PSALMS 70 and 71

Psalm 70

O Lord, Do Not Delay

To the choirmaster. Of David, for the memorial offering.

1 

Make haste, O God, to deliver me!

    O Lord, make haste to help me!

2 

Let them be put to shame and confusion

    who seek my life!

Let them be turned back and brought to dishonour

    who delight in my hurt!

3 

Let them turn back because of their shame

    who say, “Aha, Aha!”

4 

May all who seek you

    rejoice and be glad in you!

May those who love your salvation

    say evermore, “God is great!” 

5 

But I am poor and needy;

    hasten to me, O God!

You are my help and my deliverer;

    O Lord, do not delay!

Singing the Psalms - Jason Silver

https://youtu.be/tRtYA--EwuU

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Psalm 71

Forsake Me Not When My Strength Is Spent

1 

In you, O Lord, do I take refuge;

    let me never be put to shame!

2 

In your righteousness deliver me and rescue me;

    incline your ear to me, and save me!

3 

Be to me a rock of refuge,

    to which I may continually come;

you have given the command to save me,

    for you are my rock and my fortress.

4 

Rescue me, O my God, from the hand of the wicked,

    from the grasp of the unjust and cruel man.

5 

For you, O Lord, are my hope,

    my trust, O Lord, from my youth.

6 

Upon you I have leaned from before my birth;

    you are he who took me from my mother's womb.

My praise is continually of you.

7 

I have been as a portent to many,

    but you are my strong refuge.

8 

My mouth is filled with your praise,

    and with your glory all the day.

9 

Do not cast me off in the time of old age;

    forsake me not when my strength is spent.

10 

For my enemies speak concerning me;

    those who watch for my life consult together

11 

and say, “God has forsaken him;

    pursue and seize him,

    for there is none to deliver him.”

12 

O God, be not far from me;

    O my God, make haste to help me!

13 

May my accusers be put to shame and consumed;

    with scorn and disgrace may they be covered

    who seek my hurt.

14 

But I will hope continually

    and will praise you yet more and more.

15 

My mouth will tell of your righteous acts,

    of your deeds of salvation all the day,

    for their number is past my knowledge.

16 

With the mighty deeds of the Lord God I will come;

    I will remind them of your righteousness, yours alone.

17 

O God, from my youth you have taught me,

    and I still proclaim your wondrous deeds.

18 

So even to old age and gray hairs,

    O God, do not forsake me,

until I proclaim your might to another generation,

    your power to all those to come.

19 

Your righteousness, O God,

    reaches the high heavens.

You who have done great things,

    O God, who is like you?

20 

You who have made me see 
many troubles and calamities

    will revive me again;

from the depths of the earth

    you will bring me up again.

21 

You will increase my greatness

    and comfort me again.

22 

I will also praise you with the harp

    for your faithfulness, O my God;

I will sing praises to you with the lyre,

    O Holy One of Israel.

23 

My lips will shout for joy,

    when I sing praises to you;

    my soul also, which you have redeemed.

24 

And my tongue will talk of your righteous help 
all the day long,

for they have been put to shame and disappointed

    who sought to do me hurt.

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Palm 71 in songs  -
Jason Silver 

https://youtu.be/MonSOqdyuK4
Ian White
https://youtu.be/-8v30NvH2YI

The SECOND LETTER of PAUL To The CORINTHIANS Chapter 3

The Second Letter of Paul to the  

CORINTHIANS

Chapter 3

Ministers of the New Covenant

1 Are we beginning to commend ourselves again? Or do we need, as some do, letters of recommendation to you, or from you? 

2 You yourselves are our letter of recommendation, written on our hearts, to be known and read by all. 

3 And you show that you are a letter from Christ delivered by us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts.

4 Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God. 5 Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God, 

6 who has made us sufficient to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.

7 Now if the ministry of death, carved in letters on stone, came with such glory that the Israelites could not gaze at Moses' face because of its glory, which was being brought to an end, 

8 will not the ministry of the Spirit have even more glory? 

9 For if there was glory in the ministry of condemnation, the ministry of righteousness must far exceed it in glory. 

10 Indeed, in this case, what once had glory has come to have no glory at all, because of the glory that surpasses it. 

11 For if what was being brought to an end came with glory, much more will what is permanent have glory.

12 Since we have such a hope, we are very bold, 

13 not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face so that the Israelites might not gaze at the outcome of what was being brought to an end. 

14 But their minds were hardened. For to this day, when they read the old covenant, that same veil remains unlifted, because only through Christ is it taken away. 

15 Yes, to this day whenever Moses is read a veil lies over their hearts. 

16 But when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. 

17 Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. 

18 And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.

The SECOND LETTER of PAUL to the CORINTHIANS Chapter 2

The Second  Letter of Paul to the  

CORINTHIANS

Chapter Two

1 For I made up my mind not to make another painful visit to you. 2 For if I cause you pain, who is there to make me glad but the one whom I have pained? 3 And I wrote as I did, so that when I came I might not suffer pain from those who should have made me rejoice, for I felt sure of all of you, that my joy would be the joy of you all. 4 For I wrote to you out of much affliction and anguish of heart and with many tears, not to cause you pain but to let you know the abundant love that I have for you.

Forgive the Sinner

5 Now if anyone has caused pain, he has caused it not to me, but in some measure—not to put it too severely—to all of you. 6 For such a one, this punishment by the majority is enough, 7 so you should rather turn to forgive and comfort him, or he may be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow. 8 So I beg you to reaffirm your love for him. 9 For this is why I wrote, that I might test you and know whether you are obedient in everything. 10 Anyone whom you forgive, I also forgive. Indeed, what I have forgiven, if I have forgiven anything, has been for your sake in the presence of Christ, 11 so that we would not be outwitted by Satan; for we are not ignorant of his designs.

