Psalm 77

⁴To the Lord I cry aloud, and He answers me from His holy mountain. Selah

¹A Maskil of David, when he was in the cave. A prayer. I cry aloud to the Lord; I lift my voice to the Lord for mercy.

²I pour out my complaint before Him; I reveal my trouble to Him.

¹A Psalm of Asaph. The Mighty One, God the Lord, speaks and summons the earth from where the sun rises to where it sets.

¹For the choirmaster. According to Jeduthun. A Psalm of David. In God alone my soul finds rest; my salvation comes from Him.

¹For the choirmaster. For Jeduthun. A Psalm of David. I said, “I will watch my ways so that I will not sin with my tongue; I will guard my mouth with a muzzle as long as the wicked are present.”

⁶This poor man called out, and the Lord heard him; He saved him from all his troubles.

⁹My soul longs for You in the night; indeed, my spirit seeks You at dawn. For when Your judgments come upon the earth, the people of the world learn righteousness.

¹⁵Call upon Me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you will honor Me.”

¹⁶O Lord, they sought You in their distress; when You disciplined them, they poured out a quiet prayer.

³⁵All his sons and daughters tried to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted. “No,” he said. “I will go down to Sheol mourning for my son.” So his father wept for him.

⁷During the days of Jesus’ earthly life, He offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the One who could save Him from death, and He was heard because of His reverence.

¹From inside the fish, Jonah prayed to the Lord his God,

²saying: “In my distress I called to the Lord, and He answered me. From the belly of Sheol I called for help, and You heard my voice.

²From the ends of the earth I call out to You whenever my heart is faint. Lead me to the rock that is higher than I.

²I pour out my complaint before Him; I reveal my trouble to Him.

³Although my spirit grows faint within me, You know my way. Along the path I travel they have hidden a snare for me.

¹¹Therefore I will not restrain my mouth; I will speak in the anguish of my spirit; I will complain in the bitterness of my soul.

²³For calamity from God terrifies me, and His splendor I cannot overpower.

³⁹Why should any mortal man complain, in view of his sins?

⁴For the arrows of the Almighty have pierced me; my spirit drinks in their poison; the terrors of God are arrayed against me.

¹³When I think my bed will comfort me and my couch will ease my complaint,

¹⁴then You frighten me with dreams and terrify me with visions,

⁶I am weary from groaning; all night I flood my bed with weeping and drench my couch with tears.

¹³Then they sat on the ground with him for seven days and seven nights, but no one spoke a word to him because they saw how intense his suffering was.

³For then it would outweigh the sand of the seas—no wonder my words have been rash.

¹That night sleep escaped the king; so he ordered the Book of Records, the Chronicles, to be brought in and read to him.

⁷Remember the days of old; consider the years long past. Ask your father, and he will tell you, your elders, and they will inform you.

⁹Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the Lord. Wake up as in days past, as in generations of old. Was it not You who cut Rahab to pieces, who pierced through the dragon?

⁵I remember the days of old; I meditate on all Your works; I consider the work of Your hands.

¹For the choirmaster. A Maskil of the sons of Korah. We have heard with our ears, O God; our fathers have told us the work You did in their days, in the days of old.

¹⁴Shepherd with Your staff Your people, the flock of Your inheritance. They live alone in a woodland, surrounded by pastures. Let them graze in Bashan and Gilead, as in the days of old.

¹⁵As in the days when you came out of Egypt, I will show My wonders.

⁹In all their distress, He too was afflicted, and the Angel of His Presence saved them. In His love and compassion He redeemed them; He lifted them up and carried them all the days of old.

¹⁰But they rebelled and grieved His Holy Spirit. So He turned and became their enemy, and He Himself fought against them.

⁸The Lord decrees His loving devotion by day, and at night His song is with me as a prayer to the God of my life.

⁴Be angry, yet do not sin; on your bed, search your heart and be still. Selah

²³Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my concerns.

²⁴See if there is any offensive way in me; lead me in the way everlasting.

⁴⁰Let us examine and test our ways, and turn back to the Lord.

¹⁰But no one asks, ‘Where is God my Maker, who gives us songs in the night,

¹⁶I said to myself, “Behold, I have grown and increased in wisdom beyond all those before me who were over Jerusalem, and my mind has observed a wealth of wisdom and knowledge.”

¹For the choirmaster. A Psalm of the sons of Korah. You showed favor to Your land, O Lord; You restored Jacob from captivity.

³¹For the Lord will not cast us off forever.

³²Even if He causes grief, He will show compassion according to His abundant loving devotion.

⁴⁶How long, O Lord? Will You hide Yourself forever? Will Your wrath keep burning like fire?

¹I ask then, did God reject His people? Certainly not! I am an Israelite myself, a descendant of Abraham, from the tribe of Benjamin.

