M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan

Cities for the Levites

35 The Lord said to Moses in the plains of Moab by the Jordan near Jericho, ² “Tell the people of Israel to give the Levites cities to live in from the land they receive. And give the Levites fields around the cities. ³ The cities will be theirs to live in. Their fields will be for their cattle and flocks and for all their animals. ⁴ The fields you give the Levites should be around the cities, from the city walls out 500 long steps. ⁵ And you should number 1,000 long steps from the city on the east side, on the south side, on the west side, and on the north side, with the city in the center. These fields around the cities will belong to them for their animals. ⁶ The cities you give the Levites will be the six cities where people can go to be safe. They will be where a man may run to if he has killed another person. And give them forty-two other cities, added to these. ⁷ Give forty-eight cities in all to the Levites, together with their fields. ⁸ Take more cities from the larger families of Israel to give to the Levites. And take less cities from the smaller families. Each should give some of its cities to the Levites by how much land is received.”

The Cities to Be a Safe Place

⁹ Then the Lord said to Moses, ¹⁰ “Say to the people of Israel, ‘When you cross the Jordan into the land of Canaan, ¹¹ choose which cities are to be the ones where you can run to be safe. The man who has killed a person without meaning to may run there. ¹² The cities will be a safe place for you from the one who wants to punish you. So the one who has killed a person may not die until the people decide if he is guilty or not. ¹³ The cities you give will be your six cities where you can go to be safe. ¹⁴ Give three cities on the east side of the Jordan and three cities in the land of Canaan. They will be the cities where you can go to be safe. ¹⁵ These six cities will be safe places for the people of Israel and for the stranger and for the one who visits them. Anyone who kills a person without meaning to may run there.

¹⁶ ‘But if he killed him with an iron object, then he is guilty. For sure the killer will be put to death. ¹⁷ If he knocked him down with a stone so that he died, he is guilty. For sure the killer will be put to death. ¹⁸ Or if he hit him with a piece of wood in his hand so that he died, he is guilty. For sure the killer will be put to death. ¹⁹ The man who wants to punish him for the killing will put the killer to death. He will put him to death when he meets him. ²⁰ If the killer has pushed him because he hated him, or has thrown something at him after waiting for him, and because of this he died, ²¹ or if he hit him down with his hand because he hated him and killed him, for sure the one who killed him must be put to death. He is guilty. The man who wants to punish him for the killing will put him to death when he meets him.

²² ‘But if he pushed him without planning to and without hating him, or threw something at him without having waited for him, ²³ or he threw a stone without seeing him, killing him without hating him or meaning to hurt him, ²⁴ then the people will decide by these Laws between the killer and the one who wants to punish him. ²⁵ The people will save the killer from the man who wants to punish him. And they will return him to his city where he had gone to be safe. He will live in it until the death of the head religious leader who was set apart with the holy oil. ²⁶ But if the man who killed another person at sometime goes outside his city where he went to be safe, ²⁷ then the man who wants to punish him will not be guilty of blood if he finds him outside the safe city and kills him. ²⁸ Because the man should have stayed in his city to be safe until the death of the head religious leader. But after the head religious leader dies, the man who killed another person may return to his own land.

²⁹ ‘These things will be a Law to you and to all your children-to-come in all your homes. ³⁰ If anyone kills a person, the killer must be put to death by what is told by those who saw the killing. But no person may be put to death because of what one person says. ³¹ You must not take pay to save the life of a killer who is guilty of death. But he must be put to death. ³² You must not take pay for him who has run to his city to be safe, so that he may return to live in the land before the death of the religious leader. ³³ You must not make the land where you live unclean. The land is not holy when people are killed. And only the blood of him who is guilty can pay to make the land free from the blood that has fallen on it. ³⁴ Do not make the land where you live unclean, in the place where I live. For I the Lord am living among the people of Israel.’”

A Prayer for Jerusalem

79 O God, the nations have come into the land of Your people. They have made Your holy house dirty. They have crushed the walls and buildings of Jerusalem. ² They have given the dead bodies of Your servants to the birds of the heavens for food. The flesh of those who belong to You has been given to the wild animals of the earth. ³ They have poured out their blood like water all around Jerusalem. And there was no one to bury them. ⁴ We have become a shame to our neighbors. Those around us laugh at and make fun of us. ⁵ How long, O Lord? Will You be angry forever? Will Your jealousy burn like fire? ⁶ Pour out Your anger on the nations that do not know You, and on the nations that do not call on Your name. ⁷ For they have destroyed Jacob. They have laid waste the place where he lived.

