Psalm 39–41

Psalm 39

For the Chief Musician, for Jeduthun. A Psalm of David.

¹I said, I will take heed to my ways,

That I sin not with my tongue:

I will keep my mouth with a bridle,

While the wicked is before me.

²I was dumb with silence, I held my peace, even from good;

And my sorrow was stirred.

³My heart was hot within me;

While I was musing the fire burned:

Then spake I with my tongue:

⁴Jehovah, make me to know mine end,

And the measure of my days, what it is;

Let me know how frail I am.

⁵Behold, thou hast made my days as handbreadths;

And my life-time is as nothing before thee:

Surely every man at his best estate is altogether vanity. Selah

⁶Surely every man walketh in a vain show;

Surely they are disquieted in vain:

He heapeth up riches, and knoweth not who shall gather them.

⁷And now, Lord, what wait I for?

My hope is in thee.

⁸Deliver me from all my transgressions:

Make me not the reproach of the foolish.

⁹I was dumb, I opened not my mouth;

Because thou didst it.

¹⁰Remove thy stroke away from me:

I am consumed by the blow of thy hand.

¹¹When thou with rebukes dost correct man for iniquity,

Thou makest his beauty to consume away like a moth:

Surely every man is vanity. Selah

¹²Hear my prayer, O Jehovah, and give ear unto my cry;

Hold not thy peace at my tears:

For I am a stranger with thee,

A sojourner, as all my fathers were.

¹³Oh spare me, that I may recover strength,

Before I go hence, and be no more.

Psalm 40

For the Chief Musician. A Psalm of David.

¹I waited patiently for Jehovah;

And he inclined unto me, and heard my cry.

²He brought me up also out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay;

And he set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings.

³And he hath put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto our God:

Many shall see it, and fear,

And shall trust in Jehovah.

⁴Blessed is the man that maketh Jehovah his trust,

And respecteth not the proud, nor such as turn aside to lies.

⁵Many, O Jehovah my God, are the wonderful works which thou hast done,

And thy thoughts which are to us-ward;

They cannot be set in order unto thee;

If I would declare and speak of them,

They are more than can be numbered.

⁶Sacrifice and offering thou hast no delight in;

Mine ears hast thou opened:

Burnt-offering and sin-offering hast thou not required.

⁷Then said I, Lo, I am come;

In the roll of the book it is written of me:

⁸I delight to do thy will, O my God;

Yea, thy law is within my heart.

⁹I have proclaimed glad tidings of righteousness in the great assembly;

Lo, I will not refrain my lips, O Jehovah, thou knowest.

¹⁰I have not hid thy righteousness within my heart;

I have declared thy faithfulness and thy salvation;

I have not concealed thy lovingkindness and thy truth from the great assembly.

¹¹Withhold not thou thy tender mercies from me, O Jehovah;

Let thy lovingkindness and thy truth continually preserve me.

¹²For innumerable evils have compassed me about;

Mine iniquities have overtaken me, so that I am not able to look up;

They are more than the hairs of my head;

And my heart hath failed me.

¹³Be pleased, O Jehovah, to deliver me:

Make haste to help me, O Jehovah.

¹⁴Let them be put to shame and confounded together

That seek after my soul to destroy it:

Let them be turned backward and brought to dishonor

That delight in my hurt.

¹⁵Let them be desolate by reason of their shame

That say unto me, Aha, aha.

¹⁶Let all those that seek thee rejoice and be glad in thee:

Let such as love thy salvation say continually, Jehovah be magnified.

¹⁷But I am poor and needy;

Yet the Lord thinketh upon me:

Thou art my help and my deliverer;

Make no tarrying, O my God.

Psalm 41

For the Chief Musician. A Psalm of David.

¹Blessed is he that considereth the poor:

Jehovah will deliver him in the day of evil.

²Jehovah will preserve him, and keep him alive,

And he shall be blessed upon the earth;

And deliver not thou him unto the will of his enemies.

³Jehovah will support him upon the couch of languishing:

Thou makest all his bed in his sickness.

⁴I said, O Jehovah, have mercy upon me:

Heal my soul; for I have sinned against thee.

⁵Mine enemies speak evil against me, saying,

When will he die, and his name perish?

⁶And if he come to see me, he speaketh falsehood;

His heart gathereth iniquity to itself:

When he goeth abroad, he telleth it.

⁷All that hate me whisper together against me;

Against me do they devise my hurt.

⁸An evil disease, say they, cleaveth fast unto him;

And now that he lieth he shall rise up no more.

⁹Yea, mine own familiar friend, in whom I trusted,

Who did eat of my bread,

Hath lifted up his heel against me.

¹⁰But thou, O Jehovah, have mercy upon me, and raise me up,

That I may requite them.

¹¹By this I know that thou delightest in me,

Because mine enemy doth not triumph over me.

¹²And as for me, thou upholdest me in mine integrity,

And settest me before thy face for ever.

¹³Blessed be Jehovah, the God of Israel,

From everlasting and to everlasting.

Amen, and Amen.