Psalms 39–41

1I 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.”

2I was mute with silence. I held my peace, even from good. My sorrow was stirred.

3My heart was hot within me. While I meditated, the fire burned. I spoke with my tongue:

4“Yahweh, show me my end, what is the measure of my days. Let me know how frail I am.

5Behold, you have made my days hand widths. My lifetime is as nothing before you. Surely every man stands as a breath.” Selah.

6“Surely every man walks like a shadow. Surely they busy themselves in vain. He heaps up, and doesn’t know who shall gather.

7Now, Lord, what do I wait for? My hope is in you.

8Deliver me from all my transgressions. Don’t make me the reproach of the foolish.

9I was mute. I didn’t open my mouth, because you did it.

10Remove your scourge away from me. I am overcome by the blow of your hand.

11When you rebuke and correct man for iniquity, you consume his wealth like a moth. Surely every man is but a breath.” Selah.

12“Hear my prayer, Yahweh, 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.

13Oh spare me, that I may recover strength, before I go away and exist no more.”

1I waited patiently for Yahweh. He turned to me, and heard my cry.

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.

3He has put a new song in my mouth, even praise to our God. Many shall see it, and fear, and shall trust in Yahweh.

4Blessed is the man who makes Yahweh his trust, and doesn’t respect the proud, nor such as turn away to lies.

5Many, Yahweh, 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.

6Sacrifice and offering you didn’t desire. You have opened my ears. You have not required burnt offering and sin offering.

7Then I said, “Behold, I have come. It is written about me in the book in the scroll.

8I delight to do your will, my God. Yes, your law is within my heart.”

9I have proclaimed glad news of righteousness in the great assembly. Behold, I will not seal my lips, Yahweh, you know.

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.

11Don’t withhold your tender mercies from me, Yahweh. Let your loving kindness and your truth continually preserve me.

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.

13Be pleased, Yahweh, to deliver me. Hurry to help me, Yahweh.

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.

15Let them be desolate by reason of their shame that tell me, “Aha! Aha!”

16Let all those who seek you rejoice and be glad in you. Let such as love your salvation say continually, “Let Yahweh be exalted!”

17But I am poor and needy. May the Lord think about me. You are my help and my deliverer. Don’t delay, my God.

1Blessed is he who considers the poor. Yahweh will deliver him in the day of evil.

2Yahweh 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.

3Yahweh will sustain him on his sickbed, and restore him from his bed of illness.

4I said, “Yahweh, have mercy on me! Heal me, for I have sinned against you.”

5My enemies speak evil against me: “When will he die, and his name perish?”

6If he comes to see me, he speaks falsehood. His heart gathers iniquity to itself. When he goes abroad, he tells it.

7All who hate me whisper together against me. They imagine the worst for me.

8“An evil disease”, they say, “has afflicted him. Now that he lies he shall rise up no more.”

9Yes, my own familiar friend, in whom I trusted, who ate bread with me, has lifted up his heel against me.

10But you, Yahweh, have mercy on me, and raise me up, that I may repay them.

11By this I know that you delight in me, because my enemy doesn’t triumph over me.

12As for me, you uphold me in my integrity, and set me in your presence forever.

13Blessed be Yahweh, the God of Israel, from everlasting and to everlasting! Amen and amen.