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VERSES FOR OFFERINGS
Think about giving – it's truly beautiful in God's eyes. When you're preparing your offering, remember it should be your best, given with a sincere heart. It should be a joyful act, knowing how much God has already blessed us with, even when we don't deserve it. He's been incredibly generous, hasn't He?
If you only give what's leftover, well, life might just mirror that back to you. Think about it – give as if you're giving to yourself. Don't do it out of obligation or because you expect something in return. True giving comes from the heart.
Don't make a big show of it either. It's not about getting praised or patted on the back. Let your giving be a quiet act between you and God. He sees what's in your heart, and He loves a cheerful giver. Remember what it says in 2 Corinthians 9:7: "Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver."
Giving is an act of worship, a way to give back a portion of what God has already given us. And when God gives, He gives abundantly. When you offer from the heart, you're opening the door for even more blessings. The more you give, the more you receive. It's a beautiful cycle.
I will place my rainbow in the clouds, and it will become a guarantee of the covenant between me and the earth.Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds,then I will remember my covenant with you and with all living creatures of all kinds. Never again will the waters become a flood and destroy all living things.
That day the Lord made a covenant with Abram: “To your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates River –
I will confirm my covenant as a perpetual covenant between me and you. It will extend to your descendants after you throughout their generations. I will be your God and the God of your descendants after you.I will give the whole land of Canaan – the land where you are now residing – to you and your descendants after you as a permanent possession. I will be their God.”
And now, if you will diligently listen to me and keep my covenant, then you will be my special possession out of all the nations, for all the earth is mine,and you will be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words that you will speak to the Israelites.”
He took the Book of the Covenant and read it aloud to the people, and they said, “We are willing to do and obey all that the Lord has spoken.”So Moses took the blood and splashed it on the people and said, “This is the blood of the covenant that the Lord has made with you in accordance with all these words.”
So realize that the Lord your God is the true God, the faithful God who keeps covenant faithfully with those who love him and keep his commandments, to a thousand generations,
It is not because of your righteousness, or even your inner uprightness, that you have come here to possess their land. Instead, because of the wickedness of these nations the Lord your God is driving them out ahead of you in order to confirm the promise he made on oath to your ancestors, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
“Therefore, keep the terms of this covenant and obey them so that you may be successful in everything you do.
“Look! I have set before you today life and prosperity on the one hand, and death and disaster on the other.What I am commanding you today is to love the Lord your God, to walk in his ways, and to obey his commandments, his statutes, and his ordinances. Then you will live and become numerous and the Lord your God will bless you in the land which you are about to possess.
Even if the mountains are removed and the hills displaced, my devotion will not be removed from you, nor will my covenant of friendship be displaced,” says the Lord, the one who has compassion on you.
For I, the Lord, love justice and hate robbery and sin. I will repay them because of my faithfulness; I will make a permanent covenant with them.
“Indeed, a time is coming,” says the Lord, “when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and Judah.It will not be like the old covenant that I made with their ancestors when I delivered them from Egypt. For they violated that covenant, even though I was like a faithful husband to them,” says the Lord.“But I will make a new covenant with the whole nation of Israel after I plant them back in the land,” says the Lord. “I will put my law within them and write it on their hearts and minds. I will be their God and they will be my people.“People will no longer need to teach their neighbors and relatives to know me. For all of them, from the least important to the most important, will know me,” says the Lord. “For I will forgive their sin and will no longer call to mind the wrong they have done.”
“‘I will make a covenant of peace with them and will rid the land of wild beasts, so that they can live securely in the wilderness and even sleep in the woods.
I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit within you. I will remove the heart of stone from your body and give you a heart of flesh.I will put my Spirit within you; I will take the initiative and you will obey my statutes and carefully observe my regulations.
“My covenant with him was designed to bring life and peace. I gave its statutes to him to fill him with awe, and he indeed revered me and stood in awe before me.
for this is my blood, the blood of the covenant, that is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.
And in the same way he took the cup after they had eaten, saying, “This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood.
But now Jesus has obtained a superior ministry, since the covenant that he mediates is also better and is enacted on better promises.For if that first covenant had been faultless, no one would have looked for a second one.
And so he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the eternal inheritance he has promised, since he died to set them free from the violations committed under the first covenant.
“This is the covenant that I will establish with them after those days, says the Lord. I will put my laws on their hearts and I will inscribe them on their minds,”then he says, “Their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no longer.”
Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go out from your country, your relatives, and your father’s household to the land that I will show you.There was a famine in the land, so Abram went down to Egypt to stay for a while because the famine was severe.As he approached Egypt, he said to his wife Sarai, “Look, I know that you are a beautiful woman.When the Egyptians see you they will say, ‘This is his wife.’ Then they will kill me but will keep you alive.So tell them you are my sister so that it may go well for me because of you and my life will be spared on account of you.”When Abram entered Egypt, the Egyptians saw that the woman was very beautiful.When Pharaoh’s officials saw her, they praised her to Pharaoh. So Abram’s wife was taken into the household of Pharaoh,and he did treat Abram well on account of her. Abram received sheep and cattle, male donkeys, male servants, female servants, female donkeys, and camels.But the Lord struck Pharaoh and his household with severe diseases because of Sarai, Abram’s wife.So Pharaoh summoned Abram and said, “What is this you have done to me? Why didn’t you tell me that she was your wife?Why did you say, ‘She is my sister,’ so that I took her to be my wife? Here is your wife! Take her and go!”Then I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you, and I will make your name great, so that you will exemplify divine blessing.Pharaoh gave his men orders about Abram, and so they expelled him, along with his wife and all his possessions.I will bless those who bless you, but the one who treats you lightly I must curse, and all the families of the earth will bless one another by your name.”
When Abram was 99 years old, the Lord appeared to him and said, “I am the sovereign God. Walk before me and be blameless.This is my requirement that you and your descendants after you must keep: Every male among you must be circumcised.You must circumcise the flesh of your foreskins. This will be a reminder of the covenant between me and you.Throughout your generations every male among you who is eight days old must be circumcised, whether born in your house or bought with money from any foreigner who is not one of your descendants.They must indeed be circumcised, whether born in your house or bought with money. The sign of my covenant will be visible in your flesh as a permanent reminder.Any uncircumcised male who has not been circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin will be cut off from his people – he has failed to carry out my requirement.”Then God said to Abraham, “As for your wife, you must no longer call her Sarai; Sarah will be her name.I will bless her and will give you a son through her. I will bless her and she will become a mother of nations. Kings of countries will come from her!”Then Abraham bowed down with his face to the ground and laughed as he said to himself, “Can a son be born to a man who is a hundred years old? Can Sarah bear a child at the age of ninety?”Abraham said to God, “O that Ishmael might live before you!”God said, “No, Sarah your wife is going to bear you a son, and you will name him Isaac. I will confirm my covenant with him as a perpetual covenant for his descendants after him.Then I will confirm my covenant between me and you, and I will give you a multitude of descendants.”
and said, “‘I solemnly swear by my own name,’ decrees the Lord, ‘that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son,I will indeed bless you, and I will greatly multiply your descendants so that they will be as countless as the stars in the sky or the grains of sand on the seashore. Your descendants will take possession of the strongholds of their enemies.Because you have obeyed me, all the nations of the earth will pronounce blessings on one another using the name of your descendants.’”
The Lord said to Moses, “Write down these words, for in accordance with these words I have made a covenant with you and with Israel.”So he was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights; he did not eat bread, and he did not drink water. He wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the ten commandments.
The Lord our God made a covenant with us at Horeb.You must not offer false testimony against another.You must not desire another man’s wife, nor should you crave his house, his field, his male and female servants, his ox, his donkey, or anything else he owns.”The Lord said these things to your entire assembly at the mountain from the middle of the fire, the cloud, and the darkness with a loud voice, and that was all he said. Then he inscribed the words on two stone tablets and gave them to me.Then, when you heard the voice from the midst of the darkness while the mountain was ablaze, all your tribal leaders and elders approached me.You said, “The Lord our God has shown us his great glory and we have heard him speak from the middle of the fire. It is now clear to us that God can speak to human beings and they can keep on living.But now, why should we die, because this intense fire will consume us! If we keep hearing the voice of the Lord our God we will die!Who is there from the entire human race who has heard the voice of the living God speaking from the middle of the fire as we have, and has lived?You go near so that you can hear everything the Lord our God is saying and then you can tell us whatever he says to you; then we will pay attention and do it.”When the Lord heard you speaking to me, he said to me, “I have heard what these people have said to you – they have spoken well.If only it would really be their desire to fear me and obey all my commandments in the future, so that it may go well with them and their descendants forever.He did not make this covenant with our ancestors but with us, we who are here today, all of us living now.
