ACV - Psalms - 78

78:1  Give ear, O my people, to my law. Incline your ears to the words of my mouth.

78:2  I will open my mouth in parables. I will utter dark sayings of old,

78:3  which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us.

78:4  We will not hide them from their sons, telling to the generation to come the praises of Jehovah, and his strength, and his wondrous works that he has done.

78:5  For he established a testimony in Jacob, and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers, that they should make them known to their sons,

78:6  that the generation to come might know, even the sons who should be born, who should arise and tell to their sons,

78:7  that they might set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments,

78:8  and might not be as their fathers: a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation that set not their heart aright, and whose spirit was not steadfast with God.

78:9  The sons of Ephraim, being armed and carrying bows, turned back in the day of battle.

78:10  They kept not the covenant of God, and refused to walk in his law.

78:11  And they forgot his doings, and his wondrous works that he had shown them.

78:12  He did marvelous things in the sight of their fathers, in the land of Egypt, in the field of Zoan.

78:13  He divided the sea, and caused them to pass through. And he made the waters to stand as a heap.

78:14  In the daytime also he led them with a cloud, and all the night with a light of fire.

78:15  He split rocks in the wilderness, and gave them drink abundantly as out of the depths.

78:16  He brought streams also out of the rock, and caused waters to run down like rivers.

78:17  Yet they went on to still sin against him, to rebel against the Most High in the desert.

78:18  And they challenged God in their heart by asking food according to their desire.

78:19  Yea, they spoke against God. They said, Can God prepare a table in the wilderness?

78:20  Behold, he smote the rock, so that waters gushed out, and streams overflowed. Can he give bread also? Will he provide flesh for his people?

78:21  Therefore Jehovah heard, and was angry. And a fire was kindled against Jacob, and anger also went up against Israel,

78:22  because they did not believe in God, and did not trust in his salvation.

78:23  Yet he commanded the skies above, and opened the doors of heaven,

78:24  and he rained down manna upon them to eat, and gave them food from heaven.

78:25  Man ate the bread of the mighty. He sent them food to the full.

78:26  He caused the east wind to blow in the heavens, and by his power he guided the south wind.

78:27  He also rained flesh upon them as the dust, and winged birds as the sand of the seas.

78:28  And he let it fall in the midst of their camp round about their habitations.

78:29  So they ate, and were well filled, and he gave them their own desire.

78:30  They were not estranged from that which they desired. Their food was yet in their mouths

78:31  when the anger of God went up against them, and killed of the fattest of them, and smote down the young men of Israel.

78:32  For all this they still sinned, and did not believe in his wondrous works.

78:33  Therefore he consumed their days in vanity, and their years in terror.

78:34  When he killed them, then they inquired after him, and they returned and sought God earnestly.

78:35  And they remembered that God was their rock, and the Most High God their redeemer.

78:36  But they flattered him with their mouth, and lied to him with their tongue.

78:37  For their heart was not right with him, nor were they faithful in his covenant.

78:38  But he, being merciful, forgave iniquity, and destroyed not. Yea, many a time he turned his anger away, and did not stir up all his wrath.

78:39  And he remembered that they were but flesh, a wind that passes away, and comes not again.

78:40  How often they rebelled against him in the wilderness, and grieved him in the desert!

78:41  And they turned again and challenged God, and provoked the Holy One of Israel.

78:42  They did not remember his hand, nor the day when he redeemed them from the adversary,

78:43  how he set his signs in Egypt, and his wonders in the field of Zoan,

78:44  and turned their rivers into blood, and their streams, so that they could not drink.

78:45  He sent among them swarms of flies, which devoured them, and frogs, which destroyed them.

78:46  He also gave their increase to the caterpillar, and their labor to the locust.

78:47  He destroyed their vines with hail, and their sycamore trees with frost.

78:48  He also gave over their cattle to the hail, and their flocks to hot thunderbolts.

78:49  He cast upon them the fierceness of his anger, wrath, and indignation, and trouble, a band of agents of evil.

78:50  He made a path for his anger. He spared not their soul from death, but gave their life over to the pestilence,

78:51  and smote all the firstborn in Egypt, the chief of their strength in the tents of Ham.

78:52  But he led forth his own people like sheep, and guided them in the wilderness like a flock.

78:53  And he led them safely, so that they feared not, but the sea overwhelmed their enemies.

78:54  And he brought them to the border of his sanctuary, to this mountain, which his right hand had gotten.

78:55  He also drove out the nations before them, and allotted them for an inheritance by line, and made the tribes of Israel to dwell in their tents.

78:56  Yet they challenged and rebelled against the Most High God, and kept not his testimonies,

78:57  but turned back, and dealt treacherously like their fathers. They were turned aside like a deceitful bow.

78:58  For they provoked him to anger with their high places, and moved him to jealousy with their graven images.

78:59  When God heard, he was angry, and greatly abhorred Israel,

78:60  so that he forsook the tabernacle of Shiloh, the tent which he placed among men,

78:61  and delivered their strength into captivity, and their glory into the adversary's hand.

78:62  He also gave his people over to the sword, and was angry with his inheritance.

78:63  Fire devoured their young men, and their virgins had no marriage-song.

78:64  Their priests fell by the sword, and their widows made no lamentation.

78:65  Then the Lord awoke as out of sleep, like a mighty man who shouts because of wine.

78:66  And he smote his adversaries backward. He put them to a perpetual reproach.

78:67  Moreover he refused the tent of Joseph, and chose not the tribe of Ephraim,

78:68  but chose the tribe of Judah, the mount Zion which he loved.

78:69  And he built his sanctuary like the heights, like the earth which he has established forever.

78:70  He also chose David his servant, and took him from the sheepfolds.

78:71  He brought him from following the ewes that have their young, to be the shepherd of Jacob his people, and Israel his inheritance.

78:72  So he was their shepherd according to the integrity of his heart, and guided them by the skillfulness of his hands.