M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan
Nations remaining in the land
3 These are the nations that the Lord left to test all those Israelites who had no firsthand knowledge of the wars of Canaan. 2 They survived only to teach war to the generations of Israelites who had no firsthand knowledge of the earlier wars: 3 the five rulers of the Philistines, and all the Canaanites, Sidonians, and Hivites who lived in the highlands of Lebanon from Mount Baal-hermon to Lebo-hamath. 4 They were to be the test for Israel, to find out whether they would obey the Lord’s commands, which he had made to their ancestors through Moses. 5 So the Israelites lived among the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites. 6 But the Israelites intermarried with them and served their gods.
Othniel, the model judge
7 The Israelites did things that the Lord saw as evil, and they forgot the Lord their God. They served the Baals and the Asherahs.[a] 8 The Lord became angry with Israel and gave them over to King Cushan-rishathaim of Aram-naharaim. The Israelites served Cushan-rishathaim eight years. 9 But then they cried out to the Lord. So the Lord raised up a deliverer for the Israelites, Othniel, Kenaz’s son, Caleb’s younger brother, who rescued them. 10 The Lord’s spirit was in Othniel, and he led Israel. When he marched out for war, the Lord handed over Aram’s King Cushan-rishathaim. Othniel overpowered Cushan-rishathaim, 11 and the land was peaceful for forty years, until Othniel, Kenaz’s son, died.
Ehud
12 The Israelites again did things that the Lord saw as evil, and the Lord put Moab’s King Eglon in power over them, because they did these things that the Lord saw as evil. 13 He convinced the Ammonites and Amalekites to join him, defeated Israel, and took possession of Palm City. 14 So the Israelites served Moab’s King Eglon eighteen years.
15 Then the Israelites cried out to the Lord. So the Lord raised up a deliverer for them, Ehud, Gera’s son, a Benjaminite, who was left-handed. The Israelites sent him to take their tribute payment to Moab’s King Eglon. 16 Now Ehud made for himself a double-edged sword that was about a foot and a half long, and he strapped it on his right thigh under his clothes. 17 Then he presented the tribute payment to Moab’s King Eglon, who was a very fat man. 18 When he had finished delivering the tribute payment, Ehud sent on their way the people who had carried it. 19 But he himself turned back at the carved stones near Gilgal, and he said, “I have a secret message for you, King.”
So Eglon said, “Hush!” and all his attendants went out of his presence. 20 Ehud approached him while he was sitting alone in his cool second-story room, and he said, “I have a message from God for you.” At that, Eglon got up from his throne. 21 Ehud reached with his left hand and grabbed the sword from his right thigh. He stabbed it into Eglon’s stomach, 22 and even the handle went in after the blade. Since he did not pull the sword out of his stomach, the fat closed over the blade, and his guts spilled out.[b] 23 Ehud slipped out to the porch, and closed and locked the doors of the second-story room behind him.
24 After Ehud had slipped out, the king’s servants came and found that the room’s doors were locked. So they thought, He must be relieving himself in the cool chamber. 25 They waited so long that they were embarrassed, but he never opened the doors of the room. Then they used the key to open them, and there was their master lying dead on the ground!
26 Ehud had gotten away while they were waiting and had passed the carved stones and escaped to Seirah. 27 When he arrived, he blew the ram’s horn in the Ephraim highlands. So the Israelites went down from the highlands with Ehud leading them. 28 He told them, “Follow me, for the Lord has handed over your enemies the Moabites.” So they followed him, and they took control of the crossing points of the Jordan in the direction of Moab, allowing no one to cross. 29 This time, they defeated the Moabites, about ten thousand big and strong men, and no one escaped. 30 Moab was brought down by the power of Israel on that day, and there was peace in the land for eighty years.