²God did not reject His people, whom He foreknew. Do you not know what the Scripture says about Elijah, how he appealed to God against Israel:

⁵Will You be angry with us forever? Will You draw out Your anger to all generations?

³⁸Now, however, You have spurned and rejected him; You are enraged by Your anointed one.

¹⁹God is not a man, that He should lie, or a son of man, that He should change His mind. Does He speak and not act? Does He promise and not fulfill?

⁶It is not as though God’s word has failed. For not all who are descended from Israel are Israel.

⁹The Lord is not slow in keeping His promise as some understand slowness, but is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish but everyone to come to repentance.

²⁵But Abraham answered, ‘Child, remember that during your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things. But now he is comforted here, while you are in agony.

²⁶And besides all this, a great chasm has been fixed between us and you, so that even those who wish cannot cross from here to you, nor can anyone cross from there to us.’

³⁴In keeping with the forty days you spied out the land, you shall bear your guilt forty years—a year for each day—and you will experience My alienation.

¹⁸Why is my pain unending, and my wound incurable, refusing to be healed? You have indeed become like a mirage to me—water that is not there.

¹⁴But Zion said, “The Lord has forsaken me; the Lord has forgotten me!”

¹⁵“Can a woman forget her nursing child, or lack compassion for the son of her womb? Even if she could forget, I will not forget you!

¹¹O Lord, do not withhold Your mercy from me; Your loving devotion and faithfulness will always guard me.

²⁵After the master of the house gets up and shuts the door, you will stand outside knocking and saying, ‘Lord, open the door for us.’ But he will reply, ‘I do not know where you are from.’

²⁶Then you will say, ‘We ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets.’

¹⁷If anyone with earthly possessions sees his brother in need, but withholds his compassion from him, how can the love of God abide in him?

³²For God has consigned everyone to disobedience so that He may have mercy on everyone.

⁶Remember, O Lord, Your compassion and loving devotion, for they are from age to age.

³You asked, ‘Who is this who conceals My counsel without knowledge?’ Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know.

⁶Your right hand, O Lord, is majestic in power; Your right hand, O Lord, has shattered the enemy.

²²In my alarm I said, “I am cut off from Your sight!” But You heard my plea for mercy when I called to You for help.

²⁴Immediately the boy’s father cried out, “I do believe; help my unbelief!”

²O Lord, I have heard the report of You; I stand in awe, O Lord, of Your deeds. Revive them in these years; make them known in these years. In Your wrath, remember mercy!

³God came from Teman, and the Holy One from Mount Paran. Selah His glory covered the heavens, and His praise filled the earth.

⁵I considered the days of old, the years long in the past.

⁵I remember the days of old; I meditate on all Your works; I consider the work of Your hands.

¹²Remember the wonders He has done, His marvels, and the judgments He has pronounced,

⁵Remember the wonders He has done, His marvels, and the judgments He has pronounced,

¹²At their feasts are the lyre and harp, tambourines and flutes and wine. They disregard the actions of the Lord and fail to see the work of His hands.

⁵Since they show no regard for the works of the Lord or what His hands have done, He will tear them down and never rebuild them.

¹¹They forgot what He had done, the wonders He had shown them.

²⁴My tongue will indeed proclaim Your righteousness all day long, for those who seek my harm are disgraced and confounded.

¹¹They will tell of the glory of Your kingdom and speak of Your might,

⁷And you shall teach them diligently to your children and speak of them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up.

²Sing to Him, sing praises to Him; tell of all His wonders.

³⁴May my meditation be pleasing to Him, for I rejoice in the Lord.

⁴One generation will commend Your works to the next, and will proclaim Your mighty acts—

¹¹Who among the gods is like You, O Lord? Who is like You—majestic in holiness, revered with praises, performing wonders?

¹⁷until I entered God’s sanctuary; then I discerned their end.

²⁵“To whom will you liken Me, or who is My equal?” asks the Holy One.

³¹For their rock is not like our Rock, even our enemies concede.

⁶For who in the skies can compare with the Lord? Who among the heavenly beings is like the Lord?

⁷In the council of the holy ones, God is greatly feared, and awesome above all who surround Him.

¹⁸To whom will you liken God? To what image will you compare Him?

²⁷He delivers and rescues; He performs signs and wonders in the heavens and on the earth, for He has rescued Daniel from the power of the lions.”

⁴He alone does great wonders. His loving devotion endures forever.

¹¹Who among the gods is like You, O Lord? Who is like You—majestic in holiness, revered with praises, performing wonders?

⁹Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the Lord. Wake up as in days past, as in generations of old. Was it not You who cut Rahab to pieces, who pierced through the dragon?

¹⁴In the future, when your son asks you, ‘What does this mean?’ you are to tell him, ‘With a mighty hand the Lord brought us out of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.

