M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan
1 1-4 This is the list of the sons of Jacob who accompanied him to Egypt, with their families: Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Zebulun, Benjamin, Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher.
5 So the total number who went with him was seventy (for Joseph was already there). 6 In due season Joseph and each of his brothers died, ending that generation. 7 Meanwhile, their descendants were very fertile, increasing rapidly in numbers; there was a veritable population explosion so that they soon became a large nation, and they filled the land of Goshen.
8 Then, eventually, a new king came[a] to the throne of Egypt who felt no obligation to the descendants of Joseph.
9 He told his people, “These Israelis are becoming dangerous to us because there are so many of them. 10 Let’s figure out a way to put an end to this. If we don’t, and war breaks out, they will join our enemies and fight against us and escape out of the country.”
11 So the Egyptians made slaves of them and put brutal taskmasters over them to wear them down under heavy burdens while building the cities of Pithom and Rameses as supply centers for the king. 12 But the more the Egyptians mistreated and oppressed them, the more the Israelis seemed to multiply! The Egyptians became alarmed 13-14 and made the Hebrew slavery more bitter still, forcing them to toil long and hard in the fields and to carry heavy loads of mortar and brick.
15-16 Then Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, instructed the Hebrew midwives (their names were Shiphrah and Puah) to kill all Hebrew boys as soon as they were born, but to let the girls live. 17 But the midwives feared God and didn’t obey the king—they let the boys live too.
18 The king summoned them before him and demanded, “Why have you disobeyed my command and let the baby boys live?”
19 “Sir,” they told him, “the Hebrew women have their babies so quickly that we can’t get there in time! They are not slow like the Egyptian women!”
20 And God blessed the midwives because they were God-fearing women.[b] So the people of Israel continued to multiply and to become a mighty nation. 21 And because the midwives revered God, he gave them children of their own. 22 Then Pharaoh commanded all of his people to throw the newborn Hebrew boys into the Nile River. But the girls, he said, could live.
4 1-2 Then Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, left the Jordan River, being urged by the Spirit out into the barren wastelands of Judea, where Satan tempted him for forty days. He ate nothing all that time and was very hungry.
3 Satan said, “If you are God’s Son, tell this stone to become a loaf of bread.”
4 But Jesus replied, “It is written in the Scriptures, ‘Other things in life are much more important than bread!’”[a]
5 Then Satan took him up and revealed to him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time; 6-7 and the devil told him, “I will give you all these splendid kingdoms and their glory—for they are mine to give to anyone I wish—if you will only get down on your knees and worship me.”
8 Jesus replied, “We must worship God, and him alone. So it is written in the Scriptures.”
9-11 Then Satan took him to Jerusalem to a high roof of the Temple and said, “If you are the Son of God, jump off! For the Scriptures say that God will send his angels to guard you and to keep you from crashing to the pavement below!”
12 Jesus replied, “The Scriptures also say, ‘Do not put the Lord your God to a foolish test.’”
13 When the devil had ended all the temptations, he left Jesus for a while and went away.
14 Then Jesus returned to Galilee, full of the Holy Spirit’s power. Soon he became well known throughout all that region 15 for his sermons in the synagogues; everyone praised him.
16 When he came to the village of Nazareth, his boyhood home, he went as usual to the synagogue on Saturday, and stood up to read the Scriptures. 17 The book of Isaiah the prophet was handed to him, and he opened it to the place where it says:
18-19 “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me; he has appointed me to preach Good News to the poor; he has sent me to heal the brokenhearted and to announce that captives shall be released and the blind shall see, that the downtrodden shall be freed from their oppressors, and that God is ready to give blessings to all who come to him.”[b]
20 He closed the book and handed it back to the attendant and sat down, while everyone in the synagogue gazed at him intently. 21 Then he added, “These Scriptures came true today!”
22 All who were there spoke well of him and were amazed by the beautiful words that fell from his lips. “How can this be?” they asked. “Isn’t this Joseph’s son?”
23 Then he said, “Probably you will quote me that proverb, ‘Physician, heal yourself’—meaning, ‘Why don’t you do miracles here in your hometown like those you did in Capernaum?’ 24 But I solemnly declare to you that no prophet is accepted in his own hometown! 25-26 For example, remember how Elijah the prophet used a miracle to help the widow of Zarephath—a foreigner from the land of Sidon. There were many Jewish widows needing help in those days of famine, for there had been no rain for three and a half years, and hunger stalked the land; yet Elijah was not sent to them. 27 Or think of the prophet Elisha, who healed Naaman, a Syrian, rather than the many Jewish lepers needing help.”
28 These remarks stung them to fury; 29 and jumping up, they mobbed him and took him to the edge of the hill on which the city was built, to push him over the cliff. 30 But he walked away through the crowd and left them.