Shamgar
31 After Ehud, Shamgar, Anath’s son, struck down six hundred Philistines with an animal prod. He too rescued Israel.
7 The high priest asked, “Are these accusations true?”
2 Stephen responded, “Brothers and fathers, listen to me. Our glorious God appeared to our ancestor Abraham while he was still in Mesopotamia, before he settled in Haran. 3 God told him, ‘Leave your homeland and kin, and go to the land that I will show you.’[a] 4 So Abraham left the land of the Chaldeans and settled in Haran. After Abraham’s father died, God had him resettle in this land where you now live. 5 God didn’t give him an inheritance here, not even a square foot of land. However, God did promise to give the land as his possession to him and to his descendants, even though Abraham had no child. 6 God put it this way: His descendants will be strangers in a land that belongs to others, who will enslave them and abuse them for four hundred years.[b] 7 And I will condemn the nation they serve as slaves, God said, and afterward they will leave[c] that land and serve me in this place. 8 God gave him the covenant confirmed through circumcision. Accordingly, eight days after Isaac’s birth, Abraham circumcised him. Isaac did the same with Jacob, and Jacob with the twelve patriarchs.
9 “Because the patriarchs were jealous of Joseph, they sold him into slavery in Egypt. God was with him, however, 10 and rescued him from all his troubles. The grace and wisdom he gave Joseph were recognized by Pharaoh, king of Egypt, who appointed him ruler over Egypt and over his whole palace. 11 A famine came upon all Egypt and Canaan, and great hardship came with it. Our ancestors had nothing to eat. 12 When Jacob heard there was grain in Egypt, he sent our ancestors there for the first time. 13 During their second visit, Joseph told his brothers who he was, and Pharaoh learned about Joseph’s family. 14 Joseph sent for his father Jacob and all his relatives—seventy-five in all—and invited them to live with him. 15 So Jacob went down to Egypt, where he and our ancestors died. 16 Their bodies were brought back to Shechem and placed in the tomb that Abraham had purchased for a certain sum of money from Hamor’s children, who lived in Shechem.
17 “When it was time for God to keep the promise he made to Abraham, the number of our people in Egypt had greatly expanded. 18 But then another king rose to power over Egypt who didn’t know anything about Joseph.[d] 19 He exploited our people and abused our ancestors. He even forced them to abandon their newly born babies so they would die. 20 That’s when Moses was born. He was highly favored by God, and for three months his parents cared for him in their home. 21 After he was abandoned, Pharaoh’s daughter adopted and cared for him as though he were her own son. 22 Moses learned everything Egyptian wisdom had to offer, and he was a man of powerful words and deeds.
23 “When Moses was 40 years old, he decided to visit his family, the Israelites. 24 He saw one of them being wronged so he came to his rescue and evened the score by killing the Egyptian. 25 He expected his own kin to understand that God was using him to rescue them, but they didn’t. 26 The next day he came upon some Israelites who were caught up in an argument. He tried to make peace between them by saying, ‘You are brothers! Why are you harming each other?’ 27 The one who started the fight against his neighbor pushed Moses aside and said, ‘Who appointed you as our leader and judge? 28 Are you planning to kill me like you killed that Egyptian yesterday?’[e] 29 When Moses heard this, he fled to Midian, where he lived as an immigrant and had two sons.
30 “Forty years later, an angel appeared to Moses in the flame of a burning bush in the wilderness near Mount Sinai. 31 Enthralled by the sight, Moses approached to get a closer look and he heard the Lord’s voice: 32 ‘I am the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.’[f] Trembling with fear, Moses didn’t dare to investigate any further. 33 The Lord continued, ‘Remove the sandals from your feet, for the place where you are standing is holy ground. 34 I have clearly seen the oppression my people have experienced in Egypt, and I have heard their groaning. I have come down to rescue them. Come! I am sending you to Egypt.’[g]
35 “This is the same Moses whom they rejected when they asked, ‘Who appointed you as our leader and judge?’ This is the Moses whom God sent as leader and deliverer. God did this with the help of the angel who appeared before him in the bush. 36 This man led them out after he performed wonders and signs in Egypt at the Red Sea and for forty years in the wilderness. 37 This is the Moses who told the Israelites, ‘God will raise up for you a prophet like me from your own people.’[h] 38 This is the one who was in the assembly in the wilderness with our ancestors and with the angel who spoke to him on Mount Sinai. He is the one who received life-giving words to give to us. 39 He’s also the one whom our ancestors refused to obey. Instead, they pushed him aside and, in their thoughts and desires, returned to Egypt. 40 They told Aaron, ‘Make us gods that will lead us. As for this Moses who led us out of Egypt, we don’t know what’s happened to him!’[i] 41 That’s when they made an idol in the shape of a calf, offered a sacrifice to it, and began to celebrate what they had made with their own hands. 42 So God turned away from them and handed them over to worship the stars in the sky, just as it is written in the scroll of the Prophets:
Did you bring sacrifices and offerings to me
for forty years in the wilderness, house of Israel?
