M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan

Samuel’s birth

1 Now there was a certain man from Ramathaim, a Zuphite^[a] from the highlands of Ephraim, whose name was Elkanah. He was from the tribe of Ephraim, and he was the son of Jeroham son of Elihu son of Tohu son of Zuph. ² Elkanah had two wives, one named Hannah and the other named Peninnah. Peninnah had children, but Hannah didn’t.

³ Every year this man would leave his town to worship and sacrifice to the Lord of heavenly forces in Shiloh, where Eli’s two sons Hophni and Phinehas were the Lord’s priests. ⁴ Whenever he sacrificed, Elkanah would give parts of the sacrifice to his wife Peninnah and to all her sons and daughters. ⁵ But he would give only one part of it to Hannah, though he loved her, because the Lord had kept her from conceiving.^{[b] 6} And because the Lord had kept Hannah from conceiving, her rival would make fun of her mercilessly, just to bother her. ⁷ So that is what took place year after year. Whenever Hannah went to the Lord’s house, Peninnah would make fun of her. Then she would cry and wouldn’t eat anything.

⁸ “Hannah, why are you crying?” her husband Elkanah would say to her. “Why won’t you eat? Why are you^[c] so sad? Aren’t I worth more to you than ten sons?”

⁹ One time, after eating and drinking in Shiloh, Hannah got up and presented herself before the Lord.^[d] (Now Eli the priest was sitting in the chair by the doorpost of the Lord’s temple.) ¹⁰ Hannah was very upset and couldn’t stop crying as she prayed to the Lord. ¹¹ Then she made this promise: “Lord of heavenly forces, just look at your servant’s pain and remember me! Don’t forget your servant! Give her a boy! Then I’ll give him to the Lord for his entire life. No razor will ever touch his head.”

¹² As she kept praying before the Lord, Eli watched her mouth. ¹³ Now Hannah was praying in her heart; her lips were moving, but her voice was silent, so Eli thought she was drunk.

¹⁴ “How long will you act like a drunk? Sober up!” Eli told her.

¹⁵ “No sir!” Hannah replied. “I’m just a very sad woman. I haven’t had any wine or beer but have been pouring out my heart to the Lord. ¹⁶ Don’t think your servant is some good-for-nothing woman. This whole time I’ve been praying out of my great worry and trouble!”

¹⁷ Eli responded, “Then go in peace. And may the God of Israel give you what you’ve asked from him.”

¹⁸ “Please think well of me, your servant,” Hannah said. Then the woman went on her way, ate some food, and wasn’t sad any longer.^[e]

¹⁹ They got up early the next morning and worshipped the Lord. Then they went back home to Ramah. Elkanah had sex with his wife Hannah, and the Lord remembered her. ²⁰ So in the course of time, Hannah conceived and gave birth to a son. She named him Samuel, which means “I asked the Lord for him.”^[f]

Samuel’s dedication

²¹ When Elkanah and all his household went up to make the annual sacrifice and keep his solemn promise, ²² Hannah didn’t go.

“I’ll bring the boy when he is weaned,” she told her husband, “so he can be presented to the Lord and stay there permanently. I will offer him as a nazirite forever.”^[g]

²³ “Do what seems best to you,” said her husband Elkanah. “Stay here until you’ve weaned him. But may the Lord bring to pass what you’ve^[h] promised.” So the woman stayed home and nursed her son until she had weaned him.

²⁴ When he had been weaned and was still very young,^[i] Hannah took him, along with a three-year-old bull,^[j] an ephah^[k] of flour, and a jar of wine, and brought him to the Lord’s house at Shiloh. ²⁵ They slaughtered the bull, then brought the boy to Eli.

²⁶ “Excuse me, sir!” Hannah said. “As surely as you live, sir, I am the woman who stood here next to you, praying to the Lord. ²⁷ I prayed for this boy, and the Lord gave me what I asked from him. ²⁸ So now I give this boy back to the Lord. As long as he lives, he is given to the Lord.”

Then they worshipped there before the Lord.^[l]

Greeting

1 From Paul, a slave of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle and set apart for God’s good news. ^2-3 God promised this good news about his Son ahead of time through his prophets in the holy scriptures. His Son was descended from David. ⁴ He was publicly identified as God’s Son with power through his resurrection from the dead, which was based on the Spirit of holiness. This Son is Jesus Christ our Lord. ⁵ Through him we have received God’s grace and our appointment to be apostles. This was to bring all Gentiles to faithful obedience for his name’s sake. ⁶ You who are called by Jesus Christ are also included among these Gentiles.

⁷ To those in Rome who are dearly loved by God and called to be God’s people.

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

Thanksgiving and Paul’s plans to visit

⁸ First of all, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because the news about your faithfulness is being spread throughout the whole world. ⁹ I serve God in my spirit by preaching the good news about God’s Son, and God is my witness that I continually mention you ¹⁰ in all my prayers. I’m always asking that somehow, by God’s will, I might succeed in visiting you at last. ¹¹ I really want to see you to pass along some spiritual gift to you so that you can be strengthened. ¹² What I mean is that we can mutually encourage each other while I am with you. We can be encouraged by the faithfulness we find in each other, both your faithfulness and mine.

