Psalm 94:1–96:13

God the Judge of All

94Lord, you are a God who punishes; reveal your anger!

²You are the judge of all;

rise and give the proud what they deserve!

³How much longer will the wicked be glad?

How much longer, Lord?

⁴How much longer will criminals be proud

and boast about their crimes?

⁵They crush your people, Lord;

they oppress those who belong to you.

⁶They kill widows and orphans,

and murder the strangers who live in our land.

⁷They say, “The Lord does not see us;

the God of Israel does not notice.”

⁸My people, how can you be such stupid fools?

When will you ever learn?

⁹God made our ears—can’t he hear?

He made our eyes—can’t he see?

¹⁰He scolds the nations—won’t he punish them?^s

He is the teacher of all—hasn’t he any knowledge?

^11*The Lord knows what they think;

he knows how senseless their reasoning is.

¹²Lord, how happy are those you instruct,

the ones to whom you teach your law!

¹³You give them rest from days of trouble

until a pit is dug to trap the wicked.

¹⁴The Lord will not abandon his people;

he will not desert those who belong to him.

¹⁵Justice will again be found in the courts,

and all righteous people will support it.

¹⁶Who stood up for me against the wicked?

Who took my side against the evildoers?

¹⁷If the Lord had not helped me,

I would have gone quickly to the land of silence.^t

¹⁸I said, “I am falling”;

but your constant love, O Lord, held me up.

¹⁹Whenever I am anxious and worried,

you comfort me and make me glad.

²⁰You have nothing to do with corrupt judges,

who make injustice legal,

²¹who plot against good people

and sentence the innocent to death.

²²But the Lord defends me;

my God protects me.

²³He will punish them for their wickedness

and destroy them for their sins;

the Lord our God will destroy them.

A Song of Praise

95Come, let us praise the Lord!

Let us sing for joy to God, who protects us!

²Let us come before him with thanksgiving

and sing joyful songs of praise.

³For the Lord is

a mighty God, a mighty king over all the gods.

⁴He rules over the whole earth,

from the deepest caves to the highest hills.

⁵He rules over the sea, which he made;

the land also, which he himself formed.

⁶Come, let us bow down and worship him;

let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker!

^7*He is our God;

we are the people he cares for,

the flock for which he provides.

Listen today to what he says:

^8*“Don’t be stubborn, as your ancestors were at Meribah,

as they were that day in the desert at Massah.

^9*There they put me to the test and tried me,

although they had seen what I did for them.

^10*For forty years I was disgusted with those people.

I said, ‘How disloyal they are!

They refuse to obey my commands.’

^11*I was angry and made a solemn promise:

‘You will never enter the land

where I would have given you rest.’ ”

God the Supreme King

96Sing a new song to the Lord!

Sing to the Lord, all the world!

²Sing to the Lord, and praise him!

Proclaim every day the good news that he has saved us.

³Proclaim his glory to the nations,

his mighty deeds to all peoples.

⁴The Lord is great and is to be highly praised;

he is to be honoured more than all the gods.

⁵The gods of all other nations are only idols,

but the Lord created the heavens.

⁶Glory and majesty surround him;

power and beauty fill his Temple.

^7*Praise the Lord, all people on earth;

praise his glory and might.

^8*Praise the Lord’s glorious name;

bring an offering and come into his Temple.

^9*Bow down before the Holy One when he appears;^u

tremble before him, all the earth!

¹⁰Say to all the nations, “The Lord is king!

The earth is set firmly in place and cannot be moved;

he will judge the peoples with justice.”

¹¹Be glad, earth and sky!

Roar, sea, and every creature in you;

¹²be glad, fields, and everything in you!

The trees in the woods will shout for joy

¹³when the Lord comes to rule the earth.

He will rule the peoples of the world

with justice and fairness.