The Message Bible MSG
New Living Translation NLT
1 God, listen! Listen to my prayer, listen to the pain in my cries.
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LORD, hear my prayer! Listen to my plea!
2 Don't turn your back on me just when I need you so desperately. Pay attention! This is a cry for help! And hurry - this can't wait!
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Don’t turn away from me in my time of distress. Bend down to listen, and answer me quickly when I call to you.
3 I'm wasting away to nothing, I'm burning up with fever.
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For my days disappear like smoke, and my bones burn like red-hot coals.
4 I'm a ghost of my former self, half-consumed already by terminal illness.
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My heart is sick, withered like grass, and I have lost my appetite.
5 My jaws ache from gritting my teeth; I'm nothing but skin and bones.
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Because of my groaning, I am reduced to skin and bones.
6 I'm like a buzzard in the desert, a crow perched on the rubble.
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I am like an owl in the desert, like a little owl in a far-off wilderness.
7 Insomniac, I twitter away, mournful as a sparrow in the gutter.
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I lie awake, lonely as a solitary bird on the roof.
8 All day long my enemies taunt me, while others just curse.
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My enemies taunt me day after day. They mock and curse me.
9 They bring in meals - casseroles of ashes! I draw drink from a barrel of my tears.
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I eat ashes for food. My tears run down into my drink
10 And all because of your furious anger; you swept me up and threw me out.
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because of your anger and wrath. For you have picked me up and thrown me out.
11 There's nothing left of me - a withered weed, swept clean from the path.
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My life passes as swiftly as the evening shadows. I am withering away like grass.
12 Yet you, God, are sovereign still, always and ever sovereign.
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But you, O LORD, will sit on your throne forever. Your fame will endure to every generation.
13 You'll get up from your throne and help Zion - it's time for compassionate help.
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You will arise and have mercy on Jerusalem — and now is the time to pity her, now is the time you promised to help.
14 Oh, how your servants love this city's rubble and weep with compassion over its dust!
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For your people love every stone in her walls and cherish even the dust in her streets.
15 The godless nations will sit up and take notice - see your glory, worship your name -
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Then the nations will tremble before the LORD . The kings of the earth will tremble before his glory.
16 When God rebuilds Zion, when he shows up in all his glory,
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For the LORD will rebuild Jerusalem. He will appear in his glory.
17 When he attends to the prayer of the wretched. He won't dismiss their prayer.
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He will listen to the prayers of the destitute. He will not reject their pleas.
18 Write this down for the next generation so people not yet born will praise God:
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Let this be recorded for future generations, so that a people not yet born will praise the LORD .
19 "God looked out from his high holy place; from heaven he surveyed the earth.
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Tell them the LORD looked down from his heavenly sanctuary. He looked down to earth from heaven
20 He listened to the groans of the doomed, he opened the doors of their death cells."
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to hear the groans of the prisoners, to release those condemned to die.
21 Write it so the story can be told in Zion, so God's praise will be sung in Jerusalem's streets
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And so the LORD ’s fame will be celebrated in Zion, his praises in Jerusalem,
22 And wherever people gather together along with their rulers to worship him.
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when multitudes gather together and kingdoms come to worship the LORD .
23 God sovereignly brought me to my knees, he cut me down in my prime.
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He broke my strength in midlife, cutting short my days.
24 "Oh, don't," I prayed, "please don't let me die. You have more years than you know what to do with!
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But I cried to him, “O my God, who lives forever, don’t take my life while I am so young!
25 You laid earth's foundations a long time ago, and handcrafted the very heavens;
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Long ago you laid the foundation of the earth and made the heavens with your hands.
26 You'll still be around when they're long gone, threadbare and discarded like an old suit of clothes. You'll throw them away like a worn-out coat,
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They will perish, but you remain forever; they will wear out like old clothing. You will change them like a garment and discard them.
27 but year after year you're as good as new.
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But you are always the same; you will live forever.
28 Your servants' children will have a good place to live and their children will be at home with you."
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The children of your people will live in security. Their children’s children will thrive in your presence.”
Published by permission. Originally published by NavPress in English as THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright 2002 by Eugene Peterson. All rights reserved.
Holy Bible. New Living Translation copyright© 1996, 2004, 2007, 2013 by
Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.