M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan

Solomon Builds the House of God

6 In the 480th year after the people of Israel came out of the land of Egypt, in the fourth year of Solomon’s rule over Israel, in the month of Ziv, the second month, he began to build the house of the Lord. ² The house which King Solomon built for the Lord was as long as thirty long steps, as wide as ten long steps, and eight times taller than a man. ³ All along the front of the House of God was a porch ten long steps long and five long steps wide. It was as long as the house was wide. ⁴ He made windows for the house with beautiful cross-pieces. ⁵ He made a building of rooms against the outer walls of three sides of the house. These rooms were three floors high. ⁶ The bottom floor was as wide as three steps. The second floor was as wide as three long steps. And the third floor was as wide as four steps. For around the outside of the house he made places for the large wood cross-pieces to rest on. That way they would not need to be put into holes in the walls of the house. ⁷ The house was built of stone that was cut at the place where it was taken from the ground. There was no noise of a hammer or an ax or any iron object heard in the house while it was being built. ⁸ The door for the first floor room was on the right side of the house. They would go up steps to the second floor, and from the second to the third. ⁹ So he built the house and finished it. And he made the roof of the house of large pieces of cedar wood. ¹⁰ He built the three floors against the outside wall of the house. Each one was as high as a man could raise his hand. They were joined to the house with big pieces of cedar wood.

¹¹ Now the word of the Lord came to Solomon, saying, ¹² “If you obey My Laws and keep My Word, then I will keep My promise with you, which I spoke to your father David about this house you are building. ¹³ I will live among the sons of Israel. And I will not leave My people Israel alone.”

¹⁴ So Solomon built the house and finished it. ¹⁵ He built the walls of the house on the inside with pieces of cedar wood. He put wood over the inside walls from the floor of the house to the roof. And he put pieces of cypress wood over the floor of the house. ¹⁶ An inside room called the most holy place was built in the back part of the house with pieces of cedar wood, from the floor to the roof and as wide as ten long steps. ¹⁷ The rest of the house, the center room in front of the most holy place, was as long as twenty long steps. ¹⁸ There was cedar on the house within, cut to look like gourds and open flowers. It was all cedar. No stone was seen. ¹⁹ Then he built the most holy place inside the house, in which to put the special box of the agreement. ²⁰ The most holy place was as long as ten long steps, as wide as ten long steps, and more than five times taller than a man. He covered it with pure gold. And he covered the altar with cedar. ²¹ Solomon covered the inside of the house with pure gold. He crossed the front of the most holy place with chains of gold, and he covered it with gold. ²² He covered the whole house with gold, until all the house was finished. And he covered the whole altar by the most holy place with gold.

²³ In the most holy place he made two cherubim of olive wood. Each one was almost three times taller than a man. ²⁴ One wing of the cherub was as long as three steps. And the other wing of the cherub was as long as three steps. It was as far as five long steps from the end of one wing to the end of the other wing. ²⁵ It was as much as five long steps between the ends of the wings of the other cherub also. Both the cherubim were the same height, length and width, and they looked alike. ²⁶ Each of the cherubim was almost three times taller than a man. ²⁷ He put the cherubim in the most holy place of the house. The wings of the cherubim were spread out. The wing of the one cherub was touching the one wall, and the wing of the other cherub was touching the other wall. So their wings were touching each other in the center of the house. ²⁸ He covered the cherubim with gold.

²⁹ Then he cut pictures in all the walls around the house to look like cherubim, palm trees and open flowers, in the center room and the most holy place. ³⁰ He covered the floor of the house with gold, in the center room and the most holy place. ³¹ He made doors of olive wood for the most holy place. The top and sides of the door had five sides. ³² He cut pictures in the two doors of olive wood, to look like cherubim, palm trees and open flowers, and covered them with gold. He spread the gold on the cherubim and on the palm trees. ³³ For the doorway of the center room he made four-sided side pieces of olive wood ³⁴ and two doors of cypress wood. Each door had two moving parts. ³⁵ On them he cut pictures of cherubim, palm trees and open flowers. And he covered the pictures with an even covering of gold. ³⁶ He built the inside place with three rows of cut stone and one row of large pieces of cedar wood.

