321 Give ear, O heavens, and I will speak; let the earth hear the words of my mouth. 2 May my teaching drop like the rain, my speech condense like the dew; like gentle rain on grass, like showers on new growth. 3 For I will proclaim the name of the Lord; ascribe greatness to our God! 4 The Rock, his work is perfect, and all his ways are just. A faithful God, without deceit, just and upright is he; 5 yet his degenerate children have dealt falsely with him, a perverse and crooked generation. 6 Do you thus repay the Lord, O foolish and senseless people? Is not he your father, who created you, who made you and established you?
7 Remember the days of old, consider the years long past; ask your father, and he will inform you; your elders, and they will tell you. 8 When the Most High apportioned the nations, when he divided humankind, he fixed the boundaries of the peoples according to the number of the gods; 9 the Lord's own portion was his people, Jacob his allotted share. 10 He sustained him in a desert land, in a howling wilderness waste; he shielded him, cared for him, guarded him as the apple of his eye. 11 As an eagle stirs up its nest, and hovers over its young; as it spreads its wings, takes them up, and bears them aloft on its pinions, 12 the Lord alone guided him; no foreign god was with him. 13 He set him atop the heights of the land, and fed him with produce of the field; he nursed him with honey from the crags, with oil from flinty rock; 14 curds from the herd, and milk from the flock, with fat of lambs and rams; Bashan bulls and goats, together with the choicest wheat- you drank fine wine from the blood of grapes.
15 Jacob ate his fill; Jeshurun grew fat, and kicked. You grew fat, bloated, and gorged! He abandoned God who made him, and scoffed at the Rock of his salvation. 16 They made him jealous with strange gods, with abhorrent things they provoked him. 17 They sacrificed to demons, not God, to deities they had never known, to new ones recently arrived, whom your ancestors had not feared. 18 You were unmindful of the Rock that bore you; you forgot the God who gave you birth.
19 The Lord saw it, and was jealous; he spurned his sons and daughters. 20 He said: I will hide my face from them, I will see what their end will be; for they are a perverse generation, children in whom there is no faithfulness. 21 They made me jealous with what is no god, provoked me with their idols. So I will make them jealous with what is no people, provoke them with a foolish nation. 22 For a fire is kindled by my anger, and burns to the depths of Sheol; it devours the earth and its increase, and sets on fire the foundations of the mountains. 23 I will heap disasters upon them, spend my arrows against them: 24 wasting hunger, burning consumption, bitter pestilence. The teeth of beasts I will send against them, with venom of things crawling in the dust. 25 In the street the sword shall bereave, and in the chambers terror, for young man and woman alike, nursing child and old gray head.
26 I thought to scatter them and blot out the memory of them from humankind; 27 but I feared provocation by the enemy, for their adversaries might misunderstand and say, "Our hand is triumphant; it was not the Lord who did all this." 28 They are a nation void of sense; there is no understanding in them. 29 If they were wise, they would understand this; they would discern what the end would be. 30 How could one have routed a thousand, and two put a myriad to flight, unless their Rock had sold them, the Lord had given them up? 31 Indeed their rock is not like our Rock; our enemies are fools. 32 Their vine comes from the vinestock of Sodom, from the vineyards of Gomorrah; their grapes are grapes of poison, their clusters are bitter; 33 their wine is the poison of serpents, the cruel venom of asps. 34 Is not this laid up in store with me, sealed up in my treasuries? 35 Vengeance is mine, and recompense, for the time when their foot shall slip; because the day of their calamity is at hand, their doom comes swiftly. 36 Indeed the Lord will vindicate his people, have compassion on his servants, when he sees that their power is gone, neither bond nor free remaining. 37 Then he will say: Where are their gods, the rock in which they took refuge, 38 who ate the fat of their sacrifices, and drank the wine of their libations? Let them rise up and help you, let them be your protection!
39 See now that I, even I, am he; there is no god besides me. I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal; and no one can deliver from my hand. 40 For I lift up my hand to heaven, and swear: As I live forever, 41 when I whet my flashing sword, and my hand takes hold on judgment; I will take vengeance on my adversaries, and will repay those who hate me. 42 I will make my arrows drunk with blood, and my sword shall devour flesh- with the blood of the slain and the captives, from the long-haired enemy. 43 Praise, O heavens, his people, worship him, all you gods! For he will avenge the blood of his children, and take vengeance on his adversaries; he will repay those who hate him, and cleanse the land for his people.
44 Moses came and recited all the words of this song in the hearing of the people, he and Joshua son of Nun. 45 When Moses had finished reciting all these words to all Israel, 46 he said to them: "Take to heart all the words that I am giving in witness against you today; give them as a command to your children, so that they may diligently observe all the words of this law. 47 This is no trifling matter for you, but rather your very life; through it you may live long in the land that you are crossing over the Jordan to possess."
