M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan
2 Hannah prayed, and said, My heart exults and triumphs in the Lord; my horn (my strength) is lifted up in the Lord. My mouth is no longer silent, for it is opened wide over my enemies, because I rejoice in Your salvation.
2 There is none holy like the Lord, there is none besides You; there is no Rock like our God.
3 Talk no more so very proudly; let not arrogance go forth from your mouth, for the Lord is a God of knowledge, and by Him actions are weighed.
4 The bows of the mighty are broken, and those who stumbled are girded with strength.
5 Those who were full have hired themselves out for bread, but those who were hungry have ceased to hunger. The barren has borne seven, but she who has many children languishes and is forlorn.
6 The Lord slays and makes alive; He brings down to Sheol and raises up.
7 The Lord makes poor and makes rich; He brings low and He lifts up.
8 He raises up the poor out of the dust and lifts up the needy from the ash heap, to make them sit with nobles and inherit the throne of glory. For the pillars of the earth are the Lord’s, and He has set the world upon them.
9 He will guard the feet of His godly ones, but the wicked shall be silenced and perish in darkness; for by strength shall no man prevail.
10 The adversaries of the Lord shall be broken to pieces; against them will He thunder in heaven. The Lord will judge [all peoples] to the ends of the earth; and He will give strength to [a]His king (King) and exalt the power of His anointed (Anointed [b]His Christ).(A)
11 Elkanah and his wife Hannah returned to Ramah to his house. But the child ministered to the Lord before Eli the priest.
12 The sons of Eli were base and worthless; they did not know or regard the Lord.
13 And the custom of the priests with the people was this: when any man offered sacrifice, the priest’s servant came while the flesh was boiling with a fleshhook of three prongs in his hand;
14 And he thrust it into the pan or kettle or caldron or pot; all that the fleshhook brought up the priest took for himself. So they did in Shiloh with all the Israelites who came there.
15 Also, before they burned the fat, the priest’s servant came and said to the man who sacrificed, Give the priest meat to roast, for he will not accept boiled meat from you, but raw.
16 And if the man said to him, Let them burn the fat first, and then you may take as much as you want, the priest’s servant would say, No! Give it to me now or I will take it by force.
17 So the sin of the [two] young men was very great before the Lord, for they despised the offering of the Lord.
18 But Samuel ministered before the Lord, a child girded with a linen ephod.
19 Moreover, his mother made him a little robe and brought it to him from year to year when she came up with her husband to offer the yearly sacrifice.
20 And Eli would bless Elkanah and his wife and say, May the Lord give you children by this woman for the gift she asked for and gave to the Lord. Then they would go to their own home.
21 And the Lord visited Hannah, so that she bore three sons and two daughters. And the child Samuel grew before the Lord.
22 Now Eli was very old, and he heard all that his sons did to all Israel and how they lay with the women who served at the door of the Tent of Meeting.
23 And he said to them, Why do you do such things? For I hear of your evil dealings from all the people.
24 No, my sons; it is no good report which I hear the Lord’s people spreading abroad.
25 If one man wrongs another, God will mediate for him; but if a man wrongs the Lord, who shall intercede for him? Yet they did not listen to their father, for it was the Lord’s will to slay them.
26 Now the boy Samuel grew and was in favor both with the Lord and with men.
27 A man of God came to Eli and said to him, Thus has the Lord said: I plainly revealed Myself to the house of your father [forefather Aaron] when they were in Egypt in bondage to Pharaoh’s house.
28 Moreover, I selected him out of all the tribes of Israel to be My priest, to offer on My altar, to burn incense, to wear an ephod before Me. And I gave [from then on] to the house of your father [forefather] all the offerings of the Israelites made by fire.
29 Why then do you kick [trample upon, treat with contempt] My sacrifice and My offering which I commanded, and honor your sons above Me by fattening yourselves upon the choicest part of every offering of My people Israel?
30 Therefore the Lord, the God of Israel, says, I did promise that your house and that of your father [forefather Aaron] should go in and out before Me forever. But now the Lord says, Be it far from Me. For those who honor Me I will honor, and those who despise Me shall be lightly esteemed.
31 Behold, the time is coming when I will cut off your strength and the strength of your own father’s house, that there shall not be an old man in your house.
32 And you shall behold the distress of My house, even in all the prosperity which God will give Israel, and there shall not be an old man in your house forever.
33 Yet I will not cut off from My altar every man of yours; some shall survive to weep and mourn [over the family’s ruin], but all the increase of your house shall die in their best years.(B)
34 And what befalls your two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, shall be a sign to you—in one day they both shall die. [Fulfilled in I Sam. 4:17, 18.]
