Psalms 78:1
Hear my teaching, my people. Turn your ears to the words of my mouth.
Psalms 78:2
I will open my mouth in a parable. I will utter dark sayings of old,
Psalms 78:3
which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us.
Psalms 78:4
We will not hide them from their children, telling to the generation to come the praises of Yahweh, his strength, and his wondrous deeds that he has done.
Psalms 78:5
For he established a covenant in Jacob, and appointed a teaching in Israel, which he commanded our fathers, that they should make them known to their children;
Psalms 78:6
that the generation to come might know, even the children who should be born; who should arise and tell their children,
Psalms 78:7
that they might set their hope in God, and not forget God’s deeds, but keep his commandments,
Psalms 78:8
and might not be as their fathers— a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation that didn’t make their hearts loyal, whose spirit was not steadfast with God.
Psalms 78:9
The children of Ephraim, being armed and carrying bows, turned back in the day of battle.
Psalms 78:10
They didn’t keep God’s covenant, and refused to walk in his law.
Psalms 78:11
They forgot his doings, his wondrous deeds that he had shown them.
Psalms 78:12
He did marvelous things in the sight of their fathers, in the land of Egypt, in the field of Zoan.
Psalms 78:13
He split the sea, and caused them to pass through. He made the waters stand as a heap.
Psalms 78:14
In the daytime he also led them with a cloud, and all night with a light of fire.
Psalms 78:15
He split rocks in the wilderness, and gave them drink abundantly as out of the depths.
Psalms 78:16
He brought streams also out of the rock, and caused waters to run down like rivers.
Psalms 78:17
Yet they still went on to sin against him, to rebel against the Most High in the desert.
Psalms 78:18
They tempted God in their heart by asking food according to their desire.
Psalms 78:19
Yes, they spoke against God. They said, “Can God prepare a table in the wilderness?
Psalms 78:20
Behold, he struck the rock, so that waters gushed out, and streams overflowed. Can he give bread also? Will he provide meat for his people?”
Psalms 78:21
Therefore Yahweh heard, and was angry. A fire was kindled against Jacob, anger also went up against Israel,
Psalms 78:22
because they didn’t believe in God, and didn’t trust in his salvation.
Psalms 78:23
Yet he commanded the skies above, and opened the doors of heaven.
Psalms 78:24
He rained down manna on them to eat, and gave them food from the sky.
Psalms 78:25
Man ate the bread of angels. He sent them food to the full.
Psalms 78:26
He caused the east wind to blow in the sky. By his power he guided the south wind.
Psalms 78:27
He also rained meat on them as the dust, winged birds as the sand of the seas.
Psalms 78:28
He let them fall in the middle of their camp, around their habitations.
Psalms 78:29
So they ate, and were well filled. He gave them their own desire.
Psalms 78:30
They didn’t turn from their cravings. Their food was yet in their mouths,
Psalms 78:31
when the anger of God went up against them, killed some of their strongest, and struck down the young men of Israel.
Psalms 78:32
For all this they still sinned, and didn’t believe in his wondrous works.
Psalms 78:33
Therefore he consumed their days in vanity, and their years in terror.
Psalms 78:34
When he killed them, then they inquired after him. They returned and sought God earnestly.
Psalms 78:35
They remembered that God was their rock, the Most High God, their redeemer.
Psalms 78:36
But they flattered him with their mouth, and lied to him with their tongue.
Psalms 78:37
For their heart was not right with him, neither were they faithful in his covenant.
Psalms 78:38
But he, being merciful, forgave iniquity, and didn’t destroy them. Yes, many times he turned his anger away, and didn’t stir up all his wrath.
Psalms 78:39
He remembered that they were but flesh, a wind that passes away, and doesn’t come again.
Psalms 78:40
How often they rebelled against him in the wilderness, and grieved him in the desert!
Psalms 78:41
They turned again and tempted God, and provoked the Holy One of Israel.
Psalms 78:42
They didn’t remember his hand, nor the day when he redeemed them from the adversary;
Psalms 78:43
how he set his signs in Egypt, his wonders in the field of Zoan,
Psalms 78:44
he turned their rivers into blood, and their streams, so that they could not drink.
Psalms 78:45
He sent among them swarms of flies, which devoured them; and frogs, which destroyed them.
Psalms 78:46
He also gave their increase to the caterpillar, and their labor to the locust.
Psalms 78:47
He destroyed their vines with hail, their sycamore fig trees with frost.
Psalms 78:48
He also gave over their livestock to the hail, and their flocks to hot thunderbolts.
Psalms 78:49
He threw on them the fierceness of his anger, wrath, indignation, and trouble, and a band of angels of evil.
Psalms 78:50
He made a path for his anger. He didn’t spare their soul from death, but gave their life over to the pestilence,
Psalms 78:51
and struck all the firstborn in Egypt, the chief of their strength in the tents of Ham.
Psalms 78:52
But he led out his own people like sheep, and guided them in the wilderness like a flock.
Psalms 78:53
He led them safely, so that they weren’t afraid, but the sea overwhelmed their enemies.
Psalms 78:54
He brought them to the border of his sanctuary, to this mountain, which his right hand had taken.
Psalms 78:55
He also drove out the nations before them, allotted them for an inheritance by line, and made the tribes of Israel to dwell in their tents.
Psalms 78:56
Yet they tempted and rebelled against the Most High God, and didn’t keep his testimonies,
Psalms 78:57
but turned back, and dealt treacherously like their fathers. They were twisted like a deceitful bow.
Psalms 78:58
For they provoked him to anger with their high places, and moved him to jealousy with their engraved images.
Psalms 78:59
When God heard this, he was angry, and greatly abhorred Israel,
Psalms 78:60
so that he abandoned the tent of Shiloh, the tent which he placed among men,
Psalms 78:61
and delivered his strength into captivity, his glory into the adversary’s hand.
Psalms 78:62
He also gave his people over to the sword, and was angry with his inheritance.
Psalms 78:63
Fire devoured their young men. Their virgins had no wedding song.
Psalms 78:64
Their priests fell by the sword, and their widows couldn’t weep.
Psalms 78:65
Then the Lord awakened as one out of sleep, like a mighty man who shouts by reason of wine.
Psalms 78:66
He struck his adversaries backward. He put them to a perpetual reproach.
Psalms 78:67
Moreover he rejected the tent of Joseph, and didn’t choose the tribe of Ephraim,
Psalms 78:68
But chose the tribe of Judah, Mount Zion which he loved.
Psalms 78:69
He built his sanctuary like the heights, like the earth which he has established forever.
Psalms 78:70
He also chose David his servant, and took him from the sheepfolds;
Psalms 78:71
from following the ewes that have their young, he brought him to be the shepherd of Jacob, his people, and Israel, his inheritance.
Psalms 78:72
So he was their shepherd according to the integrity of his heart, and guided them by the skillfulness of his hands.