Call on me in the day of trouble. I will deliver you, and you will honor me. Psalm 50:15
Song of Solomon 1-4
Song of Solomon 1
1 The Song of songs, which is Solomon’s.
The Bride
2 Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth,
for your love is better than wine.
3 Your oils have a pleasing fragrance.
Your name is like perfume poured out,
therefore all the young women love you.
4 Take me away with you.
Let us hurry.
The king has brought me into his rooms.
Friends
We will be glad and rejoice in you.
We will praise your love more than wine!
They are right to love you.
The Bride
5 I am dark, but lovely,
you daughters of Jerusalem,
like Kedar’s tents,
like Solomon’s curtains.
6 Do not stare at me because I am dark,
because the sun has scorched me.
My mother’s sons were angry with me.
They made me keeper of the vineyards.
I have not kept my own vineyard.
7 Tell me, you whom my soul loves,
where you graze your flock,
where you rest them at noon,
for why should I be as one who is veiled
beside the flocks of your companions?
The Bridegroom
8 If you do not know, most beautiful among women,
follow the tracks of the sheep.
Graze your young goats beside the shepherds’ tents.
9 I have compared you, my love,
to a steed in Pharaoh’s chariots.
10 Your cheeks are beautiful with earrings,
your neck with strings of jewels.
Friends
11 We will make you earrings of gold,
with studs of silver.
The Bride
12 While the king sat at his table,
my perfume spread its fragrance.
13 My beloved is to me a sachet of myrrh,
that lies between my breasts.
14 My beloved is to me a cluster of henna blossoms
from the vineyards of En Gedi.
The Bridegroom
15 Behold, you are beautiful, my love.
Behold, you are beautiful.
Your eyes are like doves.
The Bride
16 Behold, you are beautiful, my beloved, yes, pleasant,
and our couch is verdant.
The Bridegroom
17 The beams of our house are cedars.
Our rafters are firs.
Song of Solomon 2
The Bride
1 I am a rose of Sharon,
a lily of the valleys.
The Bridegroom
2 As a lily among thorns,
so is my love among the daughters.
The Bride
3 Like an apple tree among the trees of the woods,
so is my beloved among the sons.
I sat down under his shadow with great delight.
His fruit was sweet to my taste.
4 He brought me to the banquet hall.
His banner over me is love.
5 Strengthen me with raisins,
refresh me with apples,
for I am faint with love.
6 His left hand is under my head.
His right hand embraces me.
7 Daughters of Jerusalem, I charge you
by the roes, or by the hinds of the field,
not to arouse, nor awaken love,
until the time is right.
8 The voice of my beloved!
Look! He comes,
leaping on the mountains,
skipping on the hills.
9 My beloved is like a roe or a young deer.
He stands behind our wall!
He looks in at the windows.
He glances through the lattice.
10 My beloved spoke and said to me,
“Rise up, my love, my beautiful one, and come away.
11 For the winter is past.
The rain is over and gone.
12 The flowers appear on the earth.
The time of the singing has come,
and the voice of the turtledove is heard in our land.
13 The fig tree ripens her green figs.
The vines are in blossom.
They give out their fragrance.
Arise, my love, my beautiful one,
and come away.”
The Bridegroom
14 My dove in the clefts of the rock,
in the hiding places of the mountainside,
let me see your face.
let me hear your voice,
for your voice is sweet and your face is lovely.
15 Catch for us the foxes,
the little foxes that plunder the vineyards,
for our vineyards are in blossom.
The Bride
16 My beloved is mine, and I am his.
He browses among the lilies.
17 Until the day is cool, and the shadows flee away,
turn, my beloved,
and be like a gazelle
or a young deer on the rugged mountains.
Song of Solomon 3
1 By night on my bed,
I sought him whom my soul loves.
I sought him, but I did not find him.
2 I will get up now and go through the city,
through the streets and in the squares.
I will seek him whom my soul loves.
I sought him, but I did not find him.
3 The watchmen who go through the city found me,
“Have you seen him whom my soul loves?”
4 I had scarcely passed from them,
when I found him whom my soul loves.
I held him and would not let him go,
until I had brought him into my mother’s house,
into the room of the one who had conceived me.
5 Daughters of Jerusalem, I charge you
by the gazelles, or by the does of the field,
that you not arouse nor awaken love,
until it so desires.
6 Who is this who comes up from the wilderness
like pillars of smoke,
perfumed with myrrh and frankincense,
with all spices of the merchant?
7 It is Solomon’s carriage!
Sixty warriors surround it,
of the mighty men of Israel.
8 They are all swordsmen, experts in war.
Every man has his sword on his thigh,
because of fear in the night.
9 King Solomon made himself a carriage
of the wood of Lebanon.
10 He made its pillars of silver,
its bottom of gold, its seat of purple,
the middle of it being paved with love,
from the daughters of Jerusalem.
11 Go out, you daughters of Zion,
and see king Solomon,
with the crown his mother bestowed,
on the day of his espousal,
on the day of his heart’s rejoicing.
