M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan
26 Eternal One: Do not fashion any idols or blasphemous images. Do not erect any sacred pillars as the nations around you do. Do not set up any carved stones in your land and bow down to them. I am the Eternal your God. 2 Honor My Sabbaths, and treat My sanctuary as a holy place. I am the Eternal One.
3 If you walk in My decrees and keep My commandments in your daily lives, 4 I will grant you plenty of rain in the seasons when you need it, and your land will produce abundant crops and your trees will be filled with fruit. 5 Your grain threshing will last until the time of the grape harvest, and the grape harvest will continue until it is time to plant again. You will fill your bellies with food and feel secure as you live in the land. 6 I will see to it that you have peace in your land. You will be able to go to bed at night without a worry on your mind. I will take away the dangerous animals that roam your land, and no armies will invade your land. 7-8 When you go after your enemies, they will fall by your sword. Five of you will go after 100 of your enemies, and 100 of you will cause 10,000 to flee. 9 I will grant you My favor, and you will be fruitful, multiply, and have many healthy children, and I will continue to honor My covenant with you. 10 You will have so much surplus food from year to year that you will have to make room for the new harvest when it comes in. 11 I will make my home among you and never turn away from you. 12 I will walk among you and be your God, and you will be My people.[a] 13 I am the Eternal One, your God, who led you out of the land of Egypt so that you would no longer be their slaves. I have shattered the yokes that broke your backs and helped you walk straight and upright.
14 However, if you do not obey Me or live by all I have commanded, 15 if you turn your backs on My decrees and despise what I have commanded so that you fail to do as I have directed and break the covenant that exists between us, 16 then this is what you can expect: I will bring a horrific cloud of terror over you, and you will waste away in disease and burning fevers, your eyes will grow dark, and your restless souls will long for life. The seeds you plant will provide you no sustenance because raiders will consume whatever you grow. 17 I will turn My face against you and stand by as your enemies strike you down. Those who despise you will reign over you, and you will run away even when no one is chasing you. 18 If, after all this, you still do not listen to Me, then I will increase your punishment until you have paid seven times for your sins. 19 I will break you of your powerful pride, and I will make the heavens above you as cold as iron and your earth below you as hard as bronze. 20 Your strength will be wasted because the land you work will not yield its crops, and the trees you plant will not bear fruit.
21 And if, after all this, you still rebel against Me and fail to listen to Me, I will strike you until you have paid seven times for your sins. 22 I will unleash ravenous wild beasts against you, and they will deprive you of your children and destroy your livestock; before long your numbers will dwindle and your busy roads will be deserted.
23 And if, after all these punishments, you still have not turned back to Me but continue to rebel against Me, 24 I will move against you, and this time I will punish you Myself until you have paid seven times for your sins. 25 I will march armies against you that will execute My vengeance against you for the covenant you have broken. When you retreat into your cities, I will send a vicious plague among you until you fall to your adversaries. 26 I will cut off your food supply until there is so little bread that 10 women will need only one oven to bake it. When they serve it, your portion will be carefully weighed and rationed and you won’t have enough to satisfy you.
27 If, after all this, you still do not listen to Me but continue to rebel against Me, 28 I will move against you with the full heat of My fury. I will punish you Myself until you have paid seven times for your sins. 29 You will become so hungry that some of you will eat the flesh of your own sons and daughters. 30 I will demolish your high places where false worship taints the land and tear down your incense altars. I will pile your lifeless bodies on the rubble of your lifeless god-images. I will detest you. 31 I will turn your bustling cities into wastelands. I will empty and silence your pagan sanctuaries. When you do sacrifice to Me, I will pay no attention to the pleasant aromas. 32 Yes, I will move against the land until it lies in ruins, and those who conquer you and settle there will be horrified by what they see. 33 I will scatter you among the nations. I will draw My sword against you. Your land will become an eerie wasteland, and your cities will lie in ruins.
34 While you are scattered among your enemies, your land will bask in its Sabbaths. For as long as the land is barren, it will enjoy the Sabbaths and the rest it deserves. 35 For all the days it lies desolate, it will have the rest it never had while you were living on the land. 36-37 For those of you who may survive, I will make your hearts despair as you live in lands occupied by your enemies. You will be so fearful that the noise made by a windblown leaf will startle you and send you running away in panic. Even when no one is chasing after you, you will run away and trip over each other as if you are being chased by an army. You will have no power to stand up to your enemies. 38 You will die far from home in foreign lands. The land of your adversaries will devour your corpses. 39 Those of you who survive will waste away in the lands of your adversaries because of their sins and the sins of their ancestors; they will surely waste away to nothing.
