M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan
20 Now Abraham moved south to the Negeb and settled between Kadesh and Shur. One day, when visiting the city of Gerar, 2 he declared that Sarah was his sister! Then King Abimelech sent for her, and had her brought to him at his palace.
3 But that night God came to him in a dream and told him, “You are a dead man, for that woman you took is married.”
4 But Abimelech hadn’t slept with her yet, so he said, “Lord, will you slay an innocent man? 5 He told me, ‘She is my sister,’ and she herself said, ‘Yes, he is my brother.’ I hadn’t the slightest intention of doing anything wrong.”
6 “Yes, I know,” the Lord replied. “That is why I held you back from sinning against me; that is why I didn’t let you touch her. 7 Now restore her to her husband, and he will pray for you (for he is a prophet) and you shall live. But if you don’t return her to him, you are doomed to death along with all your household.”
8 The king was up early the next morning, and hastily called a meeting of all the palace personnel and told them what had happened. And great fear swept through the crowd.
9-10 Then the king called for Abraham. “What is this you’ve done to us?” he demanded. “What have I done that deserves treatment like this, to make me and my kingdom guilty of this great sin? Who would suspect that you would do a thing like this to me? Whatever made you think of this vile deed?”
11-12 “Well,” Abraham said, “I figured this to be a godless place. ‘They will want my wife and will kill me to get her,’ I thought. And besides, she is my sister—or at least a half sister (we both have the same father)—and I married her. 13 And when God sent me traveling far from my childhood home, I told her, ‘Have the kindness to mention, wherever we come, that you are my sister.’”
14 Then King Abimelech took sheep and oxen and servants—both men and women—and gave them to Abraham, and returned Sarah his wife to him.
15 “Look my kingdom over, and choose the place where you want to live,” the king told him. 16 Then he turned to Sarah. “Look,” he said, “I am giving your ‘brother’ a thousand silver pieces as damages for what I did, to compensate for any embarrassment and to settle any claim against me regarding this matter. Now justice has been done.”
17 Then Abraham prayed, asking God to cure the king and queen and the other women of the household, so that they could have children; 18 for God had stricken all the women with barrenness to punish Abimelech for taking Abraham’s wife.
19 After Jesus had finished this address, he left Galilee and circled back to Judea from across the Jordan River. 2 Vast crowds followed him, and he healed their sick. 3 Some Pharisees came to interview him and tried to trap him into saying something that would ruin him.
“Do you permit divorce?” they asked.
4 “Don’t you read the Scriptures?” he replied. “In them it is written that at the beginning God created man and woman, 5-6 and that a man should leave his father and mother, and be forever united to his wife. The two shall become one—no longer two, but one! And no man may divorce what God has joined together.”
7 “Then, why,” they asked, “did Moses say a man may divorce his wife by merely writing her a letter of dismissal?”
8 Jesus replied, “Moses did that in recognition of your hard and evil hearts, but it was not what God had originally intended. 9 And I tell you this, that anyone who divorces his wife, except for fornication, and marries another, commits adultery.”[a]
10 Jesus’ disciples then said to him, “If that is how it is, it is better not to marry!”
11 “Not everyone can accept this statement,” Jesus said. “Only those whom God helps. 12 Some are born without the ability to marry,[b] and some are disabled by men, and some refuse to marry for the sake of the Kingdom of Heaven. Let anyone who can, accept my statement.”
13 Little children were brought for Jesus to lay his hands on them and pray. But the disciples scolded those who brought them. “Don’t bother him,” they said.
14 But Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and don’t prevent them. For of such is the Kingdom of Heaven.” 15 And he put his hands on their heads and blessed them before he left.
16 Someone came to Jesus with this question: “Good master, what must I do to have eternal life?”
17 “When you call me good you are calling me God,” Jesus replied, “for God alone is truly good.[c] But to answer your question, you can get to heaven if you keep the commandments.”