³⁷ In the fourth year the base of the house was laid in the month of Ziv. ³⁸ In the eleventh year, in the month of Bul, the eighth month, all the parts of the house were finished just as all the plans had been made. Solomon took seven years to build it.

3 I, Paul, am in prison because I am a missionary for Jesus Christ to you who are not Jews. ² I am sure you have heard that God trusted me with His loving-favor. ³ I wrote a little about this to you before. In a special way, God showed me His secret plan. ⁴ When you read this, you will understand how I know about the things that are not easy to understand about Christ. ⁵ Long ago men did not know these things. But now they have been shown to His missionaries and to the early preachers by the Holy Spirit. ⁶ Let me tell you that the Good News is for the people who are not Jews also. They are able to have life that lasts forever. They are to be a part of His church and family, together with the Jews. And together they are to receive all that God has promised through Christ.

⁷ God asked me to preach this Good News. He gave me the gift of His loving-favor. He gave me His power to preach it. ⁸ Of all those who belong to Christ, I am the least important. But this loving-favor was given to me to preach to the people who are not Jews. I was to tell them of the great riches in Christ which do not come to an end. ⁹ I was to make all men understand the meaning of this secret. God kept this secret to Himself from the beginning of the world. And He is the One Who made all things. ¹⁰ This was done so the great wisdom of God might be shown now to the leaders and powers in the heavenly places. It is being done through the church. ¹¹ This was the plan God had for all time. He did this through Christ Jesus our Lord. ¹² We can come to God without fear because we have put our trust in Christ. ¹³ So I ask you not to lose heart because of my suffering for you. It is to help you.

Paul’s Prayer for the Church

¹⁴ For this reason, I bow my knees and pray to the Father. ¹⁵ It is from Him that every family in heaven and on earth has its name. ¹⁶ I pray that because of the riches of His shining-greatness, He will make you strong with power in your hearts through the Holy Spirit. ¹⁷ I pray that Christ may live in your hearts by faith. I pray that you will be filled with love. ¹⁸ I pray that you will be able to understand how wide and how long and how high and how deep His love is. ¹⁹ I pray that you will know the love of Christ. His love goes beyond anything we can understand. I pray that you will be filled with God Himself.

²⁰ God is able to do much more than we ask or think through His power working in us. ²¹ May we see His shining-greatness in the church. May all people in all time honor Christ Jesus. Let it be so.

Good Comes to Israel

36 “Son of man, speak in My name to the mountains of Israel. Say, ‘O mountains of Israel, hear the Word of the Lord. ² The Lord God says, “Those who hate you have laughed and spoken against you, saying, ‘The old hills now belong to us.’ ³ So tell the mountains of Israel, ‘The Lord God says, “They have made you a waste land, and destroyed you from every side. You were taken by the rest of the nations for their own. And the people have been saying bad things about you.”’” ⁴ So, mountains of Israel, hear the Word of the Lord God. This is what the Lord God says to the mountains, the hills, the valleys, the destroyed places and empty cities, which have been robbed and made fun of by the rest of the nations around them. ⁵ The Lord God says, “I speak in the fire of My jealousy against the rest of the nations and against all Edom. They have taken My land for themselves with hearts full of joy and hate, that they might rob its good things.”

⁶ ‘So speak about the land of Israel, and tell the mountains, the hills, and valleys, “The Lord God says, ‘I speak in My jealousy and anger because you have been put to shame by the nations.’ ⁷ So the Lord God says, ‘I promise that the nations around you will also suffer shame. ⁸ But you, O mountains of Israel, will put out your branches and give your fruit for My people Israel. For they will come home soon. ⁹ See, I care for you and will show you favor. You will be plowed and planted. ¹⁰ I will cause the people to become many, all the people of Israel. People will live in the cities, and the places that have been destroyed will be built again. ¹¹ I will give you many people and animals, and they will have many young ones. You will be full of people as you were before. And I will do more good to you than ever before. Then you will know that I am the Lord. ¹² I will have people, My people Israel, walk on you and own you. You will belong to them, and you will never again take their children from them.’

¹³ “The Lord God says, ‘People say to you, “You destroy men and have taken children from your nation. ¹⁴ But you will no longer destroy men and take away your nation’s children,” says the Lord God. ¹⁵ “I will not let you hear words of shame from the nations any more. You will not be put to shame by the nations any longer. And you will no longer make your nation fall,” says the Lord God.’”

