New Living Translation NLT
The Message Bible MSG
1 I come to you for protection, O LORD my God. Save me from my persecutors—rescue me!
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God! God! I am running to you for dear life; the chase is wild.
2 If you don’t, they will maul me like a lion, tearing me to pieces with no one to rescue me.
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If they catch me, I'm finished: ripped to shreds by foes fierce as lions, dragged into the forest and left unlooked for, unremembered.
3 O LORD my God, if I have done wrong or am guilty of injustice,
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God, if I've done what they say -
4 if I have betrayed a friend or plundered my enemy without cause,
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betrayed my friends, ripped off my enemies - If my hands are really that dirty,
5 then let my enemies capture me. Let them trample me into the ground and drag my honor in the dust. Interlude
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let them get me, walk all over me, leave me flat on my face in the dirt.
6 Arise, O LORD, in anger! Stand up against the fury of my enemies! Wake up, my God, and bring justice!
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Stand up, God; pit your holy fury against my furious enemies.
7 Gather the nations before you. Rule over them from on high.
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My accusers have packed the courtroom; it's judgment time.
8 The LORD judges the nations. Declare me righteous, O LORD, for I am innocent, O Most High!
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Take your place on the bench, reach for your gavel, throw out the false charges against me. I'm ready, confident in your verdict: "Innocent."
9 End the evil of those who are wicked, and defend the righteous. For you look deep within the mind and heart, O righteous God.
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Close the book on Evil, God, but publish your mandate for us. You get us ready for life: you probe for our soft spots, you knock off our rough edges.
10 God is my shield, saving those whose hearts are true and right.
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And I'm feeling so fit, so safe: made right, kept right.
11 God is an honest judge. He is angry with the wicked every day.
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God in solemn honor does things right, but his nerves are sandpapered raw. Nobody gets by with anything.
12 If a person does not repent, God will sharpen his sword; he will bend and string his bow.
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God is already in action - Sword honed on his whetstone, bow strung, arrow on the string,
13 He will prepare his deadly weapons and shoot his flaming arrows.
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Lethal weapons in hand, each arrow a flaming missile.
14 The wicked conceive evil; they are pregnant with trouble and give birth to lies.
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Look at that guy! He had sex with sin, he's pregnant with evil. Oh, look! He's having the baby - a Lie-Baby!
15 They dig a deep pit to trap others, then fall into it themselves.
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See that man shoveling day after day, digging, then concealing, his man-trap down that lonely stretch of road? Go back and look again - you'll see him in it headfirst, legs waving in the breeze.
16 The trouble they make for others backfires on them. The violence they plan falls on their own heads.
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That's what happens: mischief backfires; violence boomerangs.
17 I will thank the LORD because he is just; I will sing praise to the name of the LORD Most High.
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I'm thanking God, who makes things right. I'm singing the fame of heaven-high God.
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.
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.