48 On that very day the Lord addressed Moses as follows: 49 "Ascend this mountain of the Abarim, Mount Nebo, which is in the land of Moab, across from Jericho, and view the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the Israelites for a possession; 50 you shall die there on the mountain that you ascend and shall be gathered to your kin, as your brother Aaron died on Mount Hor and was gathered to his kin; 51 because both of you broke faith with me among the Israelites at the waters of Meribath-kadesh in the wilderness of Zin, by failing to maintain my holiness among the Israelites. 52 Although you may view the land from a distance, you shall not enter it-the land that I am giving to the Israelites."
331 This is the blessing with which Moses, the man of God, blessed the Israelites before his death. 2 He said: The Lord came from Sinai, and dawned from Seir upon us; he shone forth from Mount Paran. With him were myriads of holy ones; at his right, a host of his own. 3 Indeed, O favorite among peoples, all his holy ones were in your charge; they marched at your heels, accepted direction from you. 4 Moses charged us with the law, as a possession for the assembly of Jacob. 5 There arose a king in Jeshurun, when the leaders of the people assembled- the united tribes of Israel.
6 May Reuben live, and not die out, even though his numbers are few. 7 And this he said of Judah: O Lord, give heed to Judah, and bring him to his people; strengthen his hands for him, and be a help against his adversaries.
8 And of Levi he said: Give to Levi your Thummim, and your Urim to your loyal one, whom you tested at Massah, with whom you contended at the waters of Meribah; 9 who said of his father and mother, "I regard them not"; he ignored his kin, and did not acknowledge his children. For they observed your word, and kept your covenant. 10 They teach Jacob your ordinances, and Israel your law; they place incense before you, and whole burnt offerings on your altar. 11 Bless, O Lord, his substance, and accept the work of his hands; crush the loins of his adversaries, of those that hate him, so that they do not rise again.
12 Of Benjamin he said: The beloved of the Lord rests in safety- the High God surrounds him all day long- the beloved rests between his shoulders. 13 And of Joseph he said: Blessed by the Lord be his land, with the choice gifts of heaven above, and of the deep that lies beneath; 14 with the choice fruits of the sun, and the rich yield of the months; 15 with the finest produce of the ancient mountains, and the abundance of the everlasting hills; 16 with the choice gifts of the earth and its fullness, and the favor of the one who dwells on Sinai. Let these come on the head of Joseph, on the brow of the prince among his brothers. 17 A firstborn bull-majesty is his! His horns are the horns of a wild ox; with them he gores the peoples, driving them to the ends of the earth; such are the myriads of Ephraim, such the thousands of Manasseh.
18 And of Zebulun he said: Rejoice, Zebulun, in your going out; and Issachar, in your tents. 19 They call peoples to the mountain; there they offer the right sacrifices; for they suck the affluence of the seas and the hidden treasures of the sand. 20 And of Gad he said: Blessed be the enlargement of Gad! Gad lives like a lion; he tears at arm and scalp. 21 He chose the best for himself, for there a commander's allotment was reserved; he came at the head of the people, he executed the justice of the Lord, and his ordinances for Israel.
22 And of Dan he said: Dan is a lion's whelp that leaps forth from Bashan. 23 And of Naphtali he said: O Naphtali, sated with favor, full of the blessing of the Lord, possess the west and the south. 24 And of Asher he said: Most blessed of sons be Asher; may he be the favorite of his brothers, and may he dip his foot in oil. 25 Your bars are iron and bronze; and as your days, so is your strength.
26 There is none like God, O Jeshurun, who rides through the heavens to your help, majestic through the skies. 27 He subdues the ancient gods, shatters the forces of old; he drove out the enemy before you, and said, "Destroy!" 28 So Israel lives in safety, untroubled is Jacob's abode in a land of grain and wine, where the heavens drop down dew. 29 Happy are you, O Israel! Who is like you, a people saved by the Lord, the shield of your help, and the sword of your triumph! Your enemies shall come fawning to you, and you shall tread on their backs.
341 Then Moses went up from the plains of Moab to Mount Nebo, to the top of Pisgah, which is opposite Jericho, and the Lord showed him the whole land: Gilead as far as Dan, 2 all Naphtali, the land of Ephraim and Manasseh, all the land of Judah as far as the Western Sea, 3 the Negeb, and the Plain-that is, the valley of Jericho, the city of palm trees-as far as Zoar. 4 The Lord said to him, "This is the land of which I swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, saying, "I will give it to your descendants'; I have let you see it with your eyes, but you shall not cross over there."
5 Then Moses, the servant of the Lord, died there in the land of Moab, at the Lord's command. 6 He was buried in a valley in the land of Moab, opposite Beth-peor, but no one knows his burial place to this day. 7 Moses was one hundred twenty years old when he died; his sight was unimpaired and his vigor had not abated. 8 The Israelites wept for Moses in the plains of Moab thirty days; then the period of mourning for Moses was ended.
