M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan

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2 My brothers and sisters, as you practice the faith of our Lord Jesus, the anointed King of glory, you must do so without favoritism. ² What I mean is this: if someone comes into your assembly wearing gold rings, all dressed up, and a poor person comes in wearing shabby clothes, ³ you cast your eyes over the person wearing fine clothes and say, “Please! Have a seat up here!” but then you turn to the poor person and say, “Stand there!” or, “Get down there by my footstool!” ⁴ When you do this, are you not discriminating among yourselves? Are you not turning into judges with evil thoughts? ⁵ Listen, my dear brothers and sisters. Isn’t it the case that God has chosen the poor (as the world sees it) to be rich in faith, and to inherit the kingdom which he has promised to those who love him? ⁶ But you have dishonored the poor man. After all, who are the rich? The rich are the ones who lord it over you and drag you into court, aren’t they? ⁷ The rich are the ones who blaspheme the wonderful name which has been pronounced over you, aren’t they?

⁸ Supposing, however, you keep the royal law, as it is written, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself”; if you do this, you will do well. ⁹ But if you show favoritism, you are committing sin, and you will be convicted by the law as a lawbreaker. ¹⁰ Anyone who keeps the whole law, you see, but fails in one point, has become guilty of all of it. ¹¹ For the one who said, “Do not commit adultery,” also said, “Do not murder.” So if you do not commit adultery, but do murder, you have become a lawbreaker. ¹² Speak and act in such a way as people who are going to be judged by the law of freedom. ¹³ Judgment is without mercy, you see, for those who have shown no mercy. But mercy triumphs over judgment.

Faith and works

¹⁴ What use is it, my dear family, if someone says they have faith when they don’t have works? Can faith save such a person? ¹⁵ Supposing a brother or sister is without clothing, and is short even of daily food, ¹⁶ and one of you says to them, “Go in peace; be warm, be full!”—but doesn’t give them what their bodies need—what use is that? ¹⁷ In the same way, faith, all by itself and without works, is dead.

¹⁸ But supposing someone says, “Well: you have faith, and I have works.” All right: show me your faith—but without doing any works; and then I will show you my faith, and I’ll do it by my works! ¹⁹ You believe that “God is one”? Well and good! The demons believe that, too, and they tremble! ²⁰ Do you want to know, you stupid person, that faith without works is lifeless? ²¹ Wasn’t Abraham our father justified by his works when he offered up his son Isaac on the altar? ²² You can see from this that faith was working together with the works, and the faith reached its fulfillment through the works. ²³ That is how the scripture was fulfilled which says, “Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness,” and he was called “God’s friend.” ²⁴ So you see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone. ²⁵ In the same way, wasn’t Rahab the prostitute justified by works when she gave shelter to the spies and sent them off by another road? ²⁶ Just as the body without the spirit is dead, you see, so faith without works is dead.

Temptation in the wilderness

4 Jesus returned from the Jordan, filled with the spirit. The spirit took him off into the wilderness ² for forty days, to be tested by the devil. He ate nothing during that time, and at the end of it he was hungry.

³ “If you are God’s son,” said the devil, “tell this stone to become a loaf of bread.”

⁴ “It is written,” replied Jesus, “ ‘It isn’t only bread that keeps you alive.’ ”

⁵ The devil then took him up and showed him, in an instant, all the kingdoms of the world.

⁶ “I will give you authority over all of this,” said the devil, “and all the prestige that goes with it. It’s been given to me, you see, and I give it to anyone I like. ⁷ So it can all be yours . . . if you will just worship me.”

⁸ “It is written,” replied Jesus, “ ‘The Lord your God is the one you must worship; he is the only one you must serve.’ ”

⁹ Then the devil took him to Jerusalem, and stood him on a pinnacle of the Temple.

“If you are God’s son,” he said, “throw yourself down from here; ¹⁰ it’s written, after all, that ‘He will give his angels a command about you, to look after you’; ¹¹ and ‘They will carry you in their hands, so that you won’t hit your foot against a stone.’ ”

¹² “It has been said,” replied Jesus, “ ‘You mustn’t put the Lord your God to the test.’ ”

¹³ When the devil had finished each temptation, he left him until another opportunity.

Opposition to Jesus in Nazareth

¹⁴ Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the spirit. His reputation spread throughout the whole district. ¹⁵ He taught in their synagogues to universal acclaim.

¹⁶ He came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. On the sabbath, as was his regular practice, he went into the synagogue and stood up to read. ¹⁷ They gave him the scroll of the prophet Isaiah. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written:

²⁰ He rolled up the scroll, gave it to the attendant, and sat down. All eyes in the synagogue were fixed on him.

²¹ “Today,” he began, “this scripture is fulfilled in your own hearing.”

²² Everyone remarked at him; they were astonished at the words coming out of his mouth—words of sheer grace.

“Isn’t this Joseph’s son?” they said.

²³ “I know what you’re going to say,” Jesus said. “You’re going to tell me the old riddle: ‘Heal yourself, doctor!’ ‘We heard of great happenings in Capernaum; do things like that here, in your own country!’

²⁴ “Let me tell you the truth,” he went on. “Prophets never get accepted in their own country. ²⁵ This is the solemn truth: there were plenty of widows in Israel in the time of Elijah, when heaven was shut up for three years and six months, and there was a great famine over all the land. ²⁶ Elijah was sent to none of them, only to a widow in the Sidonian town of Zarephath.

²⁷ “And there were plenty of people with virulent skin diseases in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet, and none of them was healed—only Naaman, the Syrian.”

²⁸ When they heard this, everyone in the synagogue flew into a rage. ²⁹ They got up and threw him out of town. They took him to the top of the hill on which their town was built, meaning to fling him off. ³⁰ But he slipped through the middle of them and went away.

Jesus’ authoritative healings

³¹ Jesus went down to Capernaum, a town of Galilee. He used to teach them every sabbath. ³² They were astonished at his teaching, because his message was powerful and authoritative.

³³ There was a man in the synagogue who had the spirit of an unclean demon.

³⁴ “Hey, you!” he yelled out at the top of his voice. “What’s going on with you and me, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—you’re God’s Holy One!”

³⁵ “Shut up!” Jesus rebuked him. “Come out of him!”

The demon threw the man down right there in front of them, and came out without harming him. ³⁶ Fear came over them all. “What’s all this?” they started to say to one another. “He’s got power! He’s got authority! He tells the unclean spirits what to do, and they come out!” ³⁷ Word about him went out to the whole surrounding region.

³⁸ He left the synagogue and went into Simon’s house. Simon’s mother-in-law was sick with a high fever, and they asked him about her. ³⁹ He stood in front of her, rebuked the fever, and it left her. And straight away she got up and waited on them.

⁴⁰ When the sun went down, everyone who had sick people—all kinds of sicknesses—brought them to him. He laid his hands on each one in turn, and healed them. ⁴¹ Demons came out of many people, shouting out, “You are the son of God!” He sternly forbade them to speak, because they knew he was the Messiah.

⁴² When day dawned he left the town and went off to a deserted place. The crowds hunted for him, and when they caught up with him they begged him not to leave them.

⁴³ “I must tell the good news of God’s kingdom to the other towns,” he said. “That’s what I was sent for.” ⁴⁴ And he was announcing the message to the synagogues of Judaea.