Therefore they have more than enough food to eat, and even suck up the water of the sea.

They say, "How does God know what we do? Is the sovereign one aware of what goes on?"

How desolate they become in a mere moment! Terrifying judgments make their demise complete!

They are like a dream after one wakes up. O Lord, when you awake you will despise them.

Remember your people whom you acquired in ancient times, whom you rescued so they could be your very own nation, as well as Mount Zion, where you dwell!

Your enemies roar in the middle of your sanctuary; they set up their battle flags.

They invade like lumberjacks swinging their axes in a thick forest.

And now they are tearing down all its engravings with axes and crowbars.

They set your sanctuary on fire; they desecrate your dwelling place by knocking it to the ground.

They say to themselves, "We will oppress all of them." They burn down all the places where people worship God in the land.

The bravehearted were plundered; they "fell asleep." All the warriors were helpless.

so that the next generation, children yet to be born, might know about them. They will grow up and tell their descendants about them.

Then they will place their confidence in God. They will not forget the works of God, and they will obey his commands.

Then they will not be like their ancestors, who were a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation that was not committed and faithful to God.

The Ephraimites were armed with bows, but they retreated in the day of battle.

They did not keep their covenant with God, and they refused to obey his law.

They forgot what he had done, the amazing things he had shown them.

Yet they continued to sin against him, and rebelled against the sovereign One in the desert.

They willfully challenged God by asking for food to satisfy their appetite.

They insulted God, saying, "Is God really able to give us food in the wilderness?

because they did not have faith in God, and did not trust his ability to deliver them.

They ate until they were stuffed; he gave them what they desired.

They were not yet filled up, their food was still in their mouths,

Despite all this, they continued to sin, and did not trust him to do amazing things.

When he struck them down, they sought his favor; they turned back and longed for God.

They remembered that God was their protector, and that the sovereign God was their deliverer.

But they deceived him with their words, and lied to him.

They were not really committed to him, and they were unfaithful to his covenant.

He remembered that they were made of flesh, and were like a wind that blows past and does not return.

How often they rebelled against him in the wilderness, and insulted him in the desert!

They again challenged God, and offended the Holy One of Israel.

They did not remember what he had done, how he delivered them from the enemy,

He turned their rivers into blood, and they could not drink from their streams.

Yet they challenged and defied the sovereign God, and did not obey his commands.

They were unfaithful and acted as treacherously as their ancestors; they were as unreliable as a malfunctioning bow.

They made him angry with their pagan shrines, and made him jealous with their idols.

A psalm of Asaph. O God, foreigners have invaded your chosen land; they have polluted your holy temple and turned Jerusalem into a heap of ruins.

They have given the corpses of your servants to the birds of the sky; the flesh of your loyal followers to the beasts of the earth.

They have made their blood flow like water all around Jerusalem, and there is no one to bury them.

For they have devoured Jacob and destroyed his home.

Pay back our neighbors in full! May they be insulted the same way they insulted you, O Lord!

O Lord God, invincible warrior! How long will you remain angry at your people while they pray to you?

It is burned and cut down. They die because you are displeased with them.

I gave them over to their stubborn desires; they did what seemed right to them.

(May those who hate the Lord cower in fear before him! May they be permanently humiliated!)

They neither know nor understand. They stumble around in the dark, while all the foundations of the earth crumble.

They carefully plot against your people, and make plans to harm the ones you cherish.

They say, "Come on, let's annihilate them so they are no longer a nation! Then the name of Israel will be remembered no more."

Yes, they devise a unified strategy; they form an alliance against you.

They were destroyed at Endor; their corpses were like manure on the ground.

Cover their faces with shame, so they might seek you, O Lord.

May they be humiliated and continually terrified! May they die in shame!

Then they will know that you alone are the Lord, the sovereign king over all the earth.

As they pass through the Baca Valley, he provides a spring for them. The rain even covers it with pools of water.

They are sustained as they travel along; each one appears before God in Zion.

I will listen to what God the Lord says. For he will make peace with his people, his faithful followers. Yet they must not return to their foolish ways.

All the nations, whom you created, will come and worship you, O Lord. They will honor your name.

They treat me like those who descend into the grave. I am like a helpless man,

They surround me like water all day long; they join forces and encircle me.

How blessed are the people who worship you! O Lord, they experience your favor.

They rejoice in your name all day long, and are vindicated by your justice.

if they break my rules and do not keep my commandments,

Your enemies, O Lord, hurl insults; they insult your chosen king as they dog his footsteps.

You bring their lives to an end and they "fall asleep." In the morning they are like the grass that sprouts up;

The days of our lives add up to seventy years, or eighty, if one is especially strong. But even one's best years are marred by trouble and oppression. Yes, they pass quickly and we fly away.

They will lift you up in their hands, so you will not slip and fall on a stone.

When the wicked sprout up like grass, and all the evildoers glisten, it is so that they may be annihilated.

The godly grow like a palm tree; they grow high like a cedar in Lebanon.

Planted in the Lord's house, they grow in the courts of our God.

They bear fruit even when they are old; they are filled with vitality and have many leaves.

So they proclaim that the Lord, my protector, is just and never unfair.

They spew out threats and speak defiantly; all the evildoers boast.

O Lord, they crush your people; they oppress the nation that belongs to you.

They kill the widow and the one residing outside his native land, and they murder the fatherless.

Then they say, "The Lord does not see this; the God of Jacob does not take notice of it."

They conspire against the blameless, and condemn to death the innocent.

He says, "Do not be stubborn like they were at Meribah, like they were that day at Massah in the wilderness,

where your ancestors challenged my authority, and tried my patience, even though they had seen my work.

For forty years I was continually disgusted with that generation, and I said, 'These people desire to go astray; they do not obey my commands.'

So I made a vow in my anger, 'They will never enter into the resting place I had set aside for them.'"

Moses and Aaron were among his priests; Samuel was one of those who prayed to him. They prayed to the Lord and he answered them.

He spoke to them from a pillar of cloud; they obeyed his regulations and the ordinance he gave them.

O Lord our God, you answered them. They found you to be a forgiving God, but also one who punished their sinful deeds.

For I eat ashes as if they were bread, and mix my drink with my tears,

so they may proclaim the name of the Lord in Zion, and praise him in Jerusalem,

They will perish, but you will endure. They will wear out like a garment; like clothes you will remove them and they will disappear.

Your shout made the waters retreat; at the sound of your thunderous voice they hurried off --

You set up a boundary for them that they could not cross, so that they would not cover the earth again.

He turns springs into streams; they flow between the mountains.

They provide water for all the animals in the field; the wild donkeys quench their thirst.

The birds of the sky live beside them; they chirp among the bushes.

He provides grass for the cattle, and crops for people to cultivate, so they can produce food from the ground,

as well as wine that makes people feel so good, and so they can have oil to make their faces shine, as well as food that sustains people's lives.

The trees of the Lord receive all the rain they need, the cedars of Lebanon which he planted,

When the sun rises, they withdraw and sleep in their dens.

You give food to them and they receive it; you open your hand and they are filled with food.

When you ignore them, they panic. When you take away their life's breath, they die and return to dust.

When you send your life-giving breath, they are created, and you replenish the surface of the ground.

He looks down on the earth and it shakes; he touches the mountains and they start to smolder.

When they were few in number, just a very few, and resident aliens within it,