⁸ Do not hold the sins of our fathers against us. Let Your loving-pity come fast to meet us. For we are in much need. ⁹ O God Who saves us, help us for the honor of Your name. Take us out of trouble and forgive our sins, for the honor of Your name. ¹⁰ Why should the nations say, “Where is their God?” Make it known among the nations, in front of our eyes, that You punish for the blood that has poured from Your servants. ¹¹ Hear the cries of those in prison. By the greatness of Your power, save those who are being sent to death. ¹² And return to our neighbors seven times the shame that they have brought You, O Lord. ¹³ Then we Your people, the sheep of Your field, will give thanks to You forever. We will tell of Your praise to all the people of all times.

Israel Set Free

27 In that day the Lord will punish Leviathan, the large snake-like sea animal, with His sharp and great and powerful sword. He will punish Leviathan the turning snake, and kill the big dragon that lives in the sea.

² In that day it will be said: “Sing about a grape-field of wine! ³ I, the Lord, am its keeper. I water it all the time. I watch over it day and night so no one will hurt it. ⁴ I am not angry. If someone were to give Me thistles and thorns in battle, I would step on them. I would burn them together. ⁵ Or let him trust in Me to keep him safe. Let him make peace with Me. Yes, let him make peace with Me.” ⁶ In the days to come Jacob will take root. Israel will flower and begin to grow, and fill the whole world with fruit.

⁷ Has the Lord punished Israel as He punished those who went against Israel? Or have as many people of Israel been killed as their killers were killed? ⁸ You showed Your anger towards them by driving them out of the land. You moved them out with Your strong wind on the day of the east wind. ⁹ So by this Jacob’s sin will be forgiven. This will be the full price of taking his sin away: When he crushes all the altar stones into fine pieces, so the wooden female goddess Asherah and the altars of special perfume will not stand. ¹⁰ The city made strong for battle is empty and alone, a place left alone like the desert. The calves eat there, and they lie down and eat from its branches. ¹¹ When its branches are dry, they are broken off. Women come and make a fire with them. They are not a people of understanding, so their Maker will not have pity on them. The One Who made them will not show kindness to them.

¹² In that day the Lord will beat out His grain from the flowing river of the Euphrates to the river of Egypt. And you will be gathered up one by one, O sons of Israel. ¹³ In that day a great horn will be blown. Those who were dying in the land of Assyria and those who were sent everywhere through the land of Egypt will come and worship the Lord on the holy mountain at Jerusalem.

5 The person who believes that Jesus is the Christ is a child of God. The person who loves the Father loves His children also. ² This is the way we know we love God’s children. It is when we love God and obey His Word. ³ Loving God means to obey His Word, and His Word is not hard to obey. ⁴ Every child of God has power over the sins of the world. The way we have power over the sins of the world is by our faith. ⁵ Who could have power over the world except by believing that Jesus is the Son of God? ⁶ Jesus Christ came by water and blood. He did not come by water only, but by water and blood. The Holy Spirit speaks about this and He is truth. ⁷ There are three Who speak of this in heaven: the Father and the Word and the Holy Spirit. These three are one. ⁸ There are three who speak of this on the earth: the Holy Spirit and the water and the blood. These three speak the same thing. ⁹ If we believe what men say, we can be sure what God says is more important. God has spoken as He has told us about His Son. ¹⁰ The person who puts his trust in God’s Son knows in his own heart that Jesus is the Son of God. The person who does not have his trust in God’s Son makes God a liar. It is because he has not believed the word God spoke about His Son. ¹¹ This is the word He spoke: God gave us life that lasts forever, and this life is in His Son. ¹² He that has the Son has life. He that does not have the Son of God does not have life.

¹³ I have written these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God. Now you can know you have life that lasts forever. ¹⁴ We are sure that if we ask anything that He wants us to have, He will hear us. ¹⁵ If we are sure He hears us when we ask, we can be sure He will give us what we ask for. ¹⁶ You may see a Christian brother sinning in a way that does not lead to death. You should pray for him. God will give him life unless he has done that sin that leads to death. There is a sin that leads to death. There is no reason to pray for him if he has done that sin. ¹⁷ Every kind of wrong-doing is sin. But there is a sin that does not lead to death. ¹⁸ We know that no child of God keeps on sinning. The Son of God watches over him and the devil cannot get near him. ¹⁹ We know that we belong to God, but the whole world is under the power of the devil. ²⁰ We know God’s Son has come. He has given us the understanding to know Him Who is the true God. We are joined together with the true God through His Son, Jesus Christ. He is the true God and the life that lasts forever. ²¹ My children, keep yourselves from false gods.