Psalms 63; Psalms 64; Psalms 65; Romans 6

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Psalms 63

1 God! My God! It's you— I search for you! My whole being thirsts for you! My body desires you in a dry and tired land, no water anywhere.
2 Yes, I've seen you in the sanctuary; I've seen your power and glory.
3 My lips praise you because your faithful love is better than life itself!
4 So I will bless you as long as I'm alive; I will lift up my hands in your name.
5 I'm fully satisfied— as with a rich dinner. My mouth speaks praise with joy on my lips—
6 whenever I ponder you on my bed, whenever I meditate on you in the middle of the night—
7 because you've been a help to me and I shout for joy in the protection of your wings.
8 My whole being clings to you; your strong hand upholds me.
9 But what about those people who want to destroy me? Let them go into the bowels of the earth!
10 Let their blood flow by the sword! Let them be food for wild jackals!
11 But the king should rejoice in God; everyone who swears by God should give praise when the mouths of liars are shut for good.
Copyright © 2011 Common English Bible

Psalms 64

1 Listen to me when I complain, God! Protect my life from the enemy's terror!
2 Hide me from the secret plots of wicked people; hide me from the schemes of evildoers
3 who sharpen their tongues like swords. They aim their arrow—a cruel word—
4 from their hiding places so as to shoot an innocent person. They shoot without warning and without fear.
5 They encourage themselves with evil words. They plan on laying traps in secret. "Who will be able to see them?" they ask.
6 "Let someone try to expose our crimes! We've devised a perfect plot! It's deep within the human mind and heart."
7 But God will shoot them with an arrow! Without warning, they will be wounded!
8 The LORD will make them trip over their own tongues; everyone who sees them will just shake their heads.
9 Then all people will honor God, will announce the act of God, will understand it was God's work.
10 Let the righteous rejoice in the LORD; let them take refuge in him; let everyone whose heart is in the right place give praise!
Copyright © 2011 Common English Bible

Psalms 65

1 God of Zion, to you even silence is praise. Promises made to you are kept—
2 you listen to prayer— and all living things come to you.
3 When wrongdoings become too much for me, you forgive our sins.
4 How happy is the one you choose to bring close, the one who lives in your courtyards! We are filled full by the goodness of your house, by the holiness of your temple.
5 In righteousness you answer us, by your awesome deeds, God of our salvation— you, who are the security of all the far edges of the earth, even the distant seas.
6 You establish the mountains by your strength; you are dressed in raw power.
7 You calm the roaring seas; calm the roaring waves, calm the noise of the nations.
8 Those who dwell on the far edges stand in awe of your acts. You make the gateways of morning and evening sing for joy.
9 You visit the earth and make it abundant, enriching it greatly by God's stream, full of water. You provide people with grain because that is what you've decided.
10 Drenching the earth's furrows, leveling its ridges, you soften it with rain showers; you bless its growth.
11 You crown the year with your goodness; your paths overflow with rich food.
12 Even the desert pastures drip with it, and the hills are dressed in pure joy.
13 The meadowlands are covered with flocks, the valleys decked out in grain— they shout for joy; they break out in song!
Copyright © 2011 Common English Bible

Romans 6

1 So what are we going to say? Should we continue sinning so grace will multiply?
2 Absolutely not! All of us died to sin. How can we still live in it?
3 Or don't you know that all who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?
4 Therefore, we were buried together with him through baptism into his death, so that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too can walk in newness of life.
5 If we were united together in a death like his, we will also be united together in a resurrection like his.
6 This is what we know: the person that we used to be was crucified with him in order to get rid of the corpse that had been controlled by sin. That way we wouldn't be slaves to sin anymore,
7 because a person who has died has been freed from sin's power.
8 But if we died with Christ, we have faith that we will also live with him.
9 We know that Christ has been raised from the dead and he will never die again. Death no longer has power over him.
10 He died to sin once and for all with his death, but he lives for God with his life.
11 In the same way, you also should consider yourselves dead to sin but alive for God in Christ Jesus.
12 So then, don't let sin rule your body, so that you do what it wants.
13 Don't offer parts of your body to sin, to be used as weapons to do wrong. Instead, present yourselves to God as people who have been brought back to life from the dead, and offer all the parts of your body to God to be used as weapons to do right.
14 Sin will have no power over you, because you aren't under Law but under grace.
15 So what? Should we sin because we aren't under Law but under grace? Absolutely not!
16 Don't you know that if you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, that you are slaves of the one whom you obey? That's true whether you serve as slaves of sin, which leads to death, or as slaves of the kind of obedience that leads to righteousness.
17 But thank God that although you used to be slaves of sin, you gave wholehearted obedience to the teaching that was handed down to you, which provides a pattern.
18 Now that you have been set free from sin, you have become slaves of righteousness.
19 (I'm speaking with ordinary metaphors because of your limitations.) Once, you offered the parts of your body to be used as slaves to impurity and to lawless behavior that leads to still more lawless behavior. Now, you should present the parts of your body as slaves to righteousness, which makes your lives holy.
20 When you were slaves of sin, you were free from the control of righteousness.
21 What consequences did you get from doing things that you are now ashamed of? The outcome of those things is death.
22 But now that you have been set free from sin and become slaves to God, you have the consequence of a holy life, and the outcome is eternal life.
23 The wages that sin pays are death, but God's gift is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Copyright © 2011 Common English Bible