Psalm 78 :: New Living Translation (NLT)

Psa 78:1A psalm[fn] of Asaph.

O my people, listen to my instructions.
Open your ears to what I am saying,

Psa 78:2for I will speak to you in a parable.
I will teach you hidden lessons from our past—

Psa 78:3stories we have heard and known,
stories our ancestors handed down to us.

Psa 78:4We will not hide these truths from our children;
we will tell the next generation
about the glorious deeds of the LORD,
about his power and his mighty wonders.

Psa 78:5

Psa 78:5For he issued his laws to Jacob;
he gave his instructions to Israel.
He commanded our ancestors
to teach them to their children,

Psa 78:6

Psa 78:6so the next generation might know them—
even the children not yet born—
and they in turn will teach their own children.

Psa 78:7

Psa 78:7So each generation should set its hope anew on God,
not forgetting his glorious miracles
and obeying his commands.

Psa 78:8

Psa 78:8Then they will not be like their ancestors—
stubborn, rebellious, and unfaithful,
refusing to give their hearts to God.

Psa 78:9

Psa 78:9The warriors of Ephraim, though armed with bows,
turned their backs and fled on the day of battle.

Psa 78:10

Psa 78:10They did not keep God’s covenant
and refused to live by his instructions.

Psa 78:11

Psa 78:11They forgot what he had done—
the great wonders he had shown them,

Psa 78:12

Psa 78:12the miracles he did for their ancestors
on the plain of Zoan in the land of Egypt.

Psa 78:13

Psa 78:13For he divided the sea and led them through,
making the water stand up like walls!

Psa 78:14

Psa 78:14In the daytime he led them by a cloud,
and all night by a pillar of fire.

Psa 78:15

Psa 78:15He split open the rocks in the wilderness
to give them water, as from a gushing spring.

Psa 78:16

Psa 78:16He made streams pour from the rock,
making the waters flow down like a river!

Psa 78:17

Psa 78:17Yet they kept on sinning against him,
rebelling against the Most High in the desert.

Psa 78:18

Psa 78:18They stubbornly tested God in their hearts,
demanding the foods they craved.

Psa 78:19

Psa 78:19They even spoke against God himself, saying,
“God can’t give us food in the wilderness.

Psa 78:20

Psa 78:20Yes, he can strike a rock so water gushes out,
but he can’t give his people bread and meat.”

Psa 78:21

Psa 78:21When the LORD heard them, he was furious.
The fire of his wrath burned against Jacob.
Yes, his anger rose against Israel,

Psa 78:22

Psa 78:22for they did not believe God
or trust him to care for them.

Psa 78:23

Psa 78:23But he commanded the skies to open;
he opened the doors of heaven.

Psa 78:24

Psa 78:24He rained down manna for them to eat;
he gave them bread from heaven.

Psa 78:25

Psa 78:25They ate the food of angels!
God gave them all they could hold.

Psa 78:26

Psa 78:26He released the east wind in the heavens
and guided the south wind by his mighty power.

Psa 78:27

Psa 78:27He rained down meat as thick as dust—
birds as plentiful as the sand on the seashore!

Psa 78:28

Psa 78:28He caused the birds to fall within their camp
and all around their tents.

Psa 78:29

Psa 78:29The people ate their fill.
He gave them what they craved.

Psa 78:30

Psa 78:30But before they satisfied their craving,
while the meat was yet in their mouths,

Psa 78:31

Psa 78:31the anger of God rose against them,
and he killed their strongest men.
He struck down the finest of Israel’s young men.

Psa 78:32

Psa 78:32But in spite of this, the people kept sinning.
Despite his wonders, they refused to trust him.

Psa 78:33

Psa 78:33So he ended their lives in failure,
their years in terror.

Psa 78:34

Psa 78:34When God began killing them,
they finally sought him.
They repented and took God seriously.

Psa 78:35

Psa 78:35Then they remembered that God was their rock,
that God Most High[fn] was their redeemer.

Psa 78:36

Psa 78:36But all they gave him was lip service;
they lied to him with their tongues.

Psa 78:37

Psa 78:37Their hearts were not loyal to him.
They did not keep his covenant.

Psa 78:38

Psa 78:38Yet he was merciful and forgave their sins
and did not destroy them all.
Many times he held back his anger
and did not unleash his fury!