He says: “Assemble my covenant people before me, those who ratified a covenant with me by sacrifice!”
O Lord, you are my God! I will exalt you in praise, I will extol your fame. For you have done extraordinary things, and executed plans made long ago exactly as you decreed.
He was wounded because of our rebellious deeds, crushed because of our sins; he endured punishment that made us well; because of his wounds we have been healed.
I will make a covenant of peace with them; it will be a perpetual covenant with them. I will establish them, increase their numbers, and place my sanctuary among them forever.
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have not come to abolish these things but to fulfill them.I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth pass away not the smallest letter or stroke of a letter will pass from the law until everything takes place.
For the promise to Abraham or to his descendants that he would inherit the world was not fulfilled through the law, but through the righteousness that comes by faith.
Brothers and sisters, I offer an example from everyday life: When a covenant has been ratified, even though it is only a human contract, no one can set it aside or add anything to it.Now the promises were spoken to Abraham and to his descendant. Scripture does not say, “and to the descendants,” referring to many, but “and to your descendant,” referring to one, who is Christ.
And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s descendants, heirs according to the promise.
But the Lord continually shows loyal love to his faithful followers, and is faithful to their descendants,
For this is what the Lord says: “For the eunuchs who observe my Sabbaths and choose what pleases me and are faithful to my covenant,I will set up within my temple and my walls a monument that will be better than sons and daughters. I will set up a permanent monument for them that will remain.
This day will become a memorial for you, and you will celebrate it as a festival to the Lord – you will celebrate it perpetually as a lasting ordinance.
He said, “See, I am going to make a covenant before all your people. I will do wonders such as have not been done in all the earth, nor in any nation. All the people among whom you live will see the work of the Lord, for it is a fearful thing that I am doing with you.
Be on guard so that you do not forget the covenant of the Lord your God that he has made with you, and that you do not make an image of any kind, just as he has forbidden you.For the Lord your God is a consuming fire; he is a jealous God.
If you obey these ordinances and are careful to do them, the Lord your God will faithfully keep covenant with you as he promised your ancestors.He will love and bless you, and make you numerous. He will bless you with many children, with the produce of your soil, your grain, your new wine, your oil, the offspring of your oxen, and the young of your flocks in the land which he promised your ancestors to give you.
The Lord always proves faithful and reliable to those who follow the demands of his covenant.
This is what the Lord says: “At the time I decide to show my favor, I will respond to you; in the day of deliverance I will help you; I will protect you and make you a covenant mediator for people, to rebuild the land and to reassign the desolate property.
“But I will make a new covenant with the whole nation of Israel after I plant them back in the land,” says the Lord. “I will put my law within them and write it on their hearts and minds. I will be their God and they will be my people.
Yet I will remember the covenant I made with you in the days of your youth, and I will establish a lasting covenant with you.
So I ask, God has not rejected his people, has he? Absolutely not! For I too am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, from the tribe of Benjamin.let their eyes be darkened so that they may not see, and make their backs bend continually.”I ask then, they did not stumble into an irrevocable fall, did they? Absolutely not! But by their transgression salvation has come to the Gentiles, to make Israel jealous.Now if their transgression means riches for the world and their defeat means riches for the Gentiles, how much more will their full restoration bring?Now I am speaking to you Gentiles. Seeing that I am an apostle to the Gentiles, I magnify my ministry,if somehow I could provoke my people to jealousy and save some of them.For if their rejection is the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance be but life from the dead?If the first portion of the dough offered is holy, then the whole batch is holy, and if the root is holy, so too are the branches.Now if some of the branches were broken off, and you, a wild olive shoot, were grafted in among them and participated in the richness of the olive root,do not boast over the branches. But if you boast, remember that you do not support the root, but the root supports you.Then you will say, “The branches were broken off so that I could be grafted in.”God has not rejected his people whom he foreknew! Do you not know what the scripture says about Elijah, how he pleads with God against Israel?
This is the record of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.Hezekiah the father of Manasseh, Manasseh the father of Amon, Amon the father of Josiah,and Josiah the father of Jeconiah and his brothers, at the time of the deportation to Babylon.After the deportation to Babylon, Jeconiah became the father of Shealtiel, Shealtiel the father of Zerubbabel,Zerubbabel the father of Abiud, Abiud the father of Eliakim, Eliakim the father of Azor,Azor the father of Zadok, Zadok the father of Achim, Achim the father of Eliud,Eliud the father of Eleazar, Eleazar the father of Matthan, Matthan the father of Jacob,and Jacob the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, by whom Jesus was born, who is called Christ.So all the generations from Abraham to David are fourteen generations, and from David to the deportation to Babylon, fourteen generations, and from the deportation to Babylon to Christ, fourteen generations.