9 Joshua son of Nun was full of the spirit of wisdom, because Moses had laid his hands on him; and the Israelites obeyed him, doing as the Lord had commanded Moses. 10 Never since has there arisen a prophet in Israel like Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face. 11 He was unequaled for all the signs and wonders that the Lord sent him to perform in the land of Egypt, against Pharaoh and all his servants and his entire land, 12 and for all the mighty deeds and all the terrifying displays of power that Moses performed in the sight of all Israel.
26 The inscription of the charge against him read, "The King of the Jews." 27 And with him they crucified two bandits, one on his right and one on his left. 28 29 Those who passed by derided him, shaking their heads and saying, "Aha! You who would destroy the temple and build it in three days, 30 save yourself, and come down from the cross!" 31 In the same way the chief priests, along with the scribes, were also mocking him among themselves and saying, "He saved others; he cannot save himself. 32 Let the Messiah, the King of Israel, come down from the cross now, so that we may see and believe." Those who were crucified with him also taunted him.
33 When it was noon, darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon. 34 At three o'clock Jesus cried out with a loud voice, "Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?" which means, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" 35 When some of the bystanders heard it, they said, "Listen, he is calling for Elijah." 36 And someone ran, filled a sponge with sour wine, put it on a stick, and gave it to him to drink, saying, "Wait, let us see whether Elijah will come to take him down." 37 Then Jesus gave a loud cry and breathed his last. 38 And the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. 39 Now when the centurion, who stood facing him, saw that in this way he breathed his last, he said, "Truly this man was God's Son!" 40 There were also women looking on from a distance; among them were Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James the younger and of Joses, and Salome. 41 These used to follow him and provided for him when he was in Galilee; and there were many other women who had come up with him to Jerusalem.
42 When evening had come, and since it was the day of Preparation, that is, the day before the sabbath, 43 Joseph of Arimathea, a respected member of the council, who was also himself waiting expectantly for the kingdom of God, went boldly to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. 44 Then Pilate wondered if he were already dead; and summoning the centurion, he asked him whether he had been dead for some time. 45 When he learned from the centurion that he was dead, he granted the body to Joseph. 46 Then Joseph bought a linen cloth, and taking down the body, wrapped it in the linen cloth, and laid it in a tomb that had been hewn out of the rock. He then rolled a stone against the door of the tomb. 47 Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses saw where the body was laid.
(Read Mark 15:22-32)
The place where our Lord Jesus was crucified, was called the place of a scull; it was the common place of execution; for he was in all respects numbered with the transgressors. Whenever we look unto Christ crucified, we must remember what was written over his head; he is a King, and we must give up ourselves to be his subjects, as Israelites indeed. They crucified two thieves with him, and him in the midst; they thereby intended him great dishonour. But it was foretold that he should be numbered with the transgressors, because he was made sin for us. Even those who passed by railed at him. They told him to come down from the cross, and they would believe; but they did not believe, though he gave them a more convincing sign when he came up from the grave. With what earnestness will the man who firmly believes the truth, as made known by the sufferings of Christ, seek for salvation! With what gratitude will he receive the dawning hope of forgiveness and eternal life, as purchased for him by the sufferings and death of the Son of God! and with what godly sorrow will he mourn over the sins which crucified the Lord of glory!
(Read Mark 15:33-41)
There was a thick darkness over the land, from noon until three in the afternoon. The Jews were doing their utmost to extinguish the Sun of Righteousness. The darkness signified the cloud which the human soul of Christ was under, when he was making it an offering for sin. He did not complain that his disciples forsook him, but that his Father forsook him. In this especially he was made sin for us. When Paul was to be offered as a sacrifice for the service saints, he could joy and rejoice, Philippians 2:17; but it is another thing to be offered as a sacrifice for the sin of sinners. At the same instant that Jesus died, the veil of the temple was rent from the top to the bottom. This spake terror to the unbelieving Jews, and was a sign of the destruction of their church and nation. It speaks comfort to all believing Christians, for it signified the laying open a new and living way into the holiest by the blood of Jesus. The confidence with which Christ had openly addressed God as his Father, and committed his soul into his hands, seems greatly to have affected the centurion. Right views of Christ crucified will reconcile the believer to the thought of death; he longs to behold, love, and praise, as he ought, that Saviour who was wounded and pierced to save him from the wrath to come.
(Read Mark 15:42-47)
We are here attending the burial of our Lord Jesus. Oh that we may by grace be planted in the likeness of it! Joseph of Arimathea was one who waited for the kingdom of God. Those who hope for a share in its privileges, must own Christ's cause, when it seems to be crushed. This man God raised up for his service. There was a special providence, that Pilate should be so strict in his inquiry, that there might be no pretence to say Jesus was alive. Pilate gave Joseph leave to take down the body, and do what he pleased with it. Some of the women beheld where Jesus was laid, that they might come after the sabbath to anoint the dead body, because they had not time to do it before. Special notice was taken of Christ's sepulchre, because he was to rise again. And he will not forsake those who trust in him, and call upon him. Death, deprived of its sting, will soon end the believer's sorrows, as it ended those of the Saviour.