35 And I will raise up for Myself a [c]faithful priest (Priest), who shall do according to what is in My heart and mind. And I will build him a sure house, and he shall walk before My anointed (Anointed) forever.(C)
36 Everyone who is left in your house shall come crouching to him for a piece of silver and a bit of bread and say, Put me, I pray you, into a priest’s office so I may have a piece of bread.
2 Therefore you have no excuse or defense or justification, O man, whoever you are who judges and condemns another. For in posing as judge and passing sentence on another, you condemn yourself, because you who judge are habitually practicing the very same things [that you censure and denounce].
2 [But] we know that the judgment (adverse verdict, sentence) of God falls justly and in accordance with truth upon those who practice such things.
3 And do you think or imagine, O man, when you judge and condemn those who practice such things and yet do them yourself, that you will escape God’s judgment and elude His sentence and adverse verdict?
4 Or are you [so blind as to] trifle with and presume upon and despise and underestimate the wealth of His kindness and forbearance and long-suffering patience? Are you unmindful or actually ignorant [of the fact] that God’s kindness is intended to lead you to repent ([a]to change your mind and inner man to accept God’s will)?
5 But by your callous stubbornness and impenitence of heart you are storing up wrath and indignation for yourself on the day of wrath and indignation, when God’s righteous judgment (just doom) will be revealed.
6 For He will render to every man according to his works [justly, as his deeds deserve]:(A)
7 To those who by patient persistence in well-doing [[b]springing from piety] seek [unseen but sure] glory and honor and [[c]the eternal blessedness of] immortality, He will give eternal life.
8 But for those who are self-seeking and self-willed and disobedient to the Truth but responsive to wickedness, there will be indignation and wrath.
9 [And] there will be tribulation and anguish and calamity and constraint for every soul of man who [habitually] does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek (Gentile).
10 But glory and honor and [heart] peace shall be awarded to everyone who [habitually] does good, the Jew first and also the Greek (Gentile).
11 For God shows no partiality [[d]undue favor or unfairness; with Him one man is not different from another].(B)
12 All who have sinned without the Law will also perish without [regard to] the Law, and all who have sinned under the Law will be judged and condemned by the Law.
13 For it is not merely hearing the Law [read] that makes one righteous before God, but it is the doers of the Law who will be held guiltless and acquitted and justified.
14 When Gentiles who have not the [divine] Law do instinctively what the Law requires, they are a law to themselves, since they do not have the Law.
15 They show that the essential requirements of the Law are written in their hearts and are operating there, with which their consciences (sense of right and wrong) also bear witness; and their [moral] [e]decisions (their arguments of reason, their condemning or approving [f]thoughts) will accuse or perhaps defend and excuse [them]
16 On that day when, as my Gospel proclaims, God by Jesus Christ will judge men in regard to [g]the things which they conceal (their hidden thoughts).(C)
17 But if you bear the name of Jew and rely upon the Law and pride yourselves in God and your relationship to Him,
18 And know and understand His will and discerningly approve the better things and have a sense of what is vital, because you are instructed by the Law;
19 And if you are confident that you [yourself] are a guide to the blind, a light to those who are in darkness, and [that
20 You are] a corrector of the foolish, a teacher of the childish, having in the Law the embodiment of knowledge and truth—
21 Well then, you who teach others, do you not teach yourself? While you teach against stealing, do you steal (take what does not really belong to you)?
22 You who say not to commit adultery, do you commit adultery [are you unchaste in action or in thought]? You who abhor and loathe idols, do you rob temples [do you appropriate to your own use what is consecrated to God, thus robbing the sanctuary and [h]doing sacrilege]?
23 You who boast in the Law, do you dishonor God by breaking the Law [by stealthily infringing upon or carelessly neglecting or openly breaking it]?
24 For, as it is written, The name of God is maligned and blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you! [The words to this effect are from your own Scriptures.](D)
25 Circumcision does indeed profit if you keep the Law; but if you habitually transgress the Law, your circumcision is made uncircumcision.
26 So if a man who is uncircumcised keeps the requirements of the Law, will not his uncircumcision be credited to him as [equivalent to] circumcision?
27 Then those who are physically uncircumcised but keep the Law will condemn you who, although you have the code in writing and have circumcision, break the Law.
28 For he is not a [real] Jew who is only one outwardly and publicly, nor is [true] circumcision something external and physical.
29 But he is a Jew who is one inwardly, and [true] circumcision is of the heart, a spiritual and not a literal [matter]. His praise is not from men but from God.
40 The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord after Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard had let him go from Ramah, when he had taken him bound in chains among all who were carried away captive from Jerusalem and Judah, who were taken as exiles to Babylon.
2 And the captain of the guard took Jeremiah and said to him, The Lord your God pronounced evil upon this place.
3 Now the Lord has brought it about and has done as He said: [It is] because you [of Judah] have sinned against the Lord and have not obeyed His voice, therefore this thing has come upon you.
