Psalms Chapter 109
For the Choir Director. A Psalm of David
1 God that I praise, speak up for me!
2 Deceitful people speak against me;
they slander me with lies.
3 They surround me with hateful words
and fight me for no reason.
4 In return for my love, they accuse me
even when I’m praying for them.
5 They repay me evil for good,
hatred for love.
Ps 109:1-5
6 Appoint someone corrupt over them,
an accuser to stand beside them.
7 When they’re judged, pronounce them guilty;
count even their prayers as acts of sin.
8 Shorten their lives
and give someone else their position of oversight.
9 Make their children fatherless
and their wives widows.
10 Have their children go begging,
looking for food far from their ruined homes.
11 Have their creditors seize everything they own
and foreigners plunder what they’d labored to produce.
12 May no one extend enduring love to them
or be gracious to their fatherless children.
13 Cut off their posterity;
erase their names from the next generation.
Ps 109:6-13
14 LORD, remember their fathers’ sins
and not blot out their mothers’ transgressions;
15always keep them in mind;
Have people forget they ever lived,
16because they didn’t show enduring love;
they persecuted poor, needy people,
and murdered the despondent.
17 They loved to curse; put curses on them!
they didn’t like to bless; don’t bless them!
18 They cover themselves with cursing like clothes;
it soaks into their bodies like water,
down to the bone like oil!
19 Put it on them like a robe they have to wear all the time,
like a belt they always have on.
20 Make such things the LORD’s reward to accusers
that claim bad things about me.
Ps 109:14-20
21 But LORD God, deal graciously with me
because your enduring love is good;
deliver me 22 because I’m poor and needy
and wounded in my heart.
23 I’m passing on like a lengthening shadow;
I’m brushed off like a locust.
24 My knees are weak from fasting;
I’m skin and bones.
25 I’m someone people scorn;
they just shake their heads at the sight of me.
Ps 109:21-25
26 Help me, LORD my God;
in your enduring love, save me.
27 Show them this is your doing.
28 Let them curse, but you bless;
when they attack me, humiliate them,
and I’ll be happy.
29 Dress those accusers in dishonor;
cover them with their humiliation like a cloak.
Ps 109:26-29
30 I’ll praise the LORD repeatedly;
I’ll praise him in front of everyone,
31because he stands by the needy
to save them from those who condemn them to death.
Ps 109:30-31