31 Then he returned to Capernaum, a city in Galilee, and preached there in the synagogue every Saturday. 32 Here, too, the people were amazed at the things he said. For he spoke as one who knew the truth, instead of merely quoting the opinions of others as his authority.
33 Once as he was teaching in the synagogue, a man possessed by a demon began shouting at Jesus, 34 “Go away! We want nothing to do with you, Jesus from Nazareth. You have come to destroy us. I know who you are—the Holy Son of God.”
35 Jesus cut him short. “Be silent!” he told the demon. “Come out!” The demon threw the man to the floor as the crowd watched, and then left him without hurting him further.
36 Amazed, the people asked, “What is in this man’s words that even demons obey him?” 37 The story of what he had done spread like wildfire throughout the whole region.
38 After leaving the synagogue that day, he went to Simon’s home where he found Simon’s mother-in-law very sick with a high fever. “Please heal her,” everyone begged.
39 Standing at her bedside he spoke to the fever, rebuking it, and immediately her temperature returned to normal, and she got up and prepared a meal for them![c]
40 As the sun went down that evening, all the villagers who had any sick people in their homes, no matter what their diseases were, brought them to Jesus; and the touch of his hands healed every one! 41 Some were possessed by demons; and the demons came out at his command, shouting, “You are the Son of God.” But because they knew he was the Christ, he stopped them and told them to be silent.
42 Early the next morning he went out into the desert. The crowds searched everywhere for him, and when they finally found him, they begged him not to leave them but to stay at Capernaum. 43 But he replied, “I must preach the Good News of the Kingdom of God in other places too, for that is why I was sent.” 44 So he continued to travel around preaching in synagogues throughout Judea.
18 The further reply of Bildad the Shuhite:
2 “Who are you trying to fool? Speak some sense if you want us to answer! 3 Have we become like animals to you, stupid and dumb? 4 Just because you tear your clothes in anger, is this going to start an earthquake? Shall we all go and hide?
5 “The truth remains that if you do not prosper, it is because you are wicked. And your bright flame shall be put out. 6 There will be darkness in every home where there is wickedness.
7 “The confident stride of the wicked man will be shortened; he will realize his failing strength. 8-9 He walks into traps, and robbers will ambush him. 10 There is a booby trap in every path he takes. 11 He has good cause for fear—his enemy is close behind him!
12 “His vigor is depleted by hunger; calamity stands ready to pounce upon him. 13 His skin is eaten by disease. Death shall devour him. 14 The wealth he trusted in shall reject him, and he shall be brought down to the king of terrors. 15 His home shall disappear beneath a fiery barrage of brimstone. 16 He shall die from the roots up, and all his branches will be lopped off.
17 “All memory of his existence will perish from the earth; no one will remember him. 18 He will be driven out from the kingdom of light into darkness and chased out of the world. 19 He will have neither son nor grandson left, nor any other relatives. 20 Old and young alike will be horrified by his fate. 21 Yes, that is what happens to sinners, to those rejecting God.”
5 Everyone is talking about the terrible thing that has happened there among you, something so evil that even the heathen don’t do it: you have a man in your church who is living in sin with his father’s wife.[a] 2 And are you still so conceited, so “spiritual”? Why aren’t you mourning in sorrow and shame and seeing to it that this man is removed from your membership?
3-4 Although I am not there with you, I have been thinking a lot about this, and in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ I have already decided what to do, just as though I were there. You are to call a meeting of the church—and the power of the Lord Jesus will be with you as you meet, and I will be there in spirit— 5 and cast out this man from the fellowship of the church and into Satan’s hands, to punish him, in the hope that his soul will be saved when our Lord Jesus Christ returns.
6 What a terrible thing it is that you are boasting about your purity and yet you let this sort of thing go on. Don’t you realize that if even one person is allowed to go on sinning, soon all will be affected? 7 Remove this evil cancer—this wicked person—from among you, so that you can stay pure. Christ, God’s Lamb, has been slain for us. 8 So let us feast upon him and grow strong in the Christian life, leaving entirely behind us the cancerous old life with all its hatreds and wickedness. Let us feast instead upon the pure bread of honor and sincerity and truth.
9 When I wrote to you before I said not to mix with evil people. 10 But when I said that I wasn’t talking about unbelievers who live in sexual sin or are greedy cheats and thieves and idol worshipers. For you can’t live in this world without being with people like that. 11 What I meant was that you are not to keep company with anyone who claims to be a brother Christian but indulges in sexual sins, or is greedy, or is a swindler, or worships idols, or is a drunkard, or abusive. Don’t even eat lunch with such a person.
12 It isn’t our job to judge outsiders. But it certainly is our job to judge and deal strongly with those who are members of the church and who are sinning in these ways. 13 God alone is the Judge of those on the outside. But you yourselves must deal with this man and put him out of your church.
The Living Bible copyright © 1971 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.