43 No! Instead, you took the tent of Moloch with you,
and the star of your god Rephan,
the images that you made in order to worship them.
Therefore, I will send you far away, farther than Babylon.[j]
44 “The tent of testimony was with our ancestors in the wilderness. Moses built it just as he had been instructed by the one who spoke to him and according to the pattern he had seen. 45 In time, when they had received the tent, our ancestors carried it with them when, under Joshua’s leadership, they took possession of the land from the nations whom God expelled. This tent remained in the land until the time of David. 46 God approved of David, who asked that he might provide a dwelling place for the God of Jacob.[k] 47 But it was Solomon who actually built a house for God. 48 However, the Most High doesn’t live in houses built by human hands. As the prophet says,
49 Heaven is my throne,
and the earth is my footstool.
‘What kind of house will you build for me,’ says the Lord,
‘or where is my resting place?
50 Didn’t I make all these things with my own hand?’[l]
51 “You stubborn people! In your thoughts and hearing, you are like those who have had no part in God’s covenant! You continuously set yourself against the Holy Spirit, just like your ancestors did. 52 Was there a single prophet your ancestors didn’t harass? They even killed those who predicted the coming of the righteous one, and you’ve betrayed and murdered him! 53 You received the Law given by angels, but you haven’t kept it.”
54 Once the council members heard these words, they were enraged and began to grind their teeth at Stephen. 55 But Stephen, enabled by the Holy Spirit, stared into heaven and saw God’s majesty and Jesus standing at God’s right side. 56 He exclaimed, “Look! I can see heaven on display and the Human One[m] standing at God’s right side!” 57 At this, they shrieked and covered their ears. Together, they charged at him, 58 threw him out of the city, and began to stone him. The witnesses placed their coats in the care of a young man named Saul. 59 As they battered him with stones, Stephen prayed, “Lord Jesus, accept my life!” 60 Falling to his knees, he shouted, “Lord, don’t hold this sin against them!” Then he died.
Loss of hope
16 The Lord’s word came to me: 2 Don’t marry or have children in this place. 3 This is what the Lord proclaims concerning children who are born in this place and their mothers and fathers who give birth to them in this place:
4 They will die of horrible diseases.
No one will mourn for them or bury them.
They will be like refuse lying on the ground.
They will die from the sword and by famine,
and their corpses will be food for birds and wild animals.
5 This is what the Lord says:
Don’t enter a house where there is mourning;
don’t grieve or lament for them,
for I have taken away my blessing, kindness, and mercy from this people,
declares the Lord.
6 From the least to the greatest,
all will die in this land,
and there will be no funerals or time of mourning.
No one will gash themselves in grief
or shave their heads in sorrow.
7 No one will bring food[a] for the mourner
as comfort for the dead.
No one will offer a cup of consolation
for the loss of father or mother.
8 Don’t enter a house where there is feasting and sit down to eat and drink. 9 This is what the Lord of heavenly forces, the God of Israel, proclaims:
Before your very eyes and in your own lifetime, I will silence in this place the sounds of joy and gladness and the voices of the bridegroom and the bride.
10 When you proclaim all these things to the people, and they ask you, “Why has the Lord pronounced such massive devastation against us? What have we done wrong? How have we sinned against the Lord our God?” 11 then you should tell them: It’s because your ancestors have deserted me and followed other gods, declares the Lord. They have served and worshipped them, while abandoning me and refusing to keep my Instruction. 12 And you, you have acted worse than your ancestors, each of you following your own willful, evil hearts and paying no attention to me. 13 So I will banish you from this land to a place that neither you nor your ancestors have known, and there you will serve other gods day and night, for I will show you no mercy.