Psa 78:39

Psa 78:39For he remembered that they were merely mortal,
gone like a breath of wind that never returns.

Psa 78:40

Psa 78:40Oh, how often they rebelled against him in the wilderness
and grieved his heart in that dry wasteland.

Psa 78:41

Psa 78:41Again and again they tested God’s patience
and provoked the Holy One of Israel.

Psa 78:42

Psa 78:42They did not remember his power
and how he rescued them from their enemies.

Psa 78:43

Psa 78:43They did not remember his miraculous signs in Egypt,
his wonders on the plain of Zoan.

Psa 78:44

Psa 78:44For he turned their rivers into blood,
so no one could drink from the streams.

Psa 78:45

Psa 78:45He sent vast swarms of flies to consume them
and hordes of frogs to ruin them.

Psa 78:46

Psa 78:46He gave their crops to caterpillars;
their harvest was consumed by locusts.

Psa 78:47

Psa 78:47He destroyed their grapevines with hail
and shattered their sycamore-figs with sleet.

Psa 78:48

Psa 78:48He abandoned their cattle to the hail,
their livestock to bolts of lightning.

Psa 78:49

Psa 78:49He loosed on them his fierce anger—
all his fury, rage, and hostility.
He dispatched against them
a band of destroying angels.

Psa 78:50

Psa 78:50He turned his anger against them;
he did not spare the Egyptians’ lives
but ravaged them with the plague.

Psa 78:51

Psa 78:51He killed the oldest son in each Egyptian family,
the flower of youth throughout the land of Egypt.[fn]

Psa 78:52

Psa 78:52But he led his own people like a flock of sheep,
guiding them safely through the wilderness.

Psa 78:53

Psa 78:53He kept them safe so they were not afraid;
but the sea covered their enemies.

Psa 78:54

Psa 78:54He brought them to the border of his holy land,
to this land of hills he had won for them.

Psa 78:55

Psa 78:55He drove out the nations before them;
he gave them their inheritance by lot.
He settled the tribes of Israel into their homes.

Psa 78:56

Psa 78:56But they kept testing and rebelling against God Most High.
They did not obey his laws.

Psa 78:57

Psa 78:57They turned back and were as faithless as their parents.
They were as undependable as a crooked bow.

Psa 78:58

Psa 78:58They angered God by building shrines to other gods;
they made him jealous with their idols.

Psa 78:59

Psa 78:59When God heard them, he was very angry,
and he completely rejected Israel.

Psa 78:60

Psa 78:60Then he abandoned his dwelling at Shiloh,
the Tabernacle where he had lived among the people.

Psa 78:61

Psa 78:61He allowed the Ark of his might to be captured;
he surrendered his glory into enemy hands.

Psa 78:62

Psa 78:62He gave his people over to be butchered by the sword,
because he was so angry with his own people—his special possession.

Psa 78:63

Psa 78:63Their young men were killed by fire;
their young women died before singing their wedding songs.

Psa 78:64

Psa 78:64Their priests were slaughtered,
and their widows could not mourn their deaths.

Psa 78:65

Psa 78:65Then the Lord rose up as though waking from sleep,
like a warrior aroused from a drunken stupor.

Psa 78:66

Psa 78:66He routed his enemies
and sent them to eternal shame.

Psa 78:67

Psa 78:67But he rejected Joseph’s descendants;
he did not choose the tribe of Ephraim.

Psa 78:68

Psa 78:68He chose instead the tribe of Judah,
and Mount Zion, which he loved.

Psa 78:69

Psa 78:69There he built his sanctuary as high as the heavens,
as solid and enduring as the earth.

Psa 78:70

Psa 78:70He chose his servant David,
calling him from the sheep pens.

Psa 78:71

Psa 78:71He took David from tending the ewes and lambs
and made him the shepherd of Jacob’s descendants—
God’s own people, Israel.

Psa 78:72

Psa 78:72He cared for them with a true heart
and led them with skillful hands.

See the NLT Preface (Especially for Parenthesis, Brackets, & Asterisks).

NLT Footnotes

(78:1)

Hebrew maskil. This may be a literary or musical term.

(78:35)

Hebrew El-Elyon.

(78:51)

Hebrew in the tents of Ham.

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For more information on this translation, see the NLT Preface.