18 “Which ones?” the man asked.
And Jesus replied, “Don’t kill, don’t commit adultery, don’t steal, don’t lie, 19 honor your father and mother, and love your neighbor as yourself!”
20 “I’ve always obeyed every one of them,” the youth replied. “What else must I do?”
21 Jesus told him, “If you want to be perfect, go and sell everything you have and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” 22 But when the young man heard this, he went away sadly, for he was very rich.
23 Then Jesus said to his disciples, “It is almost impossible for a rich man to get into the Kingdom of Heaven. 24 I say it again—it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God!”
25 This remark confounded the disciples. “Then who in the world can be saved?” they asked.
26 Jesus looked at them intently and said, “Humanly speaking, no one. But with God, everything is possible.”
27 Then Peter said to him, “We left everything to follow you. What will we get out of it?”
28 And Jesus replied, “When I, the Messiah,[d] shall sit upon my glorious throne in the Kingdom, you my disciples shall certainly sit on twelve thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel. 29 And anyone who gives up his home, brothers, sisters, father, mother, wife,[e] children, or property, to follow me, shall receive a hundred times as much in return, and shall have eternal life. 30 But many who are first now will be last then; and some who are last now will be first then.”
9 1-2 On October 10[a] the people returned for another observance; this time they fasted and clothed themselves with sackcloth and sprinkled dirt in their hair. And the Israelis separated themselves from all foreigners. 3 The laws of God were read aloud to them for two or three hours, and for several more hours they took turns confessing their own sins and those of their ancestors. And everyone worshiped the Lord their God. 4 Some of the Levites were on the platform praising the Lord God with songs of joy. These men were Jeshua, Kadmiel, Bani, Shebaniah, Bunni, Sherebiah, Bani, and Chenani.
5 Then the Levite leaders called out to the people, “Stand up and praise the Lord your God, for he lives from everlasting to everlasting. Praise his glorious name! It is far greater than we can think or say.”
The leaders in this part of the service were Jeshua, Kadmiel, Bani, Hashabneiah, Sherebiah, Hodiah, Shebaniah, and Pethahiah.
6 Then Ezra prayed, “You alone are God. You have made the skies and the heavens, the earth and the seas, and everything in them. You preserve it all; and all the angels of heaven worship you.
7 “You are the Lord God who chose Abram and brought him from Ur of the Chaldeans and renamed him Abraham. 8 When he was faithful to you, you made a contract with him to forever give him and his descendants the land of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Jebusites, and Girgashites; and now you have done what you promised, for you are always true to your word.
9 “You saw the troubles and sorrows of our ancestors in Egypt, and you heard their cries from beside the Red Sea. 10 You displayed great miracles against Pharaoh and his people, for you knew how brutally the Egyptians were treating them; you have a glorious reputation because of those never-to-be-forgotten deeds. 11 You divided the sea for your people so they could go through on dry land! And then you destroyed their enemies in the depths of the sea; they sank like stones beneath the mighty waters. 12 You led our ancestors by a pillar of cloud during the day and a pillar of fire at night so that they could find their way.
13 “You came down upon Mount Sinai and spoke with them from heaven and gave them good laws and true commandments, 14 including the laws about the holy Sabbath; and you commanded them, through Moses your servant, to obey them all.
15 “You gave them bread from heaven when they were hungry and water from the rock when they were thirsty. You commanded them to go in and conquer the land you had sworn to give them; 16 but our ancestors were a proud and stubborn lot, and they refused to listen to your commandments.
