A Prayer for Retribution against Oppressors

94 O Yahweh, God of vengeance,

God of vengeance, shine forth.

2 Rise up, O Judge of the earth.

Repay upon the proud what is their rightful due.

3 How long will the wicked, O Yahweh,

how long will the wicked exult?

4 ⌊They gush words⌋a unrestrained.

All the evildoers boast.

5 They crush your people, O Yahweh;

they oppress your inheritance.

6 They kill widow and stranger,

and they murder orphans,

7 whileb they say, “Yahc does not see,”

and “The God of Jacob does not pay attention.”

8 You pay attention, O brutes among the people.

And you fools, when will you show insight?

9 Will the one who planted the ear not hear?

Will the one who formed the eye not see?

10 Will the one who instructs nations not rebuke,

the one who teaches humankind knowledge?

11 Yahweh knows the thoughts of humankind,

that ⌊they are to no purpose⌋.d

12 Blessed is the man, O Yah, whom you instruct

and teach from your law,

13 to give him rest from days of trouble,

until a pit is dug for the wicked.

14 For Yahweh will not abandon his people,

nor forsake his inheritance.

15 For judgment will return to righteousness,e

and all the upright in heart will follow after it.

16 Who rose up for me against the wicked?

Who stood up for me against the workers of iniquity?

17 If Yahweh had not been my help,

my soul would soon have dwelt in silence.

18 When I thought,f “My foot is slipping,”

your loyal love, O Yahweh, supported me.

19 When my troubled thoughts were many ⌊within me⌋,g

your consolations cheered my soul.

20 Can there be allied with you a throne of destruction,

one that forms trouble based on statute?

21 They band together against the life of the righteous,

and declare the blameless guilty of blood.h

22 But Yahweh has become my high stronghold,

and my God has become my rock of refuge.

23 And he will repay on them their iniquity,

and byi their evil he will destroy them.

Yahweh our God will destroy them.

A Call to Worship and Obey

95 Come, let us sing for joy to Yahweh;

let us shout joyfully to the rock of our salvation.

2 Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving;

with songs let us shout joyfully to him.

3 For Yahweh is thea great God,

and the great king over all gods,

4 in whose hand are the unexplored placesb of the earth,

and the heights of the mountains are his,

5 to whom belongs the sea that he made, c

and the dry land that his hands formed.

6 Come in, let us worship and bow down;

let us kneel before Yahweh, our maker.

7 For he is our God,

and we are the people of his pasture

and the sheep of his hand.

⌊Today⌋d if you will hear his voice:e

8 “Do not harden your heart as at Meribah,

as in the day of Massah in the wilderness,

9 when your ancestorsf tried me.

They put me to the test,

even though they had seen my work.

10 For forty years I loathed that generation,

and said, ‘They are a people whose heart wanders.

And my ways they do not know.’

11 Therefore I swore in my anger,

‘They shall surely not enter into my rest.’ ”