Friday after Ash Wednesday

1“Cry aloud! Don’t spare!

Lift up your voice like a trumpet!

Declare to my people their disobedience,

and to the house of Jacob their sins.

2Yet they seek me daily,

and delight to know my ways.

As a nation that did righteousness,

and didn’t forsake the ordinance of their God,

they ask of me righteous judgments.

They delight to draw near to God.

3‘Why have we fasted,’ they say, ‘and you don’t see?

Why have we afflicted our soul, and you don’t notice?’

“Behold, in the day of your fast you find pleasure,

and oppress all your laborers.

4Behold, you fast for strife and contention,

and to strike with the fist of wickedness.

You don’t fast today so as to make your voice to be heard on high.

5Is this the fast that I have chosen?

A day for a man to humble his soul?

Is it to bow down his head like a reed,

and to spread sackcloth and ashes under himself?

Will you call this a fast,

and an acceptable day to the LORD?

6“Isn’t this the fast that I have chosen:

to release the bonds of wickedness,

to undo the straps of the yoke,

to let the oppressed go free,

and that you break every yoke?

7Isn’t it to distribute your bread to the hungry,

and that you bring the poor who are cast out to your house?

When you see the naked,

that you cover him;

and that you not hide yourself from your own flesh?

8Then your light will break out as the morning,

and your healing will appear quickly;

then your righteousness shall go before you,

and the LORD’s glory will be your rear guard.

9Then you will call, and the LORD will answer.

You will cry for help, and he will say, ‘Here I am.’

“If you take away from among you the yoke,

finger pointing,

and speaking wickedly;

1Have mercy on me, God, according to your loving kindness.

According to the multitude of your tender mercies, blot out my transgressions.

2Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity.

Cleanse me from my sin.

3For I know my transgressions.

My sin is constantly before me.

4Against you, and you only, I have sinned,

and done that which is evil in your sight,

so you may be proved right when you speak,

and justified when you judge.

…

16For you don’t delight in sacrifice, or else I would give it.

You have no pleasure in burnt offering.

17The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit.

O God, you will not despise a broken and contrite heart.

14Then John’s disciples came to him, saying, “Why do we and the Pharisees fast often, but your disciples don’t fast?” 15Jesus said to them, “Can the friends of the bridegroom mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? But the days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast.