Receiving the Testimony in the Old Testament #1

¹ Give ear, O my people, to my law: incline your ears to the words of my mouth. ² I will open my mouth in a parable: I will utter dark sayings of old: ³ Which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us. ⁴ We will not hide them from their children, shewing to the generation to come the praises of the LORD, and his strength, and his wonderful works that he hath done. ⁵ For he established a testimony in Jacob, and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers, that they should make them known to their children: ⁶ That the generation to come might know them, even the children which should be born; who should arise and declare them to their children: ⁷ That they might set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments: ⁸ And might not be as their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation; a generation that set not their heart aright, and whose spirit was not stedfast with God.

¹ Sing aloud unto God our strength: make a joyful noise unto the God of Jacob. ² Take a psalm, and bring hither the timbrel, the pleasant harp with the psaltery. ³ Blow up the trumpet in the new moon, in the time appointed, on our solemn feast day. ⁴ For this was a statute for Israel, and a law of the God of Jacob. ⁵ This he ordained in Joseph for a testimony, when he went out through the land of Egypt: where I heard a language that I understood not. ⁶ I removed his shoulder from the burden: his hands were delivered from the pots. ⁷ Thou calledst in trouble, and I delivered thee; I answered thee in the secret place of thunder: I proved thee at the waters of Meribah. Selah.

⁸ Hear, O my people, and I will testify unto thee: O Israel, if thou wilt hearken unto me; ⁹ There shall no strange god be in thee; neither shalt thou worship any strange god. ¹⁰ I am the LORD thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt: open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it. ¹¹ But my people would not hearken to my voice; and Israel would none of me. ¹² So I gave them up unto their own hearts’ lust: and they walked in their own counsels. ¹³ Oh that my people had hearkened unto me, and Israel had walked in my ways! ¹⁴ I should soon have subdued their enemies, and turned my hand against their adversaries. ¹⁵ The haters of the LORD should have submitted themselves unto him: but their time should have endured for ever. ¹⁶ He should have fed them also with the finest of the wheat: and with honey out of the rock should I have satisfied thee.