Triumph in Christ

12 When I came to Troas to preach the gospel of Christ, even though a door was opened for me in the Lord, 13 my spirit was not at rest because I did not find my brother Titus there. So I took leave of them and went on to Macedonia.

14 But thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumphal procession, and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of him everywhere. 15 For we are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing, 16 to one a fragrance from death to death, to the other a fragrance from life to life. Who is sufficient for these things? 17 For we are not, like so many, peddlers of God's word, but as men of sincerity, as commissioned by God, in the sight of God we speak in Christ.  

The SECOND LETTER of PAUL to the CORINTHIANS Chapter 1

The Second  Letter of Paul to the  

CORINTHIANS

Chapter One

An Overview of 2 Corinthians by the "Bible Project"

Greeting

1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,

To the church of God that is at Corinth, with all the saints who are in the whole of Achaia:

2 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

God of All Comfort

3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, 

4 who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. 

5 For as we share abundantly in Christ's sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too.

6 If we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation; and if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we suffer. 

7 Our hope for you is unshaken, for we know that as you share in our sufferings, you will also share in our comfort.

8 For we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. 

9 Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. 

10 He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again. 

11 You also must help us by prayer, so that many will give thanks on our behalf for the blessing granted us through the prayers of many.

Paul's Change of Plans

12 For our boast is this, the testimony of our conscience, that we behaved in the world with simplicity and godly sincerity, not by earthly wisdom but by the grace of God, and supremely so toward you. 

13 For we are not writing to you anything other than what you read and understand and I hope you will fully understand— 

14 just as you did partially understand us—that on the day of our Lord Jesus you will boast of us as we will boast of you.

15 Because I was sure of this, I wanted to come to you first, so that you might have a second experience of grace. 

16 I wanted to visit you on my way to Macedonia, and to come back to you from Macedonia and have you send me on my way to Judea. 

17 Was I vacillating when I wanted to do this? Do I make my plans according to the flesh, ready to say “Yes, yes” and “No, no” at the same time? 

18 As surely as God is faithful, our word to you has not been Yes and No. 

19 For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, whom we proclaimed among you, Silvanus and Timothy and I, was not Yes and No, but in him it is always Yes. 

20 For all the promises of God find their Yes in him. That is why it is through him that we utter our Amen to God for his glory. 

21 And it is God who establishes us with you in Christ, and has anointed us, 

22 and who has also put his seal on us and given us his Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee.

23 But I call God to witness against me—it was to spare you that I refrained from coming again to Corinth. 

24 Not that we lord it over your faith, but we work with you for your joy, for you stand firm in your faith.

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The FIRST LETTER of PAUL to the THESSALONIANS Chapter 5

The First Letter of Paul to the  

THESSALONIANS

Chapter Five

The Day of the Lord

1 Now concerning the times and the seasons, brothers, you have no need to have anything written to you. 

2 For you yourselves are fully aware that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. 

3 While people are saying, “There is peace and security,” then sudden destruction will come upon them as labor pains come upon a pregnant woman, and they will not escape. 

4 But you are not in darkness, brothers, for that day to surprise you like a thief. 

5 For you are all children of light, children of the day. We are not of the night or of the darkness. 

6 So then let us not sleep, as others do, but let us keep awake and be sober. 

7 For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, are drunk at night. 

8 But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation. 

9 For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, 

10 who died for us so that whether we are awake or asleep we might live with him. 

11 Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing.

Final Instructions and Benediction

12 We ask you, brothers, to respect those who labor among you and are over you in the Lord and admonish you, 

13 and to esteem them very highly in love because of their work. Be at peace among yourselves. 

14 And we urge you, brothers, admonish the idle, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with them all. 

15 See that no one repays anyone evil for evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to everyone. 

16 Rejoice always, 

17 pray without ceasing, 

18 give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. 

19 Do not quench the Spirit. 

20 Do not despise prophecies, 

21 but test everything; hold fast what is good. 

22 Abstain from every form of evil.

23 Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. 

24 He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it.

25 Brothers, pray for us.

26 Greet all the brothers with a holy kiss.

27 I put you under oath before the Lord to have this letter read to all the brothers.

28 The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.

The FIRST LETTER of PAUL to The THESSALONIANS Chapter 4

The First Letter of Paul to the  

THESSALONIANS

Chapter Four

A Life Pleasing to God

1 Finally, then, brothers, we ask and urge you in the Lord Jesus, that as you received from us how you ought to walk and to please God, just as you are doing, that you do so more and more. 

2 For you know what instructions we gave you through the Lord Jesus. 

3 For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality; 

4 that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honour, 5 not in the passion of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God; 

6 that no one transgress and wrong his brother in this matter, because the Lord is an avenger in all these things, as we told you beforehand and solemnly warned you. 

7 For God has not called us for impurity, but in holiness. 

8 Therefore whoever disregards this, disregards not man but God, who gives his Holy Spirit to you.

9 Now concerning brotherly love you have no need for anyone to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love one another, 

10 for that indeed is what you are doing to all the brothers throughout Macedonia. But we urge you, brothers, to do this more and more, 

11 and to aspire to live quietly, and to mind your own affairs, and to work with your hands, as we instructed you, 12 so that you may walk properly before outsiders and be dependent on no one.

The Coming of the Lord

13 But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. 

14 For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. 

15 For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord,[ that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. 

16 For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. 

17 Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. 

18 Therefore encourage one another with these words.