14 But the time is coming, declares the Lord, when no one will say, “As the Lord lives who brought up the Israelites from the land of Egypt”; 15 instead, they will say, “As the Lord lives who brought up the Israelites from the land of the north and from all the lands where he has banished them.” I will bring them back to the land that I gave to their ancestors.
16 I’m going to send hordes of fishermen to catch them, declares the Lord. Afterward I will send a party of hunters to hunt them down on every mountain, hill, and cave. 17 I am watching their every move; not one is hidden from me. Nor is their sin concealed from my sight. 18 I will initially pay them back double for their evil and sin, because they have corrupted my land with their disgusting, lifeless idols and have filled my inheritance with their detestable practices.
19 Lord, you are my strength and my stronghold;
you are my refuge in time of trouble.
The nations will flock to you
from the ends of the earth,
and they will say:
“Our ancestors have inherited utter lies,
things that are hollow and useless.”
20 Can humans make their own gods?
If so, they are not gods at all!
21 Therefore, I will teach them;
this time I will teach them
my power and my might.
They will understand that I am the Lord.
Healing and forgiveness
2 After a few days, Jesus went back to Capernaum, and people heard that he was at home. 2 So many gathered that there was no longer space, not even near the door. Jesus was speaking the word to them. 3 Some people arrived, and four of them were bringing to him a man who was paralyzed. 4 They couldn’t carry him through the crowd, so they tore off part of the roof above where Jesus was. When they had made an opening, they lowered the mat on which the paralyzed man was lying. 5 When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Child, your sins are forgiven!”
6 Some legal experts were sitting there, muttering among themselves, 7 “Why does he speak this way? He’s insulting God. Only the one God can forgive sins.”
8 Jesus immediately recognized what they were discussing, and he said to them, “Why do you fill your minds with these questions? 9 Which is easier—to say to a paralyzed person, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Get up, take up your bed, and walk’? 10 But so you will know that the Human One[a] has authority on the earth to forgive sins”—he said to the man who was paralyzed, 11 “Get up, take your mat, and go home.”
12 Jesus raised him up, and right away he picked up his mat and walked out in front of everybody. They were all amazed and praised God, saying, “We’ve never seen anything like this!”
Eating with sinners
13 Jesus went out beside the lake again. The whole crowd came to him, and he began to teach them. 14 As he continued along, he saw Levi, Alphaeus’ son, sitting at a kiosk for collecting taxes. Jesus said to him, “Follow me.” Levi got up and followed him.
15 Jesus sat down to eat at Levi’s house. Many tax collectors and sinners were eating with Jesus and his disciples. Indeed, many of them had become his followers. 16 When some of the legal experts from among the Pharisees saw that he was eating with sinners and tax collectors, they asked his disciples, “Why is he eating with sinners and tax collectors?”
17 When Jesus heard it, he said to them, “Healthy people don’t need a doctor, but sick people do. I didn’t come to call righteous people, but sinners.”
When to fast
18 John’s disciples and the Pharisees had a habit of fasting. Some people asked Jesus, “Why do John’s disciples and the Pharisees’ disciples fast, but yours don’t?”
19 Jesus said, “The wedding guests can’t fast while the groom is with them, can they? As long as they have the groom with them, they can’t fast. 20 But the days will come when the groom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast.
21 “No one sews a piece of new, unshrunk cloth on old clothes; otherwise, the patch tears away from it, the new from the old, and makes a worse tear. 22 No one pours new wine into old leather wineskins; otherwise, the wine would burst the wineskins and the wine would be lost and the wineskins destroyed. But new wine is for new wineskins.”
Scripture and the Sabbath
23 Jesus went through the wheat fields on the Sabbath. As the disciples made their way, they were picking the heads of wheat. 24 The Pharisees said to Jesus, “Look! Why are they breaking the Sabbath law?”
25 He said to them, “Haven’t you ever read what David did when he was in need, when he and those with him were hungry? 26 During the time when Abiathar was high priest, David went into God’s house and ate the bread of the presence, which only the priests were allowed to eat. He also gave bread to those who were with him.” 27 Then he said, “The Sabbath was created for humans; humans weren’t created for the Sabbath. 28 This is why the Human One[b] is Lord even over the Sabbath.”
Copyright © 2011 by Common English Bible