He has done this to show mercy to our ancestors, and to remember his holy covenant –the oath that he swore to our ancestor Abraham. This oath grants
You are the sons of the prophets and of the covenant that God made with your ancestors, saying to Abraham, ‘And in your descendants all the nations of the earth will be blessed.’
who are Israelites. To them belong the adoption as sons, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the temple worship, and the promises.To them belong the patriarchs, and from them, by human descent, came the Christ, who is God over all, blessed forever! Amen.
For every one of God’s promises are “Yes” in him; therefore also through him the “Amen” is spoken, to the glory we give to God.
For all who rely on doing the works of the law are under a curse, because it is written, “Cursed is everyone who does not keep on doing everything written in the book of the law.”Now it is clear no one is justified before God by the law, because the righteous one will live by faith.But the law is not based on faith, but the one who does the works of the law will live by them.Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us (because it is written, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”)in order that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham would come to the Gentiles, so that we could receive the promise of the Spirit by faith.
The Holy Spirit is making clear that the way into the holy place had not yet appeared as long as the old tabernacle was standing.This was a symbol for the time then present, when gifts and sacrifices were offered that could not perfect the conscience of the worshiper.
And today the Lord has declared you to be his special people (as he already promised you) so you may keep all his commandments.
He proclaims his word to Jacob, his statutes and regulations to Israel.The Lord rebuilds Jerusalem, and gathers the exiles of Israel.He has not done so with any other nation; they are not aware of his regulations. Praise the Lord!
and the Lord stood at its top. He said, “I am the Lord, the God of your grandfather Abraham and the God of your father Isaac. I will give you and your descendants the ground you are lying on.Your descendants will be like the dust of the earth, and you will spread out to the west, east, north, and south. All the families of the earth will pronounce blessings on one another using your name and that of your descendants.I am with you! I will protect you wherever you go and will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I promised you!”
God said, “No, Sarah your wife is going to bear you a son, and you will name him Isaac. I will confirm my covenant with him as a perpetual covenant for his descendants after him.
Today I invoke heaven and earth as a witness against you that I have set life and death, blessing and curse, before you. Therefore choose life so that you and your descendants may live!Then if you and your descendants turn to the Lord your God and obey him with your whole mind and being just as I am commanding you today,I also call on you to love the Lord your God, to obey him and be loyal to him, for he gives you life and enables you to live continually in the land the Lord promised to give to your ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”
He chose the tribe of Judah, and Mount Zion, which he loves.He made his sanctuary as enduring as the heavens above; as secure as the earth, which he established permanently.
“As for me, this is my promise to them,” says the Lord. “My spirit, who is upon you, and my words, which I have placed in your mouth, will not depart from your mouth or from the mouths of your children and descendants from this time forward,” says the Lord.
I, the Lord, will be their God, and my servant David will be prince among them; I, the Lord, have spoken!
I tell you, from now on I will not drink of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom.”
“Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, because he has come to help and has redeemed his people.For he has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David,
For the promise is for you and your children, and for all who are far away, as many as the Lord our God will call to himself.”
For there is no distinction between the Jew and the Greek, for the same Lord is Lord of all, who richly blesses all who call on him.For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.
But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people of his own, so that you may proclaim the virtues of the one who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.
I confirm my covenant with you: Never again will all living things be wiped out by the waters of a flood; never again will a flood destroy the earth.”
“As for me, this is my covenant with you: You will be the father of a multitude of nations.No longer will your name be Abram. Instead, your name will be Abraham because I will make you the father of a multitude of nations.
the one who made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, who remains forever faithful,
So I will assign him a portion with the multitudes, he will divide the spoils of victory with the powerful, because he willingly submitted to death and was numbered with the rebels, when he lifted up the sin of many and intervened on behalf of the rebels.”
“I, Lord, make the following promise: ‘I have made a covenant with the day and with the night that they will always come at their proper times. Only if you people could break that covenantcould my covenant with my servant David and my covenant with the Levites ever be broken. So David will by all means always have a descendant to occupy his throne as king and the Levites will by all means always have priests who will minister before me.
