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78:1  A Maskil of Asaph. My people, hear my instruction; listen to the words from my mouth.
78:2  I will declare wise sayings; I will speak mysteries from the past—
78:3  things we have heard and known and that our ancestors have passed down to us.
78:4  We will not hide them from their children, but will tell a future generation the praiseworthy acts of the Lord, his might, and the wondrous works he has performed.
78:5  He established a testimony in Jacob and set up a law in Israel, which he commanded our ancestors to teach to their children
78:6  so that a future generation— children yet to be born—might know. They were to rise and tell their children
78:7  so that they might put their confidence in God and not forget God’s works, but keep his commands.
78:8  Then they would not be like their ancestors, a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation whose heart was not loyal and whose spirit was not faithful to God.
78:9  The Ephraimite archers turned back on the day of battle.
78:10  They did not keep God’s covenant and refused to live by his law.
78:11  They forgot what he had done, the wondrous works he had shown them.
78:12  He worked wonders in the sight of their ancestors in the land of Egypt, the territory of Zoan.
78:13  He split the sea and brought them across; the water stood firm like a wall.
78:14  He led them with a cloud by day and with a fiery light throughout the night.
78:15  He split rocks in the wilderness and gave them drink as abundant as the depths.
78:16  He brought streams out of the stone and made water flow down like rivers.
78:17  But they continued to sin against him, rebelling in the desert against the Most High.
78:18  They deliberately tested God, demanding the food they craved.
78:19  They spoke against God, saying, “Is God able to provide food in the wilderness?
78:20  Look! He struck the rock and water gushed out; torrents overflowed. But can he also provide bread or furnish meat for his people?”
78:21  Therefore, the Lord heard and became furious; then fire broke out against Jacob, and anger flared up against Israel
78:22  because they did not believe God or rely on his salvation.
78:23  He gave a command to the clouds above and opened the doors of heaven.
78:24  He rained manna for them to eat; he gave them grain from heaven.
78:25  People ate the bread of angels. He sent them an abundant supply of food.
78:26  He made the east wind blow in the skies and drove the south wind by his might.
78:27  He rained meat on them like dust, and winged birds like the sand of the seas.
78:28  He made them fall in the camp, all around the tents.
78:29  The people ate and were completely satisfied, for he gave them what they craved.
78:30  Before they had turned from what they craved, while the food was still in their mouths,
78:31  God’s anger flared up against them, and he killed some of their best men. He struck down Israel’s fit young men.
78:32  Despite all this, they kept sinning and did not believe his wondrous works.
78:33  He made their days end in futility, their years in sudden disaster.
78:34  When he killed some of them, the rest began to seek him; they repented and searched for God.
78:35  They remembered that God was their rock, the Most High God, their Redeemer.
78:36  But they deceived him with their mouths, they lied to him with their tongues,
78:37  their hearts were insincere toward him, and they were unfaithful to his covenant.
78:38  Yet he was compassionate; he atoned for their iniquity and did not destroy them. He often turned his anger aside and did not unleash all his wrath.
78:39  He remembered that they were only flesh, a wind that passes and does not return.
78:40  How often they rebelled against him in the wilderness and grieved him in the desert.
78:41  They constantly tested God and provoked the Holy One of Israel.
78:42  They did not remember his power shown on the day he redeemed them from the foe,
78:43  when he performed his miraculous signs in Egypt and his wonders in the territory of Zoan.
78:44  He turned their rivers into blood, and they could not drink from their streams.
78:45  He sent among them swarms of flies, which fed on them, and frogs, which devastated them.
78:46  He gave their crops to the caterpillar and the fruit of their labor to the locust.
78:47  He killed their vines with hail and their sycamore fig trees with a flood.
78:48  He handed over their livestock to hail and their cattle to lightning bolts.
78:49  He sent his burning anger against them: fury, indignation, and calamity— a band of deadly messengers.
78:50  He cleared a path for his anger. He did not spare them from death but delivered their lives to the plague.
78:51  He struck all the firstborn in Egypt, the first progeny of the tents of Ham.
78:52  He led his people out like sheep and guided them like a flock in the wilderness.
78:53  He led them safely, and they were not afraid; but the sea covered their enemies.
78:54  He brought them to his holy territory, to the mountain his right hand acquired.
78:55  He drove out nations before them. He apportioned their inheritance by lot and settled the tribes of Israel in their tents.
78:56  But they rebelliously tested the Most High God, for they did not keep his decrees.
78:57  They treacherously turned away like their ancestors; they became warped like a faulty bow.
78:58  They enraged him with their high places and provoked his jealousy with their carved images.
78:59  God heard and became furious; he completely rejected Israel.
78:60  He abandoned the tabernacle at Shiloh, the tent where he resided among mankind.
78:61  He gave up his strength to captivity and his splendor to the hand of a foe.
78:62  He surrendered his people to the sword because he was enraged with his heritage.
78:63  Fire consumed his chosen young men, and his young women had no wedding songs.
78:64  His priests fell by the sword, and the widows could not lament.
78:65  The Lord awoke as if from sleep, like a warrior from the effects of wine.
78:66  He beat back his foes; he gave them lasting disgrace.
78:67  He rejected the tent of Joseph and did not choose the tribe of Ephraim.
78:68  He chose instead the tribe of Judah, Mount Zion, which he loved.
78:69  He built his sanctuary like the heights, like the earth that he established forever.
78:70  He chose David his servant and took him from the sheep pens;
78:71  he brought him from tending ewes to be shepherd over his people Jacob— over Israel, his inheritance.
78:72  He shepherded them with a pure heart and guided them with his skillful hands.