Psalm 113–114

^1–3113Hallelujah!

You who serve God, praise God!

Just to speak his name is praise!

Just to remember God is a blessing—

now and tomorrow and always.

From east to west, from dawn to dusk,

keep lifting all your praises to God!

^4–9God is higher than anything and anyone,

outshining everything you can see in the skies.

Who can compare with God, our God,

so majestically enthroned,

Surveying his magnificent

heavens and earth?

He picks up the poor from out of the dirt,

rescues the wretched who’ve been thrown out with the trash,

Seats them among the honored guests,

a place of honor among the brightest and best.

He gives childless couples a family,

gives them joy as the parents of children.

Hallelujah!

^1–8114After Israel left Egypt,

the clan of Jacob left those barbarians behind;

Judah became holy land for him,

Israel the place of holy rule.

Sea took one look and ran the other way;

River Jordan turned around and ran off.

The mountains turned playful and skipped like rams,

the hills frolicked like spring lambs.

What’s wrong with you, Sea, that you ran away?

and you, River Jordan, that you turned and ran off?

And mountains, why did you skip like rams?

and you, hills, frolic like spring lambs?

Tremble, Earth! You’re in the Lord’s presence!

in the presence of Jacob’s God.

He turned the rock into a pool of cool water,

turned flint into fresh spring water.