17 “They refused to obey and didn’t pay any attention to the miracles you did for them; instead, they rebelled and appointed a leader to take them back into slavery in Egypt! But you are a God of forgiveness, always ready to pardon, gracious and merciful, slow to become angry, and full of love and mercy; you didn’t abandon them, 18 even though they made a calf idol and proclaimed, ‘This is our God! He brought us out of Egypt!’ They sinned in so many ways, 19 but in your great mercy you didn’t abandon them to die in the wilderness! The pillar of cloud led them forward day by day, and the pillar of fire showed them the way through the night. 20 You sent your good Spirit to instruct them, and you did not stop giving them bread from heaven or water for their thirst. 21 For forty years you sustained them in the wilderness; they lacked nothing in all that time. Their clothes didn’t wear out, and their feet didn’t swell!
22 “Then you helped them conquer great kingdoms and many nations, and you placed your people in every corner of the land; they completely took over the land of King Sihon of Heshbon and King Og of Bashan. 23 You caused a population explosion among the Israelis and brought them into the land you had promised to their ancestors. 24 You subdued whole nations before them—even the kings and the people of the Canaanites were powerless! 25 Your people captured fortified cities and fertile land; they took over houses full of good things, with cisterns and vineyards and olive yards and many, many fruit trees; so they ate and were full and enjoyed themselves in all your blessings.
26 “But despite all this, they were disobedient and rebelled against you. They threw away your law, killed the prophets who told them to return to you, and they did many other terrible things. 27 So you gave them to their enemies. But in their time of trouble they cried to you, and you heard them from heaven, and in great mercy you sent them saviors who delivered them from their enemies. 28 But when all was going well, your people turned to sin again, and once more you let their enemies conquer them. Yet whenever your people returned to you and cried to you for help, once more you listened from heaven, and in your wonderful mercy delivered them! 29 You punished them in order to turn them toward your laws; but even though they should have obeyed them,[b] they were proud and wouldn’t listen, and continued to sin. 30 You were patient with them for many years. You sent your prophets to warn them about their sins, but still they wouldn’t listen. So once again you allowed the heathen nations to conquer them. 31 But in your great mercy you did not destroy them completely or abandon them forever. What a gracious and merciful God you are!
32 “And now, O great and awesome God, you who keep your promises of love and kindness—do not let all the hardships we have gone through become as nothing to you. Great trouble has come upon us and upon our kings and princes and priests and prophets and ancestors from the days when the kings of Assyria first triumphed over us until now. 33 Every time you punished us you were being perfectly fair; we have sinned so greatly that you gave us only what we deserved. 34 Our kings, princes, priests, and ancestors didn’t obey your laws or listen to your warnings. 35 They did not worship you despite the wonderful things you did for them and the great goodness you showered upon them. You gave them a large, fat land, but they refused to turn from their wickedness.
36 “So now we are slaves here in the land of plenty that you gave to our ancestors! Slaves among all this abundance! 37 The lush yield of this land passes into the hands of the kings whom you have allowed to conquer us because of our sins. They have power over our bodies and our cattle, and we serve them at their pleasure and are in great misery. 38 Because of all this, we again promise to serve the Lord! And we and our princes and Levites and priests put our names to this covenant.”
19 While Apollos was in Corinth, Paul traveled through Turkey and arrived in Ephesus, where he found several disciples. 2 “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” he asked them.
“No,” they replied, “we don’t know what you mean. What is the Holy Spirit?”
3 “Then what beliefs did you acknowledge at your baptism?” he asked.
And they replied, “What John the Baptist taught.”
4 Then Paul pointed out to them that John’s baptism was to demonstrate a desire to turn from sin to God and that those receiving his baptism must then go on to believe in Jesus, the one John said would come later.
5 As soon as they heard this, they were baptized in[a] the name of the Lord Jesus. 6 Then, when Paul laid his hands upon their heads, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they spoke in other languages and prophesied. 7 The men involved were about twelve in number.
8 Then Paul went to the synagogue and preached boldly each Sabbath day[b] for three months, telling what he believed and why, and persuading many to believe in Jesus. 9 But some rejected his message and publicly spoke against Christ, so he left, refusing to preach to them again. Pulling out the believers, he began a separate meeting at the lecture hall of Tyrannus and preached there daily. 10 This went on for the next two years, so that everyone in the Turkish province of Asia Minor—both Jews and Greeks—heard the Lord’s message.
