Psalm 78:1-71 TLB

[1] O my people, listen to my teaching. Open your ears to what I am saying. [2] For I will show you lessons from our history, stories handed down to us from former generations. [4] I will reveal these truths to you so that you can describe these glorious deeds of Jehovah to your children and tell them about the mighty miracles he did. [5] For he gave his laws to Israel and commanded our fathers to teach them to their children, [6] so that they in turn could teach their children too. Thus his laws pass down from generation to generation. [7] In this way each generation has been able to obey his laws and to set its hope anew on God and not forget his glorious miracles. [8] Thus they did not need to be as their fathers were-stubborn, rebellious, unfaithful, refusing to give their hearts to God. [9] The people of Ephraim, though fully armed, turned their backs and fled when the day of battle came [10] because they didn't obey his laws. They refused to follow his ways. [11] And they forgot about the wonderful miracles God had done for them and for their fathers in Egypt. [13] For he divided the sea before them and led them through! The water stood banked up along both sides of them! [14] In the daytime he led them by a cloud, and at night by a pillar of fire. [15] He split open the rocks in the wilderness to give them plenty of water, as though gushing from a spring. [16] Streams poured from the rock, flowing like a river! [17] Yet they kept on with their rebellion, sinning against the God who is above all gods. [18] They murmured and complained, demanding other food than God was giving them. [19] They even spoke against God himself. "Why can't he give us decent food as well as water?" they grumbled. [21] Jehovah heard them and was angry; the fire of his wrath burned against Israel [22] because they didn't believe in God or trust in him to care for them, [23] even though he commanded the skies to open-he opened the windows of heaven- [24] and rained down manna for their food. He gave them bread from heaven! [25] They ate angels' food! He gave them all they could hold. [26] And he led forth the east wind and guided the south wind by his mighty power. [27] He rained down birds as thick as dust, clouds of them like sands along the shore! [28] He caused the birds to fall to the ground among the tents. [29] The people ate their fill. He gave them what they asked for. [30] But they had hardly finished eating, and the meat was yet in their mouths, [31] when the anger of the Lord rose against them and killed the finest of Israel's young men. [32] Yet even so the people kept on sinning and refused to believe in miracles. [33] So he cut their lives short and gave them years of terror and disaster. [34] Then at last, when he had ruined them, they walked awhile behind him; how earnestly they turned around and followed him! [35] Then they remembered that God was their Rock-that their Savior was the God above all gods. [36] But it was only with their words that they followed him, not with their hearts; [37] their hearts were far away. They did not keep their promises. [38] Yet he was merciful and forgave their sins and didn't destroy them all. Many and many a time he held back his anger. [39] For he remembered that they were merely mortal men, gone in a moment like a breath of wind. [40] Oh, how often they rebelled against him in those desert years and grieved his heart. [41] Again and again they turned away and tempted God to kill them, and limited the Holy One of Israel from giving them his blessings. [42] They forgot his power and love and how he had rescued them from their enemies; [43] they forgot the plagues he sent upon the Egyptians in Tanis- [44] how he turned their rivers into blood so that no one could drink, [45] how he sent vast swarms of flies to fill the land, and how the frogs had covered all of Egypt! [46] He gave their crops to caterpillars. Their harvest was consumed by locusts. [47] He destroyed their grapevines and their sycamores with hail. [48] Their cattle died in the fields, mortally wounded by huge hailstones from heaven. Their sheep were killed by lightning. [49] He loosed on them the fierceness of his anger, sending sorrow and trouble. He dispatched against them a band of destroying angels. [50] He gave free course to his anger and did not spare the Egyptians' lives, but handed them over to plagues and sickness. [51] Then he killed the eldest son in each Egyptian family-he who was the beginning of its strength and joy. [52] But he led forth his own people like a flock, guiding them safely through the wilderness. [53] He kept them safe, so they were not afraid. But the sea closed in upon their enemies and overwhelmed them. [54] He brought them to the border of his land of blessing, to this land of hills he made for them. [55] He drove out the nations occupying the land and gave each tribe of Israel its apportioned place as its home. [56] Yet though he did all this for them, they still rebelled against the God above all gods and refused to follow his commands. [57] They turned back from entering the Promised Land and disobeyed as their fathers had. Like a crooked arrow, they missed the target of God's will. [58] They made him angry by erecting idols and altars to other gods. [59] When God saw their deeds, his wrath was strong and he despised his people. [60] Then he abandoned his Tabernacle at Shiloh, where he had lived among mankind, [61] and allowed his Ark to be captured; he surrendered his glory into enemy hands. [62] He caused his people to be butchered because his anger was intense. [63] Their young men were killed by fire, and their girls died before they were old enough to sing their wedding songs. [64] The priests were slaughtered, and their widows died before they could even begin their lament. [65] Then the Lord rose up as though awakening from sleep, and like a mighty man aroused by wine, [66] he routed his enemies; he drove them back and sent them to eternal shame. [67] But he rejected Joseph's family, the tribe of Ephraim, [68] and chose the tribe of Judah-and Mount Zion, which he loved. [69] There he built his towering temple, solid and enduring as the heavens and the earth. [70] He chose his servant David, taking him from feeding sheep [71] and from following the ewes with lambs; God presented David to his people as their shepherd, and he cared for them with a true heart and skillful hands.