I will give them one heart and I will put a new spirit within them; I will remove the hearts of stone from their bodies and I will give them tender hearts,
For this reason it is by faith so that it may be by grace, with the result that the promise may be certain to all the descendants – not only to those who are under the law, but also to those who have the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all
Brothers and sisters, I offer an example from everyday life: When a covenant has been ratified, even though it is only a human contract, no one can set it aside or add anything to it.
But when the appropriate time had come, God sent out his Son, born of a woman, born under the law,to redeem those who were under the law, so that we may be adopted as sons with full rights.
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have not come to abolish these things but to fulfill them.
“This is the covenant that I will establish with them after those days, says the Lord. I will put my laws on their hearts and I will inscribe them on their minds,”
The Lord said to Moses, “Write down these words, for in accordance with these words I have made a covenant with you and with Israel.”
Moreover, because he loved your ancestors, he chose their descendants who followed them and personally brought you out of Egypt with his great powerto dispossess nations greater and stronger than you and brought you here this day to give you their land as your property.
If his sons reject my law and disobey my regulations,if they break my rules and do not keep my commandments,I will punish their rebellion by beating them with a club, their sin by inflicting them with bruises.
Remember your compassionate and faithful deeds, O Lord, for you have always acted in this manner.Do not hold against me the sins of my youth or my rebellious acts! Because you are faithful to me, extend to me your favor, O Lord!
And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written: “The Deliverer will come out of Zion; he will remove ungodliness from Jacob.And this is my covenant with them, when I take away their sins.”
to the one who struck down the firstborn of Egypt, for his loyal love endures,and led Israel out from their midst, for his loyal love endures,with a strong hand and an outstretched arm, for his loyal love endures,
“Here is my servant whom I have chosen, the one I love, in whom I take great delight. I will put my Spirit on him, and he will proclaim justice to the nations.
You know that from your empty way of life inherited from your ancestors you were ransomed – not by perishable things like silver or gold,but by precious blood like that of an unblemished and spotless lamb, namely Christ.
He delivered his people; he ordained that his covenant be observed forever. His name is holy and awesome.
Though the Lord desired to crush him and make him ill, once restitution is made, he will see descendants and enjoy long life, and the Lord’s purpose will be accomplished through him.Having suffered, he will reflect on his work, he will be satisfied when he understands what he has done. “My servant will acquit many, for he carried their sins.
Go and learn what this saying means: ‘I want mercy and not sacrifice.’ For I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
Let all the people of the earth acknowledge the Lord and turn to him! Let all the nations worship you!
Therefore, since we have been declared righteous by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, how much more, since we have been reconciled, will we be saved by his life?Not only this, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received this reconciliation.So then, just as sin entered the world through one man and death through sin, and so death spread to all people because all sinned –for before the law was given, sin was in the world, but there is no accounting for sin when there is no law.Yet death reigned from Adam until Moses even over those who did not sin in the same way that Adam (who is a type of the coming one) transgressed.But the gracious gift is not like the transgression. For if the many died through the transgression of the one man, how much more did the grace of God and the gift by the grace of the one man Jesus Christ multiply to the many!And the gift is not like the one who sinned. For judgment, resulting from the one transgression, led to condemnation, but the gracious gift from the many failures led to justification.For if, by the transgression of the one man, death reigned through the one, how much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one, Jesus Christ!Consequently, just as condemnation for all people came through one transgression, so too through the one righteous act came righteousness leading to life for all people.For just as through the disobedience of the one man many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of one man many will be made righteous.through whom we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in the hope of God’s glory.
He always remembers his covenantal decree, the promise he made to a thousand generations –
But you, O Lord, are a compassionate and merciful God. You are patient and demonstrate great loyal love and faithfulness.
Do not let truth and mercy leave you; bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart.Do not accuse anyone without legitimate cause, if he has not treated you wrongly.Do not envy a violent man, and do not choose to imitate any of his ways;for one who goes astray is an abomination to the Lord, but he reveals his intimate counsel to the upright.The Lord’s curse is on the household of the wicked, but he blesses the home of the righteous.Although he is scornful to arrogant scoffers, yet he shows favor to the humble.The wise inherit honor, but he holds fools up to public contempt.Then you will find favor and good understanding, in the sight of God and people.
This is what the Lord says: “At the time I decide to show my favor, I will respond to you; in the day of deliverance I will help you; I will protect you and make you a covenant mediator for people, to rebuild the land and to reassign the desolate property.You will say to the prisoners, ‘Come out,’ and to those who are in dark dungeons, ‘Emerge.’ They will graze beside the roads; on all the slopes they will find pasture.
