruised. I have groaned by reason of the anguish of my heart. ^38:9Lord, all my desire is before you. My groaning is not hidden from you. ^38:10My heart throbs. My strength fails me. As for the light of my eyes, it has also left me. ^38:11My lovers and my friends stand aloof from my plague. My kinsmen stand far away. ^38:12They also who seek after my life lay snares. Those who seek my hurt speak mischievous things, and meditate deceits all day long. ^38:13But I, as a deaf man, don’t hear. I am as a mute man who doesn’t open his mouth. ^38:14Yes, I am as a man who doesn’t hear, in whose mouth are no reproofs. ^38:15For I hope in you, LORD. You will answer, Lord my God. ^38:16For I said, “Don’t let them gloat over me, or exalt themselves over me when my foot slips.” ^38:17For I am ready to fall. My pain is continually before me. ^38:18For I will declare my iniquity. I will be sorry for my sin. ^38:19But my enemies are vigorous and many. Those who hate me without reason are numerous. ^38:20They who give evil for good are also adversaries to me, because I follow what is good. ^38:21Don’t forsake me, LORD. My God, don’t be far from me. ^38:22Hurry to help me, Lord, my salvation. ^39:1For the Chief Musician. For Jeduthun. A Psalm by David. I said, “I will watch my ways, so that I don’t sin with my tongue. I will keep my mouth with a bridle while the wicked is before me.” ^39:2I was mute with silence. I held my peace, even from good. My sorrow was stirred. ^39:3My heart was hot within me. While I meditated, the fire burned. I spoke with my tongue: ^39:4“LORD, show me my end, what is the measure of my days. Let me know how frail I am. ^39:5Behold, you have made my days hand widths. My lifetime is as nothing before you. Surely every man stands as a breath.” Selah. ^39:6“Surely every man walks like a shadow. Surely they busy themselves in vain. He heaps up, and doesn’t know who shall gather. ^39:7Now, Lord, what do I wait for? My hope is in you. ^39:8Deliver me from all my transgressions. Don’t make me the reproach of the foolish. ^39:9I was mute. I didn’t open my mouth, because you did it. ^39:10Remove your scourge away from me. I am overcome by the blow of your hand. ^39:11When you rebuke and correct man for iniquity, you consume his wealth like a moth. Surely every man is but a breath.” Selah. ^39:12“Hear my prayer, LORD, and give ear to my cry. Don’t be silent at my tears. For I am a stranger with you, a foreigner, as all my fathers were. ^39:13Oh spare me, that I may recover strength, before I go away and exist no more.” ^40:1For the Chief Musician. A Psalm by David. I waited patiently for the LORD. He turned to me, and heard my cry. ^40:2He brought me up also out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay. He set my feet on a rock, and gave me a firm place to stand. ^40:3He has put a new song in my mouth, even praise to our God. Many shall see it, and fear, and shall trust in the LORD. ^40:4Blessed is the man who makes the LORD his trust, and doesn’t respect the proud, nor such as turn away to lies. ^40:5Many, LORD, my God, are the wonderful works which you have done, and your thoughts which are toward us. They can’t be declared back to you. If I would declare and speak of them, they are more than can be counted. ^40:6Sacrifice and offering you didn’t desire. You have opened my ears. You have not required burnt offering and sin offering. ^40:7Then I said, “Behold, I have come. It is written about me in the book in the scroll. ^40:8I delight to do your will, my God. Yes, your law is within my heart.” ^40:9I have proclaimed glad news of righteousness in the great assembly. Behold, I will not seal my lips, LORD, you know. ^40:10I have not hidden your righteousness within my heart. I have declared your faithfulness and your salvation. I have not concealed your loving kindness and your truth from the great assembly. ^40:11Don’t withhold your tender mercies from me, LORD. Let your loving kindness and your truth continually preserve me. ^40:12For innumerable evils have surrounded me. My iniquities have overtaken me, so that I am not able to look up. They are more than the hairs of my head. My heart has failed me. ^40:13Be pleased, LORD, to deliver me. Hurry to help me, LORD. ^40:14Let them be disappointed and confounded together who seek after my soul to destroy it. Let them be turned backward and brought to dishonor who delight in my hurt. ^40:15Let them be desolate by reason of their shame that tell me, “Aha! Aha!” ^40:16Let all those who seek you rejoice and be glad in you. Let such as love your salvation say continually, “Let the LORD be exalted!” ^40:17But I am poor and needy. May the Lord think about me. You are my help and my deliverer. Don’t delay, my God. ^41:1For the Chief Musician. A Psalm by David. Blessed is he who considers the poor. The LORD will deliver him in the day of evil. ^41:2The LORD will preserve him, and keep him alive. He shall be blessed on the earth, and he will not surrender him to the will of his enemies. ^41:3The LORD will sustain him on his sickbed, and restore him from his bed of illness. ^41:4I said, “LORD, have mercy on me! Heal me, for I have sinned against you.” ^41:5My enemies speak evil against me: “When will he die, and his name perish?” ^41:6If he comes to see me, he speaks falsehood. His heart gathers iniquity to itself. When he goes abroad, he tells it. ^41:7All who hate me whisper together against me. They imagine the worst for me. ^41:8“An evil disease”, they say, “has afflicted him. Now that he lies he shall rise up no more.” ^41:9Yes, my own familiar friend, in whom I trusted, who ate bread with me, has lifted up his heel against me. ^41:10But you, LORD, have mercy on me, and raise me up, that I may repay them. ^41:11By this I know that you delight in me, because my enemy doesn’t triumph over me. ^41:12As for me, you uphold me in my integrity, and set me in your presence forever. ^41:13Blessed be the LORD, the God of Israel, from everlasting and to everlasting! Amen and amen. ^42:1For the Chief Musician. A contemplation by the sons of Korah. As the deer pants for the water brooks, so my soul pants after you, God. ^42:2My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God? ^42:3My tears have been my food day and night, while they continually ask me, “Where is your God?” ^42:4These things I remember, and pour out my soul within me, how I used to go with the crowd, and led them to God’s house, with the voice of joy and praise, a multitude keeping a holy day. ^42:5Why are you in despair, my soul? Why are you disturbed within me? Hope in God! For I shall still praise him for the saving help of his presence. ^42:6My God, my soul is in despair within me. Therefore I remember you from the land of the Jordan, the heights of Hermon, from the hill Mizar. ^42:7Deep calls to deep at the noise of your waterfalls. All your waves and your billows have swept over me. ^42:8The LORD will command his loving kindness in the daytime. In the night his song shall be with me: a prayer to the God of my life. ^42:9I will ask God, my rock, “Why have you forgotten me? Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?” ^42:10As with a sword in my bones, my adversaries reproach me, while they continually ask me, “Where is your God?” ^42:11Why are you in despair, my soul? Why are you disturbed within me? Hope in God! For I shall still praise him, the saving help of my countenance, and my God. ^43:1Vindicate me, God, and plead my cause against an ungodly nation. Oh, deliver me from deceitful and wicked men. ^43:2For you are the God of my strength. Why have you rejected me? Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy? ^43:3Oh, send out your light and your truth. Let them lead me. Let them bring me to your holy hill, to your tents. ^43:4Then I will go to the altar of God, to God, my exceeding joy. I will praise you on the harp, God, my God. ^43:5Why are you in despair, my soul? Why are you disturbed within me? Hope in God! For I shall still praise him: my Savior, my helper, and my God.