DAILY OFFICE

Psalm 41

¹ Blessed is the one who considers the poor!
    In the day of trouble the Lord delivers him;
² the Lord protects him and keeps him alive;
    he is called blessed in the land;
    you do not give him up to the will of his enemies.
³ The Lord sustains him on his sickbed;
    in his illness you restore him to full health.
⁴ As for me, I said, “O Lord, be gracious to me;
    heal me, for I have sinned against you!”
⁵ My enemies say of me in malice,
    “When will he die, and his name perish?”
⁶ And when one comes to see me, he utters empty words,
    while his heart gathers iniquity;
    when he goes out, he tells it abroad.
⁷ All who hate me whisper together about me;
    they imagine the worst for me.
⁸ They say, “A deadly thing is poured out on him;
    he will not rise again from where he lies.”
⁹ Even my close friend in whom I trusted,
    who ate my bread, has lifted his heel against me.
¹⁰ But you, O Lord, be gracious to me,
    and raise me up, that I may repay them!
¹¹ By this I know that you delight in me:
    my enemy will not shout in triumph over me.
¹² But you have upheld me because of my integrity,
    and set me in your presence forever.
¹³ Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel,
    from everlasting to everlasting!
   Amen and Amen.

Psalm 44

¹ O God, we have heard with our ears,
    our fathers have told us,
    what deeds you performed in their days,
    in the days of old:
² you with your own hand drove out the nations,
    but them you planted;
    you afflicted the peoples,
    but them you set free;
³ for not by their own sword did they win the land,
    nor did their own arm save them,
    but your right hand and your arm,
    and the light of your face,
    for you delighted in them.
⁴ You are my King, O God;
    ordain salvation for Jacob!
⁵ Through you we push down our foes;
    through your name we tread down those who rise up against us.
⁶ For not in my bow do I trust,
    nor can my sword save me.
⁷ But you have saved us from our foes
    and have put to shame those who hate us.
⁸ In God we have boasted continually,
    and we will give thanks to your name forever.
⁹ But you have rejected us and disgraced us
    and have not gone out with our armies.
¹⁰ You have made us turn back from the foe,
    and those who hate us have gotten spoil.
¹¹ You have made us like sheep for slaughter
    and have scattered us among the nations.
¹² You have sold your people for a trifle,
    demanding no high price for them.
¹³ You have made us the taunt of our neighbors,
    the derision and scorn of those around us.
¹⁴ You have made us a byword among the nations,
    a laughingstock among the peoples.
¹⁵ All day long my disgrace is before me,
    and shame has covered my face
¹⁶ at the sound of the taunter and reviler,
    at the sight of the enemy and the avenger.
¹⁷ All this has come upon us,
    though we have not forgotten you,
    and we have not been false to your covenant.
¹⁸ Our heart has not turned back,
    nor have our steps departed from your way;
¹⁹ yet you have broken us in the place of jackals
    and covered us with the shadow of death.
²⁰ If we had forgotten the name of our God
    or spread out our hands to a foreign god,
²¹ would not God discover this?
    For he knows the secrets of the heart.
²² Yet for your sake we are killed all the day long;
    we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.
²³ Awake! Why are you sleeping, O Lord?
    Rouse yourself! Do not reject us forever!
²⁴ Why do you hide your face?
    Why do you forget our affliction and oppression?
²⁵ For our soul is bowed down to the dust;
    our belly clings to the ground.
²⁶ Rise up; come to our help!
    Redeem us for the sake of your steadfast love!

Psalm 52

¹ Why do you boast of evil, O mighty man?
    The steadfast love of God endures all the day.
² Your tongue plots destruction,
    like a sharp razor, you worker of deceit.
³ You love evil more than good,
    and lying more than speaking what is right. Selah
⁴ You love all words that devour,
    O deceitful tongue.
⁵ But God will break you down forever;
    he will snatch and tear you from your tent;
    he will uproot you from the land of the living. 
⁶ The righteous shall see and fear,
    and shall laugh at him, saying,
⁷ “See the man who would not make
    God his refuge,
    but trusted in the abundance of his riches
    and sought refuge in his own destruction!”
⁸ But I am like a green olive tree
    in the house of God.
    I trust in the steadfast love of God
    forever and ever.
⁹ I will thank you forever,
    because you have done it.
    I will wait for your name, for it is good,
    in the presence of the godly.

Galatians 1:18-2:10

¹⁸  Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to visit Cephas and remained with him fifteen days. ¹⁹ But I saw none of the other apostles except James the Lord’s brother. ²⁰ (In what I am writing to you, before God, I do not lie!) ²¹ Then I went into the regions of Syria and Cilicia. ²² And I was still unknown in person to the churches of Judea that are in Christ. ²³ They only were hearing it said, “He who used to persecute us is now preaching the faith he once tried to destroy.” ²⁴ And they glorified God because of me. ^2:1 Then after fourteen years I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, taking Titus along with me. ² I went up because of a revelation and set before them (though privately before those who seemed influential) the gospel that I proclaim among the Gentiles, in order to make sure I was not running or had not run in vain. ³ But even Titus, who was with me, was not forced to be circumcised, though he was a Greek. ⁴ Yet because of false brothers secretly brought in—who slipped in to spy out our freedom that we have in Christ Jesus, so that they might bring us into slavery— ⁵ to them we did not yield in submission even for a moment, so that the truth of the gospel might be preserved for you. ⁶ And from those who seemed to be influential (what they were makes no difference to me; God shows no partiality)—those, I say, who seemed influential added nothing to me. ⁷ On the contrary, when they saw that I had been entrusted with the gospel to the uncircumcised, just as Peter had been entrusted with the gospel to the circumcised ⁸ (for he who worked through Peter for his apostolic ministry to the circumcised worked also through me for mine to the Gentiles), ⁹ and when James and Cephas and John, who seemed to be pillars, perceived the grace that was given to me, they gave the right hand of fellowship to Barnabas and me, that we should go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised. ¹⁰ Only, they asked us to remember the poor, the very thing I was eager to do.

Matthew 13:44-52

⁴⁴ “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field. ⁴⁵ “Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls, ⁴⁶ who, on finding one pearl of great value, went and sold all that he had and bought it. ⁴⁷ “Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a net that was thrown into the sea and gathered fish of every kind. ⁴⁸ When it was full, men drew it ashore and sat down and sorted the good into containers but threw away the bad. ⁴⁹ So it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come out and separate the evil from the righteous ⁵⁰ and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. ⁵¹ “Have you understood all these things?” They said to him, “Yes.” ⁵² And he said to them, “Therefore every scribe who has been trained for the kingdom of heaven is like a master of a house, who brings out of his treasure what is new and what is old.”

English Standard Version (ESV) The Holy Bible, English Standard Version Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.