¹³ I want you to know, brothers and sisters, that I planned to visit you many times, although I have been prevented from coming until now. I want to harvest some fruit among you, just as I have done among the other Gentiles. ¹⁴ I have a responsibility both to Greeks and to those who don’t speak Greek, both to the wise and to the foolish.

God’s righteousness is revealed

¹⁵ That’s why I’m ready to preach the gospel also to you who are in Rome. ¹⁶ I’m not ashamed of the gospel: it is God’s own power for salvation to all who have faith in God, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. ¹⁷ God’s righteousness is being revealed in the gospel, from faithfulness^[a] for faith,^[b] as it is written, The righteous person will live by faith.^[c]

Gentiles are without excuse

¹⁸ God’s wrath is being revealed from heaven against all the ungodly behavior and the injustice of human beings who silence the truth with injustice. ¹⁹ This is because what is known about God should be plain to them because God made it plain to them. ²⁰ Ever since the creation of the world, God’s invisible qualities—God’s eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, because they are understood through the things God has made. So humans are without excuse. ²¹ Although they knew God, they didn’t honor God as God or thank him. Instead, their reasoning became pointless, and their foolish hearts were darkened. ²² While they were claiming to be wise, they made fools of themselves. ²³ They exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images that look like mortal humans: birds, animals, and reptiles. ²⁴ So God abandoned them to their hearts’ desires, which led to the moral corruption of degrading their own bodies with each other. ²⁵ They traded God’s truth for a lie, and they worshipped and served the creation instead of the creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.

²⁶ That’s why God abandoned them to degrading lust. Their females traded natural sexual relations for unnatural sexual relations. ²⁷ Also, in the same way, the males traded natural sexual relations with females, and burned with lust for each other. Males performed shameful actions with males, and they were paid back with the penalty they deserved for their mistake in their own bodies. ²⁸ Since they didn’t think it was worthwhile to acknowledge God, God abandoned them to a defective mind to do inappropriate things. ²⁹ So they were filled with all injustice, wicked behavior, greed, and evil behavior. They are full of jealousy, murder, fighting, deception, and malice. They are gossips, ³⁰ they slander people, and they hate God. They are rude and proud, and they brag. They invent ways to be evil, and they are disobedient to their parents. ³¹ They are without understanding, disloyal, without affection, and without mercy. ³² Though they know God’s decision that those who persist in such practices deserve death, they not only keep doing these things but also approve others who practice them.

Fall of Jerusalem

39 In the ninth year and the tenth month of Judah’s King Zedekiah, Babylon’s King Nebuchadnezzar and his entire army came against Jerusalem and surrounded it. ² In the eleventh year of Zedekiah, on the ninth day of the fourth month, they broke through the city walls. ³ Then all the commanding officers of the king of Babylon—Nergal-sharezer, Samgar-nebo,^[a] Sarsechim the chief officer, Nergal-sharezer the field commander—entered it and took their places at the middle gate with the rest of the officials of the king of Babylon.

⁴ When Judah’s King Zedekiah and his troops saw them, they tried to escape at night through the royal gardens and the gate between the two walls, toward the desert plain. ⁵ But the Babylonian^[b] army chased them down and caught Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho. They arrested him and brought him before Babylon’s King Nebuchadnezzar at Riblah in the land of Hamath. There the king put him on trial. ⁶ The king of Babylon slaughtered Zedekiah’s children at Riblah before his very own eyes, and the king of Babylon slaughtered all the officials of Judah. ⁷ Then he gouged out Zedekiah’s eyes, bound him in chains, and dragged him off to Babylon.

⁸ The Babylonians burned down the royal palace and the houses of the people, and they destroyed the Jerusalem walls. ⁹ Nebuzaradan the captain of the special guard rounded up the rest of the people who were left in the city, including those who had defected to the Babylonians, and deported them to Babylon. ¹⁰ But Nebuzaradan the captain of the special guard left some of the poorest people in the land of Judah. He gave them vineyards and fields at that time.

¹¹ Babylon’s King Nebuchadnezzar gave orders concerning Jeremiah to Nebuzaradan the captain of the special guard: ¹² “Find Jeremiah and look after him; don’t harm him but do whatever he asks from you.” ¹³ So Nebuzaradan the captain of the special guard, Nebushazban the chief officer, Nergal-sharezer the field commander, and all the commanders of the king of Babylon ¹⁴ sent orders^[c] to release Jeremiah from the prison quarters. They entrusted him to Gedaliah, Ahikam’s son and Shaphan’s grandson, so that Jeremiah could move about freely^[d] among the people.

¹⁵ The Lord’s word came to Jeremiah when he was still confined to the prison quarters: ¹⁶ Go and say to Ebed-melech the Cushite that the Lord of heavenly forces, the God of Israel, proclaims: I’m about to fulfill my words concerning this city, for harm and not for good. You will witness it for yourself on that day. ¹⁷ But on that day, declares the Lord:

Psalm 13

For the music leader. A song of David.

Psalm 14

For the music leader. Of David.