40 But if they own up to their sins and acknowledge the sins of their ancestors, if they admit that they have been unfaithful to Me, defied Me, and rebelled against Me— 41 which prompted Me to turn against them and scatter them among their enemies—if they humble their uncircumcised hearts and offer reparations for their sins, 42 then I will remember My covenant with Jacob, Isaac, and Abraham, and I will also remember the land. 43 As long as the land lies deserted without them, it will catch up on the Sabbaths it has missed and be renewed. In the meantime, they must offer reparations for their sins because they turned their backs on My decrees and despised My commands. 44 But even then, as long as My people are dwelling in the land of their adversaries, I will not reject them or hate them so much that I break My covenant with them and annihilate them. I am the Eternal One, their God. 45 Still they will benefit when I remember the covenant I made with their ancestors when I led them out of the land of Egypt with the whole world watching so that I could be their God. I am the Eternal One.
46 These are the directives, commandments, and instructions the Eternal One gave through Moses on Mount Sinai to establish the covenant between Himself and the Israelites.
Psalm 33
1 Release your heart’s joy in sweet music to the Eternal.
When the upright passionately sing glory-filled songs to Him, everything is in its right place.
2 Worship the Eternal with your instruments, strings offering their praise;
write awe-filled songs to Him on the 10-stringed harp.
3 Sing to Him a new song;
play each the best way you can,
and don’t be afraid to be bold with your joyful feelings.
4 For the word of the Eternal is perfect and true;
His actions are always faithful and right.
5 He loves virtue and equity;
the Eternal’s love fills the whole earth.
6 The unfathomable cosmos came into being at the word of the Eternal’s imagination, a solitary voice in endless darkness.
The breath of His mouth whispered the sea of stars into existence.
7 He gathers every drop of every ocean as in a jar,
securing the ocean depths as His watery treasure.
8 Let all people stand in awe of the Eternal;
let every man, woman, and child live in wonder of Him.
9 For He spoke, and all things came into being.
A single command from His lips, and all creation obeyed and stood its ground.
10 The Eternal cripples the schemes of the other nations;
He impedes the plans of rival peoples.
11 The Eternal’s purposes will last to the end of time;
the thoughts of His heart will awaken and stir all generations.
12 The nation whose True God is the Eternal is truly blessed;
fortunate are all whom He chooses to inherit His legacy.
13 The Eternal peers down from heaven
and watches all of humanity;
14 He observes every soul
from His divine residence.
15 He has formed every human heart, breathing life into every human spirit;
He knows the deeds of each person, inside and out.
16 A king is not delivered by the might of his army.
Even the strongest warrior is not saved by his own strength.
17 A horse is not the way to victory;
its great strength cannot rescue.
18 Listen, the eye of the Eternal is upon those who live in awe of Him,
those who hope in His steadfast love,
19 That He may save them from the darkness of the grave
and be kept alive during the lean seasons.
20 We live with hope in the Eternal. We wait for Him,
for He is our Divine Help and Impenetrable Shield.
21 Our hearts erupt with joy in Him
because we trust His holy name.
22 O Eternal, drench us with Your endless love,
even now as we wait for You.
9 Teacher: So I set my mind on all of this, examined it thoroughly, and here’s what I think: The righteous and the wise and all their deeds are in God’s hands. Whether they are destined to be loved or hated, no one but God knows. 2 Everyone shares a common destiny—the righteous and the wicked, the good [and the bad],[a] the clean and the unclean, those who sacrifice and those who neglect the sacrifices. The good and the faithful are treated no differently than the sinner. Those who take an oath are treated no differently than those afraid to commit. Such a great injustice! 3 Here is an evil that pervades all that is done under the sun: the same destiny happens to us all. Human hearts are inclined toward evil; madness runs deep throughout our lives. And then what happens? We die. 4 So long as we are alive, we have hope; it is better to be a living dog, you see, than a dead lion. 5 At least the living know they will die; the dead don’t know anything. No future, no reward is awaiting them, and one day they will be completely forgotten. 6 All of their love and hate and envy die with them; then it is too late to share in the human struggle under the sun.
At best, life is unpredictable. No one knows whether a pleasant or harsh future awaits. Perhaps it is better that way. It would be nice if good actions always guaranteed a pleasant future, but they don’t. Sometimes, in this fallen world, it is just the opposite. One thing is certain, however: everyone faces death. It is the great equalizer. Yet the teacher is assured of something else: those who are right with God and live wisely are in His hands.
