Psalm 78

¹ Give ear, my people, to my instruction;
incline your ears to the words of my mouth.

² I will open my mouth in a parable;
I will utter riddles from of old—

³ things we have heard and known,
that our ancestors told us.

⁴ We will not hide them from their children;
to the coming generation we will recount
the praises of the LORD and his strength,
and the wonders he has done.

⁵ He established a testimony in Jacob
and set a law in Israel,
which he commanded our ancestors
to make known to their children,

⁶ so that the next generation would know—
children yet unborn—
who would rise and tell their own children.

⁷ Then they would place their confidence in God
and not forget the deeds of God
but keep his commands,

⁸ and not be like their ancestors—
a stubborn and rebellious generation,
a generation that did not set its heart firm,
whose spirit was not faithful to God.

⁹ The sons of Ephraim, armed bowmen,
turned back on the day of battle.

¹⁰ They did not keep God's covenant
and refused to walk in his law.

¹¹ They forgot his deeds
and his wonders that he had shown them.

¹² Before their ancestors he worked marvels
in the land of Egypt, in the field of Zoan.

¹³ He split the sea and brought them through;
he made the waters stand like a wall.

¹⁴ He led them with the cloud by day
and all night with a fiery light.

¹⁵ He split rocks in the wilderness
and gave them drink as from the great deep.

¹⁶ He brought streams out of the rock
and made water flow down like rivers.

¹⁷ Yet they sinned still more against him,
rebelling against the Most High in the dry land.

¹⁸ They tested God in their heart
by demanding food for their appetite.

¹⁹ They spoke against God, saying,
"Can God spread a table in the wilderness?

²⁰ Look—he struck the rock and water gushed out,
streams overflowed.
But can he also give bread?
Can he provide meat for his people?"

²¹ Therefore the LORD heard and was furious;
a fire was kindled against Jacob,
and anger rose against Israel,

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

²³ Yet he commanded the skies above
and opened the doors of heaven.

²⁴ He rained down manna for them to eat
and gave them the grain of heaven.

²⁵ Mortals ate the bread of angels;
he sent them food in abundance.

²⁶ He set loose the east wind in the heavens
and drove the south wind by his power.

²⁷ He rained meat on them like dust,
winged birds like the sand of the seas.

²⁸ He let them fall in the midst of their camp,
all around their dwellings.

²⁹ They ate and were well filled,
for he brought them what they craved.

³⁰ They had not turned from their craving,
their food was still in their mouths,

³¹ when God's anger rose against them.
He killed the sturdiest among them
and struck down the young men of Israel.

³² Despite all this they still sinned
and did not believe in his wonders.

³³ So he ended their days in futility
and their years in terror.

³⁴ When he killed them, they sought him;
they turned and searched earnestly for God.

³⁵ They remembered that God was their rock,
the Most High God their redeemer.

³⁶ But they flattered him with their mouths
and lied to him with their tongues.

³⁷ Their heart was not steadfast toward him;
they were not faithful to his covenant.

³⁸ Yet he, being compassionate,
atoned for guilt and did not destroy.
Many times he turned back his anger
and did not stir up all his wrath.

³⁹ He remembered that they were flesh,
a wind that passes and does not return.

⁴⁰ How often they rebelled against him in the wilderness
and grieved him in the wasteland!

⁴¹ Again and again they tested God
and provoked the Holy One of Israel.

⁴² They did not remember his hand—
the day he redeemed them from the foe,

⁴³ when he set his signs in Egypt
and his wonders in the field of Zoan.

⁴⁴ He turned their rivers to blood,
and their streams—they could not drink.

⁴⁵ He sent swarms of flies that devoured them,
and frogs that destroyed them.

⁴⁶ He gave their crops to the locust
and their labor to the swarming locust.

⁴⁷ He killed their vines with hail
and their sycamores with frost.

⁴⁸ He gave over their cattle to the hail
and their livestock to bolts of lightning.

⁴⁹ He unleashed on them the heat of his anger—
fury and indignation and distress,
a band of destroying angels.

⁵⁰ He leveled a path for his anger;
he did not spare them from death
but gave their lives over to plague.

⁵¹ He struck every firstborn in Egypt,
the first fruits of strength in the tents of Ham.

⁵² Then he led out his people like sheep
and guided them like a flock in the wilderness.

⁵³ He led them in safety, and they were not afraid,
but the sea covered their enemies.

⁵⁴ He brought them to his holy territory,
this mountain his right hand had won.

⁵⁵ He drove out nations before them
and apportioned them an inheritance by lot;
he settled the tribes of Israel in their tents.

⁵⁶ But they tested and rebelled against the Most High God
and did not keep his testimonies.

⁵⁷ They turned back and acted faithlessly like their ancestors;
they twisted aside like a faulty bow.

⁵⁸ They provoked him with their high places
and made him jealous with their carved images.

⁵⁹ God heard and was furious;
he utterly rejected Israel.

⁶⁰ He abandoned the tabernacle at Shiloh,
the tent he had pitched among mortals.

⁶¹ He delivered his strength into captivity,
his splendor into the hand of the foe.

⁶² He gave his people over to the sword
and was furious with his inheritance.

⁶³ Fire consumed their young men,
and their young women had no wedding songs.

⁶⁴ Their priests fell by the sword,
and their widows could not weep.

⁶⁵ Then the Lord awoke as from sleep,
like a warrior shouting from wine.

⁶⁶ He beat back his foes;
he put on them everlasting disgrace.

⁶⁷ He rejected the tent of Joseph
and did not choose the tribe of Ephraim,

⁶⁸ but chose the tribe of Judah,
Mount Zion, which he loved.

⁶⁹ He built his sanctuary like the heights,
like the earth he established forever.

⁷⁰ He chose David his servant
and took him from the sheepfolds;

⁷¹ from following the nursing ewes he brought him
to shepherd Jacob his people,
Israel his inheritance.

⁷² He shepherded them with a blameless heart
and guided them with the skill of his hands.