81
Psalm 81 – For the Feast of Tabernacles
For the leader. On the gittith. Of Asaph.
1 Sing aloud to God our strength,
shout for joy to the God of Jacob.
2 Raise a song, sound the timbrel,
sweet lyre and harp.
3 On the new moon blow the horn,
at the full moon, the day of our festival.
4 For this is a statute for Israel,
a ruling of the God of Jacob,
5 a witness he set up in Joseph,
when he marched against Egypt’s land,
where he heard an unknown voice say:
6 “I removed from your shoulder the burden,
and freed your hands from the basket.
7 At your call of distress I delivered you,
from the thundercloud I answered you.
At Meribah’s waters I tested you.
Selah
8 “Listen, my people, to my warning,
O Israel, if you would but listen!
9 There must not be a strange god among you,
you must bow to no foreign god.
10 I am the Lord your God
who brought you up out of Egypt.
Open your mouth, that I fill it.
11 “But my people did not listen to my voice,
Israel would have none of me.
12 So to their own hard hearts I left them,
to follow their own devices.
13 O that my people would listen,
that Israel would walk in my ways.
14 Soon would I humble their enemies,
and turn my hand on their foes.
15 Those who hate the Lord would cringe before him
in everlasting terror.
16 But you would I feed with the richest wheat,
and with honey from the rock to your heart’s desire.”