M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan

David wins against his enemies

18 After some time, David attacked the Philistines and he won against them. He took Gath city and the villages around it from the Philistines.

² David also won a battle against the Moabites. They were now under David's authority and they paid taxes to him.

³ David also won a battle against Hadadezer, king of Zobah. He won land as far as Hamath. That happened when Hadadezer took his army to the Euphrates river to show that he had authority there. ⁴ David took from Hadadezer 1,000 chariots and 7,000 men who drove them. He also caught 20,000 of Hadadezer's other soldiers. David kept 100 horses that pulled chariots. But he cut the legs of the other horses so that they could not run.

⁵ The Syrians from Damascus sent an army to help King Hadadezer of Zobah. But David killed 22,000 soldiers of the Syrian army. ⁶ David put some of his soldiers in Damascus to keep his authority over the Syrian people. They had to pay taxes to King David.

The Lord helped David to win all the battles that he fought.

⁷ David took the gold shields that Hadadezer's officers had carried. He brought the shields to Jerusalem. ⁸ David also took a lot of bronze things from Tebah and Cun. Those towns had belonged to Hadadezer towns. Later, Solomon used that bronze to make the big bath in the temple that was called ‘the Sea’. He also used the bronze to make pillars and other things for the temple.

⁹ Tou, the king of Hamath, heard news that David had won the battle against the whole army of King Hadadezer of Zobah. ¹⁰ There had been a war between King Hadadezer and King Tou. So Tou sent his son, Hadoram, to say ‘hello’ to King David. He wanted to praise David because he had won the battle against King Hadadezer. He also sent many gifts of gold, silver and bronze to David.

¹¹ King David took those gifts and he offered them to the Lord. He also offered to the Lord all the silver and gold things that he had taken from other nations. Those nations were Edom, Moab, the Ammonites, the Philistines and the Amalekites.

¹² Zeruiah's son Abishai killed 18,000 men from Edom in the Valley of Salt. ¹³ He put groups of his soldiers in Edom, so that David had authority over all the Edomites.

The Lord helped David to win all the battles that he fought.

David's officers

¹⁴ David ruled over all Israel. He did everything that was right and fair for all his people. ¹⁵ Zeruiah's son Joab was the leader of Israel's army. Ahilud's son Jehoshaphat wrote down the important things that happened. ¹⁶ Ahitub's son Zadok and Abiathar's son Ahimelech were priests. Shavsha was David's secretary. ¹⁷ Jehoiada's son Benaiah was the leader of David's personal guards. David's sons were his most important officers.^[a]

Troubles for rich people

5 Now, listen to me, you rich people. Weep and cry aloud, because many troubles will soon happen to you. ² Your money no longer has any value. Insects have eaten your beautiful clothes and they have spoiled them. ³ You have stored silver and gold coins to spend for yourselves. But dirt has spoiled those coins. That dirt will show that you are guilty. It will become like fire that is burning your bodies. In the last days of this world you have stored all this money for yourselves. ⁴ But you have not paid the workers in your fields the money that you should have paid them. You have cheated them. Now they are shouting against you. The Lord of great power has heard them when they cry to him for help. ⁵ During your life here on this earth, you have had all that you wanted. You have lived like kings. You have eaten as much food as you want. So now you are like fat animals that are ready for men to kill. ⁶ You say that a righteous person is guilty. You have even killed him and he could not stop you.

Be patient until the Lord comes again

⁷ So, my Christian friends, be patient until the Lord Jesus returns. Think about how a farmer is patient. He waits for the ground to give him valuable food to eat. He waits patiently for the rain to come in the autumn and in the spring. ⁸ You also must be patient, because the Lord will return soon. Be strong as you continue to trust him.

⁹ My Christian friends, do not complain against each other. If you do, God will punish you. So be careful! He is the Judge and he is ready now to judge people.

¹⁰ Think about how God's prophets were also patient. They spoke messages on behalf of the Lord. Many troubles happened to them but they were patient. So, my Christian friends, you should copy their example. ¹¹ We know that God blessed people who were like that. They continued to trust God when trouble happened to them. You have heard about Job. He waited patiently for God to help him in his troubles. You know how the Lord helped him in the end. Because of that, we see that the Lord God is very kind and he helps us.

¹² Here is another important thing to remember, my Christian friends. When you want to make a strong promise, never use extra words. Do not say, ‘I promise by heaven,’ or ‘I promise by the earth.’ Do not use any extra words like that. When you say ‘yes,’ that should be enough. When you say ‘no,’ that should also be enough. If you say more than that, God will say that you are guilty.

Prayer

¹³ Is anyone among you in trouble? Then they should pray to God about it. Or, is anyone feeling happy? They should praise God with songs. ¹⁴ Is anyone ill? They should ask the leaders of the church to come and to pray for them. The leaders should put some olive oil on the sick person. They should pray for him with the authority of the Lord Jesus. ¹⁵ If they pray in that way and they trust that God will answer them, the sick person will become well again. The Lord will cause him to become well. And God will forgive him if he has done any wrong things.