4 Now, see, I am freeing you today [Jeremiah] from the chains upon your hands. If it seems good to you to come with me to Babylon, come, and I will keep an eye on you and look after you well. But if it seems bad to you to come with me to Babylon, then do not do it. Behold, all the land is before you; wherever it seems good, right, and convenient for you to go, go there.
5 While [Jeremiah] was hesitating, [the captain of the guard] said, Go back then to Gedaliah son of Ahikam, the son of Shaphan, whom the king of Babylon made governor over the cities of Judah, and dwell with him among the people; or go wherever it seems right for you to go. So the captain of the guard gave him an allowance of food and a present and let him go.
6 Then Jeremiah went to Gedaliah son of Ahikam at Mizpah and dwelt with him among the people who were left in the land.
7 Now when all the captains of the forces that were in the open country [of Judah] and their men heard that the king of Babylon had made Gedaliah son of Ahikam governor in the land [of Judah] and had committed to him men, women, and children, those of the poorest of the land who had not been taken into exile to Babylon,
8 They went to Gedaliah at Mizpah—Ishmael son of Nethaniah, Johanan and Jonathan the sons of Kareah, Seraiah son of Tanhumeth, the sons of Ephai the Netophathite, and Jezaniah the son of the Maacathite, they and their men.
9 And Gedaliah son of Ahikam, the son of Shaphan, swore to them and their men, saying, Do not be afraid to serve the Chaldeans; dwell in [this] land and serve the king of Babylon, and it shall be well with you.
10 As for me, I will dwell at Mizpah to stand [for you] before the Chaldeans who come to us [ministering to them and looking after the king’s interests]; but as for you, gather the juice [of the grape], summer fruits and oil, and store them in your utensils [chosen for such purposes], and dwell in your cities that you have seized.
11 Likewise, when all the Jews who were in Moab and among the people of Ammon and in Edom and who were in all the other countries heard that the king of Babylon had left a remnant in Judah and had set over them [as governor] Gedaliah son of Ahikam, the son of Shaphan,
12 Then all the Jews returned from all the places to which they had been driven and came to the land of Judah, to Gedaliah at Mizpah, and gathered a great abundance of juice [of the grape] and summer fruits.
13 Moreover, Johanan son of Kareah and all the captains of the forces that were in the open country came to Gedaliah at Mizpah
14 And said to him, Do you know that Baalis king of the Ammonites has sent Ishmael son of Nethaniah to take your life? But Gedaliah son of Ahikam did not believe them.
15 Then Johanan son of Kareah spoke to Gedaliah in Mizpah secretly, saying, Let me go, I pray you, and I will slay Ishmael son of Nethaniah, and no man will know it. Why should he slay you and cause all the Jews who are gathered to you to be scattered and the remnant of Judah to perish?
16 But Gedaliah son of Ahikam said to Johanan son of Kareah, You shall not do this thing, for you speak falsely of Ishmael.
Psalm 15
A Psalm of David.
1 Lord, who shall dwell [temporarily] in Your tabernacle? Who shall dwell [permanently] on Your holy hill?
2 He who walks and lives uprightly and blamelessly, who works rightness and justice and speaks and thinks the truth in his heart,
3 He who does not slander with his tongue, nor does evil to his friend, nor takes up a reproach against his neighbor;
4 In whose eyes a vile person is despised, but he who honors those who fear the Lord (who revere and worship Him); who swears to his own hurt and does not change;
5 [He who] does not put out his money for [a]interest [to one of his own people] and who will not take a bribe against the innocent. He who does these things shall never be moved.(A)
Psalm 16
A Poem of David; [probably] intended to record memorable thoughts.
1 Keep and protect me, O God, for in You I have found refuge, and in You do I put my trust and hide myself.
2 I say to the Lord, You are my Lord; I have no good beside or beyond You.
3 As for the godly (the saints) who are in the land, they are the excellent, the noble, and the glorious, in whom is all my delight.
4 Their sorrows shall be multiplied who choose another god; their drink offerings of blood will I not offer or take their names upon my lips.
5 The Lord is my chosen and assigned portion, my cup; You hold and maintain my lot.
6 The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; yes, I have a good heritage.
7 I will bless the Lord, Who has given me counsel; yes, my heart instructs me in the night seasons.
8 I have set the Lord continually before me; because He is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.
9 Therefore my heart is glad and my glory [my inner self] rejoices; my body too shall rest and confidently dwell in safety,
10 For You will not abandon me to Sheol (the place of the dead), neither will You suffer Your holy one [Holy One] to see corruption.(B)
11 You will show me the path of life; in Your presence is fullness of joy, at Your right hand there are pleasures forevermore.(C)
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