Psalms 78

1 My people, pay attention to my law; incline your ears to the words of my mouth.

2 I will open my mouth in parables; I will utter riddles from the beginning,

3 things we have heard and known and that our fathers recounted to us.

4 They were not hidden from their children. The fathers recounted to another generation the Lord’s praises, his mighty acts, and the wonders he performed.

5 He raised up a witness in Jacob and established a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers to make known to their children,

6 so another generation might know them, children who would be born, who would rise and recount them to their children,

7 so they might place their hope in God, not forget God’s works, and diligently seek his commands,

8 and not become like their fathers—a crooked and provoking generation, a generation that did not direct its heart and whose spirit was not faithful with God.

9 The sons of Ephraim, drawing and shooting bows, turned back on the day of battle.

10 They did not keep God’s covenant and did not want to walk in his law.

11 They forgot his good deeds and the wonders he had shown them,

12 the wonders he performed before their fathers in the land of Egypt, in the plain of Tanis.

13 He split the sea and led them through; he made the waters stand like a leather container.

14 He guided them with a cloud by day and with the light of fire all night.

15 He split a rock in the wilderness and gave them drink as though from a great deep.

16 He brought water out of a rock and made waters flow down like rivers.

17 Yet they continued to sin against him; they provoked the Most High in a waterless land.

18 They tested God in their hearts by asking for food for their souls.

19 They spoke against God and said,

“Can God prepare a table in the wilderness?

20 He struck a rock, and waters flowed and torrents flooded. But can he also give bread or prepare a table for his people?”

21 Therefore the Lord heard and was enraged. Fire was kindled in Jacob, and anger rose against Israel,

22 because they did not trust in God or hope in his rescue.

23 Yet he commanded the clouds above and opened heaven’s doors.

24 He rained manna upon them to eat and gave them the bread of heaven.

25 A human being ate the bread of messengers; he sent them food until they were full.

26 He removed the south wind from heaven and brought in the southwest wind by his might.

27 He rained flesh upon them like dust, winged birds like the sand of the seas.

28 They fell in the middle of their camp, all around their tents.

29 They ate and were thoroughly filled, and he brought them what they desired.

30 They were not deprived of their desire. But while their food was still in their mouths,

31 God’s anger rose against them. He killed some of their well-fed men and tripped up Israel’s chosen men.

32 In spite of all this, they continued to sin and did not trust his wonders.

33 Their days ended in futility, and their years in haste.

34 Whenever he killed them, they sought him; they turned back and rose early for God.

35 They remembered that God was their helper and God Most High was their ransomer.

36 But they deceived him with their mouths and lied to him with their tongues.

37 Their hearts were not right with him, and they were not faithful to his covenant.

38 Yet he is compassionate. He will be merciful to them despite their sins and will not destroy them. He repeatedly turned his fury away and did not kindle all his anger.

39 He remembered that they are flesh, a wind that passes on and does not return.

40 How often they provoked him in the wilderness and angered him in a waterless land!

41 They turned back and tested God; they provoked the Holy One of Israel.

42 They did not remember his hand, the day he ransomed them from the hand of the oppressor,

43 when he set his signs in Egypt and his wonders in the plain of Tanis.

44 He turned their rivers to blood and their rainwater, so they could not drink.

45 He sent the dog fly among them, and it devoured them; he sent the frog, and it destroyed them.

46 He gave their fruit to blight and their labor to the locust.

47 He killed their vines with hail and their sycamores with frost.

48 He handed their cattle over to hail and their possessions to fire.

49 He sent the fury of his anger against them—fury, anger, and affliction—sent through evil messengers.

50 He prepared a path for his anger. He did not spare their souls from death but confined their cattle to death.

51 He struck every firstborn in Egypt, the firstfruits of their labor in the tents of Ham.

52 He moved his people like sheep and led them like a flock through the wilderness.

53 He guided them in hope, and they were not afraid, while the sea covered their enemies.

54 He brought them into the boundary of his sanctuary, this mountain that his right hand acquired.

55 He drove nations out before them and apportioned their inheritance with a measuring line; he settled Israel’s tribes in their tents.

56 Yet they tested and provoked God Most High and did not keep his witnesses.

57 They turned back and broke faith like their fathers; they changed into a crooked bow.

58 They angered him at their high places and made him jealous with their carved images.

59 God heard and disregarded them; he utterly despised Israel.

60 He rejected the tent at Shiloh, his dwelling where he lived among humanity.

61 He handed their strength into captivity and their beauty into an enemy’s hands.

62 He confined his people to the sword and disregarded his inheritance.

63 Fire devoured their young men, and their young women were not mourned.

64 Their priests fell by the sword, and their widows will not be mourned.

65 Then the Lord woke like someone sleeping, like a mighty man overcome by wine.

66 He struck his enemies from behind and gave them enduring reproach.

67 He rejected Joseph’s dwelling and did not choose Ephraim’s tribe.

68 But he chose Judah’s tribe, Mount Zion, which he loved.

69 He built his sanctuary like that of one-horned oxen; he founded it forever on the earth.

70 He chose his servant David and took him from the sheepfolds.

71 He took him from behind the sheep giving birth, to shepherd Jacob his people and Israel his inheritance.

72 David shepherded them with innocence of heart and guided them with the understanding of his hands.