Song of Solomon 4
The Bridegroom
1 You are beautiful, my love.
You are beautiful.
Your eyes are like doves behind your veil.
Your hair is as a flock of goats,
that descend from Mount Gilead.
2 Your teeth are like a newly shorn flock,
which have come up from the washing,
where every one of them has twins.
None is bereaved among them.
3 Your lips are like scarlet thread.
Your mouth is lovely.
Your brow beneath your veil
is like a slice of pomegranate.
4 Your neck is like David’s tower
built in rows of stone,
on which a thousand shields hang,
all the shields of the warriors.
5 Your two breasts are like two fawns
that are twins of a roe,
which feed among the lilies.
6 Until the day is cool, and the shadows flee,
I will go to the mountain of myrrh,
to the hill of frankincense.
7 You are altogether beautiful, my love.
There is no flaw in you.
8 Come with me from Lebanon, my bride,
with me from Lebanon.
Look from the top of Amana,
from the top of Senir and Hermon,
from the lions’ dens,
from the mountains of the leopards.
9 You have ravished my heart, my sister, my bride.
You have ravished my heart with one of your eyes,
with one chain of your neck.
10 How beautiful is your love, my sister, my bride!
How much better is your love than wine,
the fragrance of your perfumes than all kinds of spices!
11 Your lips, my bride, drip like the honeycomb.
Honey and milk are under your tongue.
The smell of your garments is like the smell of Lebanon.
12 My sister, my bride, is a locked up garden,
a locked up spring,
a sealed fountain.
13 Your shoots are a paradise of pomegranates,
with precious fruits,
henna with spikenard plants,
14 spikenard and saffron,
calamus and cinnamon,
with every kind of incense tree,
myrrh and aloes, with all the best spices,
15 a fountain of gardens,
a well of living waters,
flowing streams from Lebanon.
The Bride
16 Awake, north wind and come, you south!
Blow on my garden, that its spices may flow out.
Let my beloved come into his garden,
and taste his precious fruits.
2 Corinthians 8:16-24
Titus Commended
16 But thanks be to God, who put the same concern I have for you, into the heart of Titus. 17 For he indeed accepted our exhortation, but being himself very earnest, he went out to you of his own accord.
18 We are sending, together with Titus, the brother whose praises are known throughout all the churches for his work in spreading the Gospel. 19 Not only this, but he was also appointed by the churches to travel with us in this grace, which is served by us to the glory of the Lord himself, and to show our readiness.
20 We are avoiding this, that any man should blame us concerning this abundance which is administered by us, 21 having regard for honorable things, not only in the sight of the Lord, but also in the sight of men.
22 We have sent with them our brother, whom we have many times proved earnest in many things, but now much more earnest, because of the great confidence which he has in you. 23 As for Titus, he is my partner and fellow worker for you. As for our brothers, they are the apostles of the assemblies, the glory of Christ. 24 Therefore show the proof of your love to them before the churches, and of our boasting on your behalf.
Psalm 50
The Mighty One Calls
A Psalm by Asaph.
1 The Mighty One, the Lord God speaks,
and calls the earth from sunrise to sunset.
2 Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty,
God shines out.
3 Our God comes, and does not keep silent.
A fire devours before him.
It is very stormy around him.
4 He calls to the heavens above,
to the earth, that he may judge his people:
5 “Gather my saints together to me,
those who have made a covenant with me by sacrifice.”
6 The heavens shall declare his righteousness,
for the Lord himself is judge.
Selah.
7 “Hear, my people, and I will speak.
Israel, I will testify against you.
I am the Lord, your God.
8 I do not rebuke you for your sacrifices.
Your burnt offerings are continually before me.
9 I have no need for a bull from your stall,
nor male goats from your pens.
10 For every animal of the forest is mine,
and the cattle on a thousand hills.
11 I know all the birds of the mountains.
The wild animals of the field are mine.
12 If I were hungry, I would not tell you,
for the world is mine, and all that is in it.
13 Will I eat the meat of bulls,
or drink the blood of goats?
14 Offer to the Lord the sacrifice of thanksgiving.
Pay your vows to the Most High.
15 Call on me in the day of trouble.
I will deliver you, and you will honor me.”
16 But to the wicked the Lord says,
“What right do you have to declare my statutes,
that you have taken my covenant on your lips,
17 since you hate instruction,
and throw my words behind you?
18 When you saw a thief, you consented with him,
and have participated with adulterers.
19 You give your mouth to evil.
Your tongue frames deceit.
20 You sit and speak against your brother.
You slander your own mother’s son.
21 You have done these things, and I kept silent.
You thought that I was just like you.
I will rebuke you, and accuse you in front of your eyes.
22 Now consider this, you who forget the Lord,
lest I tear you into pieces, and there be no one to deliver.
23 Whoever offers the sacrifice of thanksgiving glorifies me,
and prepares his way so that I will show the Lord’s salvation to him.”
Proverbs 22:22-23
22 Do not exploit the poor because he is poor,
and do not crush the needy in court,
23 for the Lord will plead their case
and plunder the life of those who plunder them.