Read the Bible

^1 (a)Praise the Lord!
Give thanks to the Lord, because he is good;
    his love is eternal.
² Who can tell all the great things he has done?
    Who can praise him enough?
³ Happy are those who obey his commands,
    who always do what is right.

⁴ Remember me, Lord, when you help your people;
    include me when you save them.
⁵ Let me see the prosperity of your people
    and share in the happiness of your nation,
    in the glad pride of those who belong to you.

⁶ We have sinned as our ancestors did;
    we have been wicked and evil.
^7 (b)Our ancestors in Egypt did not understand God's wonderful acts;
    they forgot the many times he showed them his love,
    and they rebelled against the Almighty^[a] at the Red Sea.
⁸ But he saved them, as he had promised,
    in order to show his great power.
^9 (c)He gave a command to the Red Sea,
    and it dried up;
    he led his people across on dry land.
¹⁰ He saved them from those who hated them;
    he rescued them from their enemies.
¹¹ But the water drowned their enemies;
    not one of them was left.
^12 (d)Then his people believed his promises
    and sang praises to him.

¹³ But they quickly forgot what he had done
    and acted without waiting for his advice.
^14 (e)They were filled with craving in the desert
    and put God to the test;
¹⁵ so he gave them what they asked for,
    but also sent a terrible disease among them.

^16 (f)There in the desert they were jealous of Moses
    and of Aaron, the Lord's holy servant.
¹⁷ Then the earth opened up and swallowed Dathan
    and buried Abiram and his family;
¹⁸ fire came down on their followers
    and burned up those wicked people.

^19 (g)They made a gold bull-calf at Sinai
    and worshiped that idol;
²⁰ they exchanged the glory of God
    for the image of an animal that eats grass.
²¹ They forgot the God who had saved them
    by his mighty acts in Egypt.
²² What wonderful things he did there!
    What amazing things at the Red Sea!
²³ When God said that he would destroy his people,
    his chosen servant, Moses, stood up against God
    and kept his anger from destroying them.

^24 (h)Then they rejected the pleasant land,
    because they did not believe God's promise.
²⁵ They stayed in their tents and grumbled
    and would not listen to the Lord.
²⁶ So he have them a solemn warning
    that he would make them die in the desert
^27 (i)and scatter their descendants among the heathen,
    letting them die in foreign countries.

^28 (j)Then at Peor, God's people joined in the worship of Baal
    and ate sacrifices offered to dead gods.
²⁹ They stirred up the Lord's anger by their actions,
    and a terrible disease broke out among them.
³⁰ But Phinehas stood up and punished the guilty,
    and the plague was stopped.
³¹ This has been remembered in his favor ever since
    and will be for all time to come.

^32 (k)At the springs of Meribah the people made the Lord angry,
    and Moses was in trouble on their account.
³³ They made him so bitter
    that he spoke without stopping to think.

^34 (l)They did not kill the heathen,
    as the Lord had commanded them to do,
³⁵ but they intermarried with them
    and adopted their pagan ways.
³⁶ God's people worshiped idols,
    and this caused their destruction.
^37 (m)They offered their own sons and daughters
    as sacrifices to the idols of Canaan.
^38 (n)They killed those innocent children,
    and the land was defiled by those murders.
³⁹ They made themselves impure by their actions
    and were unfaithful to God.

^40 (o)So the Lord was angry with his people;
    he was disgusted with them.
⁴¹ He abandoned them to the power of the heathen,
    and their enemies ruled over them.
⁴² They were oppressed by their enemies
    and were in complete subjection to them.
⁴³ Many times the Lord rescued his people,
    but they chose to rebel against him
    and sank deeper into sin.
⁴⁴ Yet the Lord heard them when they cried out,
    and he took notice of their distress.
⁴⁵ For their sake he remembered his covenant,
    and because of his great love he relented.
⁴⁶ He made all their oppressors
    feel sorry for them.

^47 (p)Save us, O Lord our God,
    and bring us back from among the nations,
so that we may be thankful
    and praise your holy name.

⁴⁸ Praise the Lord, the God of Israel;
    praise him now and forever!
    Let everyone say, "Amen!"

Praise the Lord!