¹⁸Blessed be the Lord God, the God of Israel, who alone does marvelous deeds.

²⁹But they are Your people, Your inheritance, whom You brought out by Your great power and outstretched arm.”

⁶Therefore tell the Israelites: ‘I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians and deliver you from their bondage. I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment.

⁹In all their distress, He too was afflicted, and the Angel of His Presence saved them. In His love and compassion He redeemed them; He lifted them up and carried them all the days of old.

²Remember Your congregation, which You purchased long ago and redeemed as the tribe of Your inheritance—Mount Zion, where You dwell.

²⁶And I prayed to the Lord and said, “O Lord God, do not destroy Your people, Your inheritance, whom You redeemed through Your greatness and brought out of Egypt with a mighty hand.

³Jacob said to Joseph, “God Almighty appeared to me at Luz in the land of Canaan, and there He blessed me

⁴and told me, ‘Behold, I will make you fruitful and multiply you; I will make you a multitude of peoples, and will give this land to your descendants after you as an everlasting possession.’

²¹Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and all that night the Lord drove back the sea with a strong east wind that turned it into dry land. So the waters were divided,

¹⁵You trampled the sea with Your horses, churning the great waters.

¹⁵Now the Jordan overflows its banks throughout the harvest season. But as soon as the priests carrying the ark reached the Jordan and their feet touched the water’s edge,

¹⁶the flowing water stood still. It backed up as far upstream as Adam, a city in the area of Zarethan, while the water flowing toward the Sea of the Arabah (the Salt Sea) was completely cut off. So the people crossed over opposite Jericho.

³The sea observed and fled; the Jordan turned back;

⁴the mountains skipped like rams, the hills like lambs.

⁸Were You angry at the rivers, O Lord? Was Your wrath against the streams? Did You rage against the sea when You rode on Your horses, on Your chariots of salvation?

⁹You brandished Your bow; You called for many arrows. Selah You split the earth with rivers.

¹⁴He shot His arrows and scattered the foes; He hurled lightning and routed them.

¹⁵He shot His arrows and scattered the foes; He hurled lightning and routed them.

⁴O Lord, when You went out from Seir, when You marched from the land of Edom, the earth trembled, the heavens poured out rain, and the clouds poured down water.

⁶Flash forth Your lightning and scatter them; shoot Your arrows and rout them.

⁸the earth shook and the heavens poured down rain before God, the One on Sinai, before God, the God of Israel.

⁹You sent abundant rain, O God; You refreshed Your weary inheritance.

³³to Him who rides upon the highest heavens of old; behold, His mighty voice resounds.

⁴His lightning illuminates the world; the earth sees and trembles.

¹⁹Then the temple of God in heaven was opened, and the ark of His covenant appeared in His temple. And there were flashes of lightning, rumblings, peals of thunder, an earthquake, and a great hailstorm.

⁵¹At that moment the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth quaked, and the rocks were split.

²Suddenly there was a great earthquake, for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven, rolled away the stone, and sat on it.

⁴O Lord, when You went out from Seir, when You marched from the land of Edom, the earth trembled, the heavens poured out rain, and the clouds poured down water.

¹⁴The Lord thundered from heaven; the voice of the Most High resounded.

²⁸The waters flowed back and covered the chariots and horsemen—the entire army of Pharaoh that had chased the Israelites into the sea. Not one of them survived.

¹⁵You trampled the sea with Your horses, churning the great waters.

¹¹You divided the sea before them, and they crossed through it on dry ground. You hurled their pursuers into the depths like a stone into raging waters.

¹⁰The Lord sits enthroned over the flood; the Lord is enthroned as King forever.

²Clouds and darkness surround Him; righteousness and justice are His throne’s foundation.

³³O, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments, and untraceable His ways!

²¹And the Lord went before them in a pillar of cloud to guide their way by day, and in a pillar of fire to give them light by night, so that they could travel by day or night.

⁵²He led out His people like sheep and guided them like a flock in the wilderness.

¹⁹And the angel of God, who had gone before the camp of Israel, withdrew and went behind them. The pillar of cloud also moved from before them and stood behind them,

¹¹Then His people remembered the days of old, the days of Moses. Where is He who brought them through the sea with the shepherds of His flock? Where is the One who set His Holy Spirit among them,

¹²who sent His glorious arm to lead them by the right hand of Moses, who divided the waters before them to gain for Himself everlasting renown,

¹For the choirmaster. To the tune of “The Lilies of the Covenant.” A Psalm of Asaph. Hear us, O Shepherd of Israel, who leads Joseph like a flock; You who sit enthroned between the cherubim, shine forth

¹³But by a prophet the Lord brought Israel out of Egypt, and by a prophet he was preserved.