Through My Bible Yr 2 – December 20

Psalm 140

For the director of music. A psalm of David.

¹ Rescue me, O LORD, from evil men;
protect me from men of violence,

² who devise evil plans in their hearts
and stir up war every day.

³ They make their tongues as sharp as a serpent’s;
the poison of vipers is on their lips.
Selah

⁴ Keep me, O LORD, from the hands of the wicked;
protect me from men of violence
who plan to trip my feet.

⁵ Proud men have hidden a snare for me;
they have spread out the cords of their net
and have set traps for me along my path.
Selah

⁶ O LORD, I say to you, “You are my God.”
Hear, O LORD, my cry for mercy.

⁷ O Sovereign LORD, my strong deliverer,
who shields my head in the day of battle-

⁸ do not grant the wicked their desires, O LORD;
do not let their plans succeed,
or they will become proud.
Selah

⁹ Let the heads of those who surround me
be covered with the trouble their lips have caused.

¹⁰ Let burning coals fall upon them;
may they be thrown into the fire,
into miry pits, never to rise.

¹¹ Let slanderers not be established in the land;
may disaster hunt down men of violence.

¹² I know that the LORD secures justice for the poor
and upholds the cause of the needy.

¹³ Surely the righteous will praise your name
and the upright will live before you.

Psalm 141

A psalm of David.

¹ O LORD, I call to you; come quickly to me.
Hear my voice when I call to you.

² May my prayer be set before you like incense;
may the lifting up of my hands be like the evening sacrifice.

³ Set a guard over my mouth, O LORD;
keep watch over the door of my lips.

⁴ Let not my heart be drawn to what is evil,
to take part in wicked deeds
with men who are evildoers;
let me not eat of their delicacies.

⁵ Let a righteous man ^[a] strike me—it is a kindness;
let him rebuke me—it is oil on my head.
My head will not refuse it.
Yet my prayer is ever against the deeds of evildoers;

⁶ their rulers will be thrown down from the cliffs,
and the wicked will learn that my words were well spoken.

⁷ They will say, “As one plows and breaks up the earth,
so our bones have been scattered at the mouth of the grave. ^[b]”

⁸ But my eyes are fixed on you, O Sovereign LORD;
in you I take refuge—do not give me over to death.

⁹ Keep me from the snares they have laid for me,
from the traps set by evildoers.

¹⁰ Let the wicked fall into their own nets,
while I pass by in safety.

Footnotes:

1. Psalm 141:5 Or Let the Righteous One
2. Psalm 141:7 Hebrew Sheol

Scripture taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright©1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved.