Morning Prayer (Matins) | Evening Prayer (Vespers) | Prayer at the Close of Day (Compline)

Lamentations 1:1–12 (Listen)

How Lonely Sits the City

1:1   How lonely sits the city
    that was full of people!
  How like a widow has she become,
    she who was great among the nations!
  She who was a princess among the provinces
    has become a slave.
2   She weeps bitterly in the night,
    with tears on her cheeks;
  among all her lovers
    she has none to comfort her;
  all her friends have dealt treacherously with her;
    they have become her enemies.
3   Judah has gone into exile because of affliction
    and hard servitude;
  she dwells now among the nations,
    but finds no resting place;
  her pursuers have all overtaken her
    in the midst of her distress.
4   The roads to Zion mourn,
    for none come to the festival;
  all her gates are desolate;
    her priests groan;
  her virgins have been afflicted,
    and she herself suffers bitterly.
5   Her foes have become the head;
    her enemies prosper,
  because the LORD has afflicted her
    for the multitude of her transgressions;
  her children have gone away,
    captives before the foe.
6   From the daughter of Zion
    all her majesty has departed.
  Her princes have become like deer
    that find no pasture;
  they fled without strength
    before the pursuer.
7   Jerusalem remembers
    in the days of her affliction and wandering
  all the precious things
    that were hers from days of old.
  When her people fell into the hand of the foe,
    and there was none to help her,
  her foes gloated over her;
    they mocked at her downfall.
8   Jerusalem sinned grievously;
    therefore she became filthy;
  all who honored her despise her,
    for they have seen her nakedness;
  she herself groans
    and turns her face away.
9   Her uncleanness was in her skirts;
    she took no thought of her future;
  therefore her fall is terrible;
    she has no comforter.
  “O LORD, behold my affliction,
    for the enemy has triumphed!”
10   The enemy has stretched out his hands
    over all her precious things;
  for she has seen the nations
    enter her sanctuary,
  those whom you forbade
    to enter your congregation.
11   All her people groan
    as they search for bread;
  they trade their treasures for food
    to revive their strength.
  “Look, O LORD, and see,
    for I am despised.”
12   “Is it nothing to you, all you who pass by?
    Look and see
  if there is any sorrow like my sorrow,
    which was brought upon me,
  which the LORD inflicted
    on the day of his fierce anger.

1 Corinthians 15:41–50 (Listen)

41 There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars; for star differs from star in glory.

42 So is it with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown is perishable; what is raised is imperishable. 43 It is sown in dishonor; it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness; it is raised in power. 44 It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. 45 Thus it is written, “The first man Adam became a living being”; the last Adam became a life-giving spirit. 46 But it is not the spiritual that is first but the natural, and then the spiritual. 47 The first man was from the earth, a man of dust; the second man is from heaven. 48 As was the man of dust, so also are those who are of the dust, and as is the man of heaven, so also are those who are of heaven. 49 Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the man of heaven.

Mystery and Victory

50 I tell you this, brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.

Matthew 11:25–30 (Listen)

Come to Me, and I Will Give You Rest

25 At that time Jesus declared, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children; 26 yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. 27 All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him. 28 Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

Morning Psalms

Psalm 12 (Listen)

The Faithful Have Vanished

To the choirmaster: according to The Sheminith. A Psalm of David.

12:1   Save, O LORD, for the godly one is gone;
    for the faithful have vanished from among the children of man.
2   Everyone utters lies to his neighbor;
    with flattering lips and a double heart they speak.
3   May the LORD cut off all flattering lips,
    the tongue that makes great boasts,
4   those who say, “With our tongue we will prevail,
    our lips are with us; who is master over us?”
5   “Because the poor are plundered, because the needy groan,
    I will now arise,” says the LORD;
    “I will place him in the safety for which he longs.”
6   The words of the LORD are pure words,
    like silver refined in a furnace on the ground,
    purified seven times.
7   You, O LORD, will keep them;
    you will guard us from this generation forever.
8   On every side the wicked prowl,
    as vileness is exalted among the children of man.