Then you will live in the land I gave to your fathers; you will be my people, and I will be your God.
For the Lord is good. His loyal love endures, and he is faithful through all generations.
So we must not grow weary in doing good, for in due time we will reap, if we do not give up.
For I will pour water on the parched ground and cause streams to flow on the dry land. I will pour my spirit on your offspring and my blessing on your children.
For his anger lasts only a brief moment, and his good favor restores one’s life. One may experience sorrow during the night, but joy arrives in the morning.
“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened for you.For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.
For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is God’s power for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.For the righteousness of God is revealed in the gospel from faith to faith, just as it is written, “The righteous by faith will live.”
You demonstrate your faithfulness to all generations. You established the earth and it stood firm.
For this is what the high and exalted one says, the one who rules forever, whose name is holy: “I dwell in an exalted and holy place, but also with the discouraged and humiliated, in order to cheer up the humiliated and to encourage the discouraged.
But above all pursue his kingdom and righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.
Now may the God of peace who by the blood of the eternal covenant brought back from the dead the great shepherd of the sheep, our Lord Jesus Christ,equip you with every good thing to do his will, working in us what is pleasing before him through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever. Amen.
I will find delight in your commands, which I love.I will lift my hands to your commands, which I love, and I will meditate on your statutes. ז (Zayin)
I will bow down toward your holy temple, and give thanks to your name, because of your loyal love and faithfulness, for you have exalted your promise above the entire sky.
Don’t be afraid, for I am with you! Don’t be frightened, for I am your God! I strengthen you – yes, I help you – yes, I uphold you with my saving right hand!
I will not break my covenant or go back on what I promised.Once and for all I have vowed by my own holiness, I will never deceive David.
It is not as though the word of God had failed. For not all those who are descended from Israel are truly Israel,
You are my witnesses,” says the Lord, “my servant whom I have chosen, so that you may consider and believe in me, and understand that I am he. No god was formed before me, and none will outlive me.
He did not waver in unbelief about the promise of God but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God.
The Lord avenges me. O Lord, your loyal love endures. Do not abandon those whom you have made!
Praise the Lord, O my soul! O Lord my God, you are magnificent. You are robed in splendor and majesty.He turns springs into streams; they flow between the mountains.They provide water for all the animals in the field; the wild donkeys quench their thirst.The birds of the sky live beside them; they chirp among the bushes.He waters the mountains from the upper rooms of his palace; the earth is full of the fruit you cause to grow.He provides grass for the cattle, and crops for people to cultivate, so they can produce food from the ground,as well as wine that makes people feel so good, and so they can have oil to make their faces shine, as well as food that sustains people’s lives.The trees of the Lord receive all the rain they need, the cedars of Lebanon which he planted,where the birds make nests, near the evergreens in which the herons live.The wild goats live in the high mountains; the rock badgers find safety in the cliffs.He made the moon to mark the months, and the sun sets according to a regular schedule.He covers himself with light as if it were a garment. He stretches out the skies like a tent curtain,You make it dark and night comes, during which all the beasts of the forest prowl around.The lions roar for prey, seeking their food from God.When the sun rises, they withdraw and sleep in their dens.Men then go out to do their work, and labor away until evening.How many living things you have made, O Lord! You have exhibited great skill in making all of them; the earth is full of the living things you have made.Over here is the deep, wide sea, which teems with innumerable swimming creatures, living things both small and large.The ships travel there, and over here swims the whale you made to play in it.All of your creatures wait for you to provide them with food on a regular basis.You give food to them and they receive it; you open your hand and they are filled with food.When you ignore them, they panic. When you take away their life’s breath, they die and return to dust.and lays the beams of the upper rooms of his palace on the rain clouds. He makes the clouds his chariot, and travels along on the wings of the wind.When you send your life-giving breath, they are created, and you replenish the surface of the ground.May the splendor of the Lord endure! May the Lord find pleasure in the living things he has made!He looks down on the earth and it shakes; he touches the mountains and they start to smolder.I will sing to the Lord as long as I live; I will sing praise to my God as long as I exist!May my thoughts be pleasing to him! I will rejoice in the Lord.May sinners disappear from the earth, and the wicked vanish! Praise the Lord, O my soul! Praise the Lord!He makes the winds his messengers, and the flaming fire his attendant.He established the earth on its foundations; it will never be upended.
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,gentleness, and self-control. Against such things there is no law.