Daily Office

If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us the sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Come now, and let us reason together, says the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow. Though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.

Let the wicked forsake their way, and the unrighteous their thoughts. Let them return to the Lord, and he will have mercy on them; and to our God, for he will freely pardon.

¹O come, let us sing to the Lord; *
let us heartily rejoice in the strength of our salvation.

²Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving, *
and show ourselves glad in him with psalms.

³For the Lord is a great God, *
and a great King above all gods.

⁴In his hand are all the corners of the earth, *
and the strength of the hills is his also.

⁵The sea is his, and he made it; *
and his hands prepared the dry land.

⁶O come, let us worship and bow down, *
and kneel before the Lord our Maker.

⁷For he is the Lord our God, *
and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand.

¹Great is the Lord, and highly to be praised; *
in the city of our God is his holy hill.

²Beautiful and lofty, the joy of all the earth, is the hill of Zion, *
the very center of the world and the city of the great King.

³God is in her citadels; *
he is known to be her sure refuge.

⁴Behold, the kings of the earth assembled *
and marched forward together.

⁵They looked and were astounded; *
they retreated and fled in terror.

⁶Trembling seized them there; *
they writhed like a woman in childbirth, *
like ships of the sea when the east wind shatters them.

⁷As we have heard, so have we seen, in the city of the Lord of hosts, in the city of our God; *
God has established her for ever.

⁸We have waited in silence on your loving-kindness, O God, *
in the midst of your temple.

⁹Your praise, like your Name, O God, reaches to the world’s end; *
your right hand is full of justice.

¹⁰Let Mount Zion be glad and the cities of Judah rejoice, *
because of your judgments.

²²Solomon stood before the LORD’s altar in the presence of all the assembly of Israel, and spread out his hands towards heaven; ²³and he said, “LORD, the God of Israel, there is no God like you, in heaven above, or on earth beneath; who keeps covenant and loving kindness with your servants who walk before you with all their heart; ²⁴who has kept with your servant David my father that which you promised him. Yes, you spoke with your mouth, and have fulfilled it with your hand, as it is today. ²⁵Now therefore, may LORD, the God of Israel, keep with your servant David my father that which you have promised him, saying, ‘There shall not fail from you a man in my sight to sit on the throne of Israel, if only your children take heed to their way, to walk before me as you have walked before me.’

²⁶“Now therefore, God of Israel, please let your word be verified, which you spoke to your servant David my father. ²⁷But will God in very deed dwell on the earth? Behold, heaven and the heaven of heavens can’t contain you; how much less this house that I have built! ²⁸Yet have respect for the prayer of your servant and for his supplication, LORD my God, to listen to the cry and to the prayer which your servant prays before you today; ²⁹that your eyes may be open towards this house night and day, even towards the place of which you have said, ‘My name shall be there;’ to listen to the prayer which your servant prays towards this place. ³⁰Listen to the supplication of your servant, and of your people Israel, when they pray towards this place. Yes, hear in heaven, your dwelling place; and when you hear, forgive.

³¹“If a man sins against his neighbour, and an oath is laid on him to cause him to swear, and he comes and swears before your altar in this house, ³²then hear in heaven, and act, and judge your servants, condemning the wicked, to bring his way on his own head, and justifying the righteous, to give him according to his righteousness.

³³“When your people Israel are struck down before the enemy because they have sinned against you, if they turn again to you and confess your name, and pray and make supplication to you in this house, ³⁴then hear in heaven, and forgive the sin of your people Israel, and bring them again to the land which you gave to their fathers.

³⁵“When the sky is shut up and there is no rain because they have sinned against you, if they pray towards this place and confess your name, and turn from their sin when you afflict them, ³⁶then hear in heaven, and forgive the sin of your servants, and of your people Israel, when you teach them the good way in which they should walk; and send rain on your land which you have given to your people for an inheritance.

³⁷“If there is famine in the land, if there is pestilence, if there is blight, mildew, locust or caterpillar; if their enemy besieges them in the land of their cities, whatever plague, whatever sickness there is, ³⁸whatever prayer and supplication is made by any man, or by all your people Israel, who shall each know the plague of his own heart, and spread out his hands towards this house, ³⁹then hear in heaven, your dwelling place, and forgive, and act, and give to every man according to all his ways, whose heart you know (for you, even you only, know the hearts of all the children of men); ⁴⁰that they may fear you all the days that they live in the land which you gave to our fathers.

⁴¹“Moreover, concerning the foreigner, who is not of your people Israel, when he comes out of a far country for your name’s sake ⁴²(for they shall hear of your great name and of your mighty hand and of your outstretched arm), when he comes and prays towards this house, ⁴³hear in heaven, your dwelling place, and do according to all that the foreigner calls to you for; that all the peoples of the earth may know your name, to fear you, as do your people Israel, and that they may know that this house which I have built is called by your name.