Psalm 146 (Listen)

Put Not Your Trust in Princes

146:1   Praise the LORD!
  Praise the LORD, O my soul!
2   I will praise the LORD as long as I live;
    I will sing praises to my God while I have my being.
3   Put not your trust in princes,
    in a son of man, in whom there is no salvation.
4   When his breath departs, he returns to the earth;
    on that very day his plans perish.
5   Blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob,
    whose hope is in the LORD his God,
6   who made heaven and earth,
    the sea, and all that is in them,
  who keeps faith forever;
7     who executes justice for the oppressed,
    who gives food to the hungry.
  The LORD sets the prisoners free;
8     the LORD opens the eyes of the blind.
  The LORD lifts up those who are bowed down;
    the LORD loves the righteous.
9   The LORD watches over the sojourners;
    he upholds the widow and the fatherless,
    but the way of the wicked he brings to ruin.
10   The LORD will reign forever,
    your God, O Zion, to all generations.
  Praise the LORD!

Evening Psalms

Psalm 36 (Listen)

How Precious Is Your Steadfast Love

To the choirmaster. Of David, the servant of the LORD.

36:1   Transgression speaks to the wicked
    deep in his heart;
  there is no fear of God
    before his eyes.
2   For he flatters himself in his own eyes
    that his iniquity cannot be found out and hated.
3   The words of his mouth are trouble and deceit;
    he has ceased to act wisely and do good.
4   He plots trouble while on his bed;
    he sets himself in a way that is not good;
    he does not reject evil.
5   Your steadfast love, O LORD, extends to the heavens,
    your faithfulness to the clouds.
6   Your righteousness is like the mountains of God;
    your judgments are like the great deep;
    man and beast you save, O LORD.
7   How precious is your steadfast love, O God!
    The children of mankind take refuge in the shadow of your wings.
8   They feast on the abundance of your house,
    and you give them drink from the river of your delights.
9   For with you is the fountain of life;
    in your light do we see light.
10   Oh, continue your steadfast love to those who know you,
    and your righteousness to the upright of heart!
11   Let not the foot of arrogance come upon me,
    nor the hand of the wicked drive me away.
12   There the evildoers lie fallen;
    they are thrust down, unable to rise.

Psalm 7 (Listen)

In You Do I Take Refuge

A Shiggaion of David, which he sang to the LORD concerning the words of Cush, a Benjaminite.

7:1   O LORD my God, in you do I take refuge;
    save me from all my pursuers and deliver me,
2   lest like a lion they tear my soul apart,
    rending it in pieces, with none to deliver.
3   O LORD my God, if I have done this,
    if there is wrong in my hands,
4   if I have repaid my friend with evil
    or plundered my enemy without cause,
5   let the enemy pursue my soul and overtake it,
    and let him trample my life to the ground
    and lay my glory in the dust. Selah
6   Arise, O LORD, in your anger;
    lift yourself up against the fury of my enemies;
    awake for me; you have appointed a judgment.
7   Let the assembly of the peoples be gathered about you;
    over it return on high.
8   The LORD judges the peoples;
    judge me, O LORD, according to my righteousness
    and according to the integrity that is in me.
9   Oh, let the evil of the wicked come to an end,
    and may you establish the righteous—
  you who test the minds and hearts,
    O righteous God!
10   My shield is with God,
    who saves the upright in heart.
11   God is a righteous judge,
    and a God who feels indignation every day.
12   If a man does not repent, God will whet his sword;
    he has bent and readied his bow;
13   he has prepared for him his deadly weapons,
    making his arrows fiery shafts.
14   Behold, the wicked man conceives evil
    and is pregnant with mischief
    and gives birth to lies.
15   He makes a pit, digging it out,
    and falls into the hole that he has made.
16   His mischief returns upon his own head,
    and on his own skull his violence descends.
17   I will give to the LORD the thanks due to his righteousness,
    and I will sing praise to the name of the LORD, the Most High.