Teacher: 7 So here is what you should do: go and enjoy your meals, drink your wine and love every minute of it because God is already pleased with what you do. 8 Dress your best, and don’t forget a splash of scented fragrance. 9 Enjoy life with the woman you love. Cherish every moment of the fleeting life which God has given you under the sun. For this is your lot in life, your great reward for all of your hard work under the sun. 10 Whatever you find to do, do it well because where you are going—the grave—there will be no working or thinking or knowing or wisdom.
11 I turned and witnessed something else under the sun: the race does not always go to the swift, the battle is not always won by the strong, bread does not always fill the table of the wise, wealth does not always accrue to the skillful, and favor is not always granted to the knowledgeable; but time and misfortune happen to them all. 12 A person can’t possibly know when his time will come. Like fish caught in a cruel net or birds trapped in a snare, without warning the unexpected happens, and people are caught up in an evil time.
When tragedy strikes, neither our wisdom nor our wealth nor our power can spare us from it.
13 I have witnessed an example of wisdom under the sun and admit I found it impressive: 14 Once there was a small town with only a few people in it. One day, out of nowhere, a king and his powerful army marched against it, surrounded it, and besieged it. The villagers didn’t know how to fend off such a powerful enemy. 15 But one man, who was very poor but very wise, rallied the villagers and managed to drive the army away. (The village remains to this day, but no one remembers the name of that one wise man who saved the village.) 16 So I said, “Wisdom is better than strength.” But the wisdom of the poor is despised; nobody listens to their wise counsel.
17 It is better to hear the soft-spoken words of a wise person
than the rant of a tyrant in the company of fools.
18 Wisdom is better than weapons of war,
yet one wrongdoer can undo much good.
1 Paul, servant of God and emissary[a] of Jesus, the Anointed One, on behalf of the faith that is accepted by God’s chosen people and the knowledge of the undeniable truth that leads to godliness.
Paul is ready to defend the truth. He knows it is pure and honorable. He knows that it comes from and leads back to God. In contrast, Paul perceives the constant threat of false teaching that produces chaos, overturns entire families, and is filled with myths and instructions taught by those outside the faith. This counter-truth is filled with lusts and passions that tear down others, and it results in petty debates over family trees with fights and disagreements over the law. The line is clearly drawn between them. Paul leaves no room to sit on the fence; there is no partial truth—the future of the church is at stake.
2 We rest in this hope we’ve been given—the hope that we will live forever with our God—the hope that He proclaimed ages and ages ago (even before time began). And our God is no liar; He is not even capable of uttering lies. 3 So we can be sure that it is in His exact right time that He released His word into the world—through the preaching that God our Savior has commanded into my care.
His word brings into the world the absolute clarity of God’s perspective and life-saving knowledge.
4 To you, Titus, my dear son birthed through our shared faith: may grace and peace rest upon you from God the Father and Jesus the Anointed, our Savior.
5 I left you on Crete so you could sort out the chaos and the unfinished business and appoint elders over communities in each and every city according to my earlier orders. 6 Here’s what you should look for in an elder: he should be above suspicion; if he is married, he should be the husband of one wife, raise children who believe, and be a person who can’t be accused of rough and raucous living. 7 It is necessary that any overseer you appoint be blameless, as he is entrusted with God’s mission. Look for someone who isn’t pompous or quick to anger, who is not a drunkard, violent, or chasing after seedy gain or worldly fame. 8 Find a person who lovingly opens his home to others; who honors goodness; who is thoughtful, fair, devout, self-controlled; and 9 who clings to the faithful word that was taught because he must be able, not only to encourage people with sound teaching, but also to challenge those who are against it.
10 You see antagonists everywhere; they are rebellious, loose-lipped, and deceitful (especially those who are from the circumcised lot). 11 Their talk must be quashed—their mouths sealed up because impure teaching is flying out of their lips and overturning entire families for the sake of their own squalid gain. 12 I’ll tell you, even their own prophet was heard saying, “Chronic liars, foul beasts, and lazy gluttons—that’s who you’ll meet in Crete.” 13 And he’s right! This is why we have to scold them, sometimes severely, so they will be sound in the faith 14 and be able to ignore Jewish myths as well as any commandments given by those who turn away from the truth.
15 Listen: to those who are pure, all things are pure. But to those who are tainted, stained, and unbelieving, nothing is pure because their minds and their consciences are polluted. 16 They claim, “I know God,” but their actions are a slap to His face. They are wretched, disobedient, and useless to any worthwhile cause.
The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.