New Life for Israel

¹⁶ The Word of the Lord came to me saying, ¹⁷ “Son of man, when the people of Israel were living in their own land, they made it sinful by their ways and their works. The way they acted before Me was unclean, like a woman is unclean during her time each month. ¹⁸ So I poured out My anger upon them because of the blood they had poured on the land, and because they had made it sinful with their false gods. ¹⁹ I sent them among the different nations and spread them out among the lands. I judged them for their ways and their works. ²⁰ But in every place they went among the nations, they brought shame upon My holy name, because it was said of them, ‘These are the people of the Lord, yet they had to leave His land.’ ²¹ But I cared about My holy name, which the people of Israel had put to shame among the nations where they had gone.

²² “So tell the people of Israel, ‘The Lord God says, “It is not because of you, O people of Israel, that I am about to act. It is because of My holy name, which you have put to shame among the nations where you have gone. ²³ I will show how holy My great name is, which you have put to shame among the nations. Then the nations will know that I am the Lord,” says the Lord God, “when I use you to show them that I am holy. ²⁴ For I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the lands, and bring you into your own land. ²⁵ Then I will put clean water on you, and you will be clean. I will make you clean from all your unclean ways and from all your false gods. ²⁶ I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you. I will take away your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. ²⁷ And I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to follow My Laws and be careful to do what I tell you. ²⁸ And you will live in the land that I gave to your fathers. You will be My people, and I will be your God. ²⁹ I will save you from all your unclean ways. I will give you much grain, and you will not have to go without food. ³⁰ I will have the trees give much fruit and the fields give much food. So you will never again suffer the shame of going hungry among the nations. ³¹ Then you will remember your sinful ways and your sinful works, and you will hate yourselves because of your sins and wrong-doing. ³² I want you to know that I am not doing this because of you,” says the Lord God. “Be ashamed and troubled because of your ways, O people of Israel!”

³³ ‘The Lord God says, “On the day that I make you clean from all your sins, I will fill the cities with people, and the destroyed places will be built again. ³⁴ And the waste land will be planted, instead of being a waste in the eyes of all who pass by. ³⁵ They will say, ‘This waste land has become like the garden of Eden. And the destroyed cities now have strong walls and many people.’ ³⁶ Then the nations that are left around you will know that I, the Lord, have built again the places that were destroyed, and planted what had been waste land. I, the Lord, have spoken, and I will do what I say.”

³⁷ ‘The Lord God says, “I will also let the people of Israel ask Me to do this for them: I will give them many people, like the sheep of a flock. ³⁸ The empty cities will be filled with flocks of people, like the flock kept for burnt gifts, like the flock at Jerusalem during her special suppers. Then they will know that I am the Lord.”’”

A Prayer for Help

86 Hear, O Lord, and answer me. For I am suffering and in need. ² Keep my life, for I am faithful to You. You are my God. Save Your servant who trusts in You. ³ Show me loving-kindness, O Lord. For I cry to You all day long. ⁴ Bring joy to Your servant. For I lift up my soul to You, O Lord. ⁵ For You are good and ready to forgive, O Lord. You are rich in loving-kindness to all who call to You. ⁶ Hear my prayer, O Lord. Listen to my cry for help. ⁷ I will call to You in the day of my trouble. For You will answer me. ⁸ There is no one like You among the gods, O Lord. And there are no works like Yours. ⁹ All the nations You have made will come and worship before You, O Lord. And they will bring honor to Your name. ¹⁰ For You are great and do great things. You alone are God.

¹¹ Teach me Your way, O Lord. I will walk in Your truth. May my heart fear Your name. ¹² O Lord my God, I will give thanks to You with all my heart. I will bring honor to Your name forever. ¹³ For Your loving-kindness toward me is great. And You have saved my soul from the bottom of the grave.

¹⁴ O God, proud men have come up against me. A group of fighting men want to take my life. And they do not think of You. ¹⁵ But You, O Lord, are a God full of love and pity. You are slow to anger and rich in loving-kindness and truth. ¹⁶ Turn to me, and show me loving-kindness. Give Your strength to Your servant. And save the son of your woman servant. ¹⁷ Give me something special to see of Your favor. Then those who hate me may see it and be ashamed. Because You, O Lord, have helped me and comforted me.