M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan

24 Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying, ² “Command the children of Israel, that they bring to you pure olive oil beaten for the light, to cause a lamp to burn continually. ³ Outside of the veil of the Testimony, in the Tent of Meeting, Aaron shall keep it in order from evening to morning before Yahweh continually. It shall be a statute forever throughout your generations. ⁴ He shall keep in order the lamps on the pure gold lamp stand before Yahweh continually.

⁵ “You shall take fine flour, and bake twelve cakes of it: two tenths of an ephah^[a] shall be in one cake. ⁶ You shall set them in two rows, six on a row, on the pure gold table before Yahweh. ⁷ You shall put pure frankincense on each row, that it may be to the bread for a memorial, even an offering made by fire to Yahweh. ⁸ Every Sabbath day he shall set it in order before Yahweh continually. It is an everlasting covenant on the behalf of the children of Israel. ⁹ It shall be for Aaron and his sons. They shall eat it in a holy place; for it is most holy to him of the offerings of Yahweh made by fire by a perpetual statute.”

¹⁰ The son of an Israelite woman, whose father was an Egyptian, went out among the children of Israel; and the son of the Israelite woman and a man of Israel strove together in the camp. ¹¹ The son of the Israelite woman blasphemed the Name, and cursed; and they brought him to Moses. His mother’s name was Shelomith, the daughter of Dibri, of the tribe of Dan. ¹² They put him in custody until Yahweh’s will should be declared to them. ¹³ Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying, ¹⁴ “Bring him who cursed out of the camp; and let all who heard him lay their hands on his head, and let all the congregation stone him. ¹⁵ You shall speak to the children of Israel, saying, ‘Whoever curses his God shall bear his sin. ¹⁶ He who blasphemes Yahweh’s name, he shall surely be put to death. All the congregation shall certainly stone him. The foreigner as well as the native-born shall be put to death when he blasphemes the Name.

¹⁷ “‘He who strikes any man mortally shall surely be put to death. ¹⁸ He who strikes an animal mortally shall make it good, life for life. ¹⁹ If anyone injures his neighbor, it shall be done to him as he has done: ²⁰ fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth. It shall be done to him as he has injured someone. ²¹ He who kills an animal shall make it good; and he who kills a man shall be put to death. ²² You shall have one kind of law for the foreigner as well as the native-born; for I am Yahweh your God.’”

²³ Moses spoke to the children of Israel; and they brought him who had cursed out of the camp, and stoned him with stones. The children of Israel did as Yahweh commanded Moses.

For the Chief Musician. A Psalm by David.

7 A good name is better than fine perfume; and the day of death better than the day of one’s birth. ² It is better to go to the house of mourning than to go to the house of feasting; for that is the end of all men, and the living should take this to heart. ³ Sorrow is better than laughter; for by the sadness of the face the heart is made good. ⁴ The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning; but the heart of fools is in the house of mirth. ⁵ It is better to hear the rebuke of the wise than for a man to hear the song of fools. ⁶ For as the crackling of thorns under a pot, so is the laughter of the fool. This also is vanity. ⁷ Surely extortion makes the wise man foolish; and a bribe destroys the understanding. ⁸ Better is the end of a thing than its beginning.

The patient in spirit is better than the proud in spirit. ⁹ Don’t be hasty in your spirit to be angry, for anger rests in the bosom of fools. ¹⁰ Don’t say, “Why were the former days better than these?” For you do not ask wisely about this.

¹¹ Wisdom is as good as an inheritance. Yes, it is more excellent for those who see the sun. ¹² For wisdom is a defense, even as money is a defense; but the excellency of knowledge is that wisdom preserves the life of him who has it.

¹³ Consider the work of God, for who can make that straight which he has made crooked? ¹⁴ In the day of prosperity be joyful, and in the day of adversity consider; yes, God has made the one side by side with the other, to the end that man should not find out anything after him.

¹⁵ All this I have seen in my days of vanity: there is a righteous man who perishes in his righteousness, and there is a wicked man who lives long in his evildoing. ¹⁶ Don’t be overly righteous, neither make yourself overly wise. Why should you destroy yourself? ¹⁷ Don’t be too wicked, neither be foolish. Why should you die before your time? ¹⁸ It is good that you should take hold of this. Yes, also don’t withdraw your hand from that; for he who fears God will come out of them all. ¹⁹ Wisdom is a strength to the wise man more than ten rulers who are in a city. ²⁰ Surely there is not a righteous man on earth who does good and doesn’t sin. ²¹ Also don’t take heed to all words that are spoken, lest you hear your servant curse you; ²² for often your own heart knows that you yourself have likewise cursed others. ²³ All this I have proved in wisdom. I said, “I will be wise;” but it was far from me. ²⁴ That which is, is far off and exceedingly deep. Who can find it out? ²⁵ I turned around, and my heart sought to know and to search out, and to seek wisdom and the scheme of things, and to know that wickedness is stupidity, and that foolishness is madness.

²⁶ I find more bitter than death the woman whose heart is snares and traps, whose hands are chains. Whoever pleases God shall escape from her; but the sinner will be ensnared by her.

²⁷ “Behold, I have found this,” says the Preacher, “to one another, to find an explanation ²⁸ which my soul still seeks, but I have not found. I have found one man among a thousand, but I have not found a woman among all those. ²⁹ Behold, I have only found this: that God made mankind upright; but they search for many inventions.”

3 But know this: that in the last days, grievous times will come. ² For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, ³ without natural affection, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, fierce, not lovers of good, ⁴ traitors, headstrong, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, ⁵ holding a form of godliness but having denied its power. Turn away from these, also. ⁶ For some of these are people who creep into houses and take captive gullible women loaded down with sins, led away by various lusts, ⁷ always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. ⁸ Even as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so these also oppose the truth, men corrupted in mind, who concerning the faith are rejected. ⁹ But they will proceed no further. For their folly will be evident to all men, as theirs also came to be.

¹⁰ But you followed my teaching, conduct, purpose, faith, patience, love, steadfastness, ¹¹ persecutions, and sufferings—those things that happened to me at Antioch, Iconium, and Lystra. I endured those persecutions. The Lord delivered me out of them all. ¹² Yes, and all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution. ¹³ But evil men and impostors will grow worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived. ¹⁴ But you remain in the things which you have learned and have been assured of, knowing from whom you have learned them. ¹⁵ From infancy, you have known the holy Scriptures which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. ¹⁶ Every Scripture is God-breathed and^[a] profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for instruction in righteousness, ¹⁷ that each person who belongs to God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.