11 And God gave Paul the power to do unusual miracles, 12 so that even when his handkerchiefs or parts of his clothing were placed upon sick people, they were healed, and any demons within them came out.
13 A team of itinerant Jews who were traveling from town to town casting out demons planned to experiment by using the name of the Lord Jesus. The incantation they decided on was this: “I adjure you by Jesus, whom Paul preaches, to come out!” 14 Seven sons of Sceva, a Jewish priest, were doing this. 15 But when they tried it on a man possessed by a demon, the demon replied, “I know Jesus and I know Paul, but who are you?” 16 And he leaped on two of them and beat them up, so that they fled out of his house naked and badly injured.
17 The story of what happened spread quickly all through Ephesus, to Jews and Greeks alike; and a solemn fear descended on the city, and the name of the Lord Jesus was greatly honored. 18-19 Many of the believers who had been practicing black magic confessed their deeds and brought their incantation books and charms and burned them at a public bonfire. (Someone estimated the value of the books at $10,000.
21 Afterwards Paul felt impelled by the Holy Spirit[d] to go across to Greece before returning to Jerusalem. “And after that,” he said, “I must go on to Rome!” 22 He sent his two assistants, Timothy and Erastus, on ahead to Greece while he stayed awhile longer in Asia Minor.
23 But about that time, a big blowup developed in Ephesus concerning the Christians. 24 It began with Demetrius, a silversmith who employed many craftsmen to manufacture silver shrines of the Greek goddess Diana. 25 He called a meeting of his men, together with others employed in related trades, and addressed them as follows:
“Gentlemen, this business is our income. 26 As you know so well from what you’ve seen and heard, this man Paul has persuaded many, many people that handmade gods aren’t gods at all. As a result, our sales volume is going down! And this trend is evident not only here in Ephesus, but throughout the entire province! 27 Of course, I am not only talking about the business aspects of this situation and our loss of income, but also of the possibility that the temple of the great goddess Diana will lose its influence, and that Diana—this magnificent goddess worshiped not only throughout this part of Turkey but all around the world—will be forgotten!”
28 At this their anger boiled and they began shouting, “Great is Diana of the Ephesians!”
29 A crowd began to gather, and soon the city was filled with confusion. Everyone rushed to the amphitheater, dragging along Gaius and Aristarchus, Paul’s traveling companions, for trial. 30 Paul wanted to go in, but the disciples wouldn’t let him. 31 Some of the Roman officers of the province, friends of Paul, also sent a message to him, begging him not to risk his life by entering.
32 Inside the people were all shouting, some one thing and some another—everything was in confusion. In fact, most of them didn’t even know why they were there.
33 Alexander was spotted among the crowd by some of the Jews and dragged forward. He motioned for silence and tried to speak. 34 But when the crowd realized he was a Jew, they started shouting again and kept it up for two hours: “Great is Diana of the Ephesians! Great is Diana of the Ephesians!”
35 At last the mayor was able to quiet them down enough to speak. “Men of Ephesus,” he said, “everyone knows that Ephesus is the center[e] of the religion of the great Diana, whose image fell down to us from heaven. 36 Since this is an indisputable fact, you shouldn’t be disturbed no matter what is said, and should do nothing rash. 37 Yet you have brought these men here who have stolen nothing from her temple and have not defamed her. 38 If Demetrius and the craftsmen have a case against them, the courts are currently in session and the judges can take the case at once. Let them go through legal channels. 39 And if there are complaints about other matters, they can be settled at the regular City Council meetings; 40 for we are in danger of being called to account by the Roman government for today’s riot, since there is no cause for it. And if Rome demands an explanation, I won’t know what to say.”
41 Then he dismissed them, and they dispersed.
The Living Bible copyright © 1971 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.