The Bible, quoted
in its own voices.

For the king trusts in the LORD. Through the loving kindness of the Most High, he shall not be moved. Your hand will find out all of your enemies. Your right hand will find out those who hate you. You will make them as a fiery furnace in the time of your anger. The LORD will swallow them up in his wrath. The fire shall devour them. You will destroy their descendants from the earth, their posterity from among the children of men. For they intended evil against you. They plotted evil against you which cannot succeed. For you will make them turn their back, when you aim drawn bows at their face. Be exalted, LORD, in your strength, so we will sing and praise your power.

Moreover the LORD’s word came to me, saying, “Son of man, when the house of Israel lived in their own land, they defiled it by their ways and by their deeds. Their way before me was as the uncleanness of a woman in her impurity. Therefore I poured out my wrath on them for the blood which they had poured out on the land, and because they had defiled it with their idols. I scattered them among the nations, and they were dispersed through the countries. I judged them according to their way and according to their deeds. When they came to the nations where they went, they profaned my holy name, in that men said of them, ‘These are the LORD’s people, and have left his land.’ But I had respect for my holy name, which the house of Israel had profaned among the nations where they went.

The LORD stands up to contend, and stands to judge the peoples. The LORD will enter into judgment with the elders of his people and their leaders: “It is you who have eaten up the vineyard. The plunder of the poor is in your houses. What do you mean that you crush my people, and grind the face of the poor?” says the Lord, GOD of Armies. Moreover the LORD said, “Because the daughters of Zion are arrogant, and walk with outstretched necks and flirting eyes, walking daintily as they go, jingling ornaments on their feet; therefore the Lord brings sores on the crown of the head of the women of Zion, and the LORD will make their scalps bald.”

Therefore I urge you, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service. Don’t be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what is the good, well-pleasing, and perfect will of God.

For the Chief Musician. To the tune of “Do Not Destroy.” A poem by David, when he fled from Saul, in the cave.

Be merciful to me, God, be merciful to me, for my soul takes refuge in you. Yes, in the shadow of your wings, I will take refuge, until disaster has passed. I cry out to God Most High, to God who accomplishes my requests for me. He will send from heaven, and save me, he rebukes the one who is pursuing me. Selah. God will send out his loving kindness and his truth. My soul is among lions. I lie among those who are set on fire, even the sons of men, whose teeth are spears and arrows, and their tongue a sharp sword. Be exalted, God, above the heavens! Let your glory be above all the earth! They have prepared a net for my steps. My soul is bowed down. They dig a pit before me. They fall into the middle of it themselves. Selah.

“They say, ‘If a man puts away his wife, and she goes from him, and becomes another man’s, should he return to her again?’ Wouldn’t that land be greatly polluted? But you have played the prostitute with many lovers; yet return again to me,” says the LORD. “Lift up your eyes to the bare heights, and see! Where have you not been lain with? You have sat waiting for them by the road, as an Arabian in the wilderness. You have polluted the land with your prostitution and with your wickedness. Therefore the showers have been withheld and there has been no latter rain; yet you have had a prostitute’s forehead and you refused to be ashamed. Will you not from this time cry to me, ‘My Father, you are the guide of my youth!’? “‘Will he retain his anger forever? Will he keep it to the end?’ Behold, you have spoken and have done evil things, and have had your way.”

Love is patient and is kind. Love doesn’t envy. Love doesn’t brag, is not proud, doesn’t behave itself inappropriately, doesn’t seek its own way, is not provoked, takes no account of evil; doesn’t rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things.

Then the LORD’s word came to Jeremiah, after the king had burned the scroll, and the words which Baruch wrote at the mouth of Jeremiah, saying, “Take again another scroll, and write in it all the former words that were in the first scroll, which Jehoiakim the king of Judah has burned. Concerning Jehoiakim king of Judah you shall say, ‘The LORD says: “You have burned this scroll, saying, ‘Why have you written therein, saying, “The king of Babylon will certainly come and destroy this land, and will cause to cease from there man and animal”?’” Therefore the LORD says concerning Jehoiakim king of Judah: “He will have no one to sit on David’s throne. His dead body will be cast out in the day to the heat, and in the night to the frost. I will punish him, his offspring, and his servants for their iniquity. I will bring on them, on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and on the men of Judah, all the evil that I have pronounced against them, but they didn’t listen.”’” Then Jeremiah took another scroll, and gave it to Baruch the scribe, the son of Neriah, who wrote therein from the mouth of Jeremiah all the words of the book which Jehoiakim king of Judah had burned in the fire; and many similar words were added to them.

Now as I saw the living creatures, behold, there was one wheel on the earth beside the living creatures, for each of the four faces of it. The appearance of the wheels and their work was like a beryl. The four of them had one likeness. Their appearance and their work was as it were a wheel within a wheel. When they went, they went in their four directions. They didn’t turn when they went. As for their rims, they were high and dreadful; and the four of them had their rims full of eyes all around.

All my affairs will be made known to you by Tychicus, the beloved brother, faithful servant, and fellow bondservant in the Lord. I am sending him to you for this very purpose, that he may know your circumstances and comfort your hearts, together with Onesimus, the faithful and beloved brother, who is one of you. They will make known to you everything that is going on here. Aristarchus, my fellow prisoner, greets you, and Mark the cousin of Barnabas (concerning whom you received instructions, “if he comes to you, receive him”), and Jesus who is called Justus. These are my only fellow workers for God’s Kingdom who are of the circumcision, men who have been a comfort to me.