¹⁶ So you should tell each other about any wrong things that you have done. Then you will be able to pray for each other, so that God makes you well again. When a good person prays to God, God does powerful things. ¹⁷ For example, God's prophet Elijah was an ordinary person, as we are. He prayed to God that it would not rain. He continued to pray and it did not rain on the land for three years and six months. ¹⁸ After that time, he prayed to God to send rain again. After that, rain came down from the sky. The seeds that were in the ground began to grow and give food for people to eat.

¹⁹ My Christian friends, if anyone among you turns away from God's true message, you should help him. Try to bring him back to God. ²⁰ Understand this: if you turn a person back from their bad ways, you will save them from death. And God will forgive that person for his many sins.

Jonah's prayer

2 From inside the fish's stomach, Jonah prayed to the Lord his God.

² He said,

¹⁰ Then the Lord told the great fish to spit Jonah out from its stomach. So it dropped Jonah onto the shore.

A Roman officer believes that Jesus can help him

7 After Jesus had finished speaking to the people, he went to Capernaum.^{[a] 2} A Roman officer there had a servant that he liked very much. The servant was very ill and he was dying.

³ The officer heard about Jesus, so he sent some important Jews to speak to him. ‘Please go to Jesus,’ he said to them. ‘I would like him to make my servant well. Ask him if he would come to do that.’ ⁴ The Jewish leaders went to Jesus. They asked him, ‘Please would you do something to help this Roman officer. ⁵ He loves the Jewish people. He himself built a meeting place for us.’

⁶ So Jesus went with them. When he was not very far away from the house, the officer sent some friends to talk to him. He told them to say to Jesus, ‘Sir, I do not want to be a trouble to you. I am not good enough for you to come into my house. ⁷ That is why I did not come to talk to you myself. Instead, just say that my servant will get better. I know that he will then be well again. ⁸ In my work, someone has authority over me. I also have authority over other soldiers. I say to one soldier, “Go!” and he goes. I say to another one, “Come!” and he comes. I say to my servant, “Do this!” and he does it.’

⁹ When Jesus heard this message from the officer, he was very surprised. He turned towards the crowd that was following him. He said to them, ‘I tell you, I have not found anyone like this man in all of Israel. Nobody else believes in me as well as he does.’

¹⁰ The friends of the officer then returned to his house. When they arrived there, they saw that the servant was well again.

Jesus makes a dead man alive again

¹¹ The next day, Jesus went to a town called Nain. His disciples and a large group of other people went with him. ¹² When he had almost reached the gate of the town, lots of people were coming out. They were carrying a dead man on a wooden board. They were taking him to bury him. His mother had no other sons and her husband was also dead. A large crowd of people from the town was going with her.

¹³ When the Lord Jesus saw her, he felt very sorry for her. He said to her, ‘Do not cry.’ ¹⁴ He went to the board and he touched it. The people who were carrying the dead man stopped. Jesus said, ‘Young man, I am telling you, get up!’ ¹⁵ Immediately, the dead man sat up and he began to talk. Jesus then gave him back to his mother.

¹⁶ Everyone there was very afraid. They praised God and said, ‘A great prophet of God has appeared among us. God has come to save his people!’

¹⁷ This news about Jesus went everywhere in Judea. The people in the places that were near there also heard about it.

Jesus talks about John the Baptist

¹⁸ Then some disciples of John the Baptist went to visit him in prison. They told him about all the things that Jesus was doing. So John chose two of them to go to the Lord Jesus for him. ¹⁹ He said to them, ‘I want you to ask Jesus, “Are you the special person that God is sending to us? If not, should we still look for someone else?” ’

²⁰ So the two men came to Jesus. They said to him, ‘John the Baptist has sent us to you. He wants us to ask you, “Are you the special person that God has promised to send to us? If not, should we still look for someone else?” ’

²¹ At that time, Jesus was making many people well. They had many different illnesses. Some had bad spirits in them. Jesus also caused many blind people to see again. ²² Then he said to the two men that John had sent, ‘Go back to John. Tell him what you have seen. Tell him what you have heard. Blind people can now see again. People that could not walk can now walk again. People who had a bad disease of the skin are now well again. Deaf people can now hear again. People who had died now live again. Poor people are hearing God's good news. ²³ If anyone believes in me and does not turn away, he will be really happy.’^[b]

²⁴ The two disciples of John then left. Jesus spoke to the crowd about John. He said to them, ‘You went out to the wilderness. What did you go there to see? Was it a tall piece of grass which the wind was blowing this way and that? No, you did not go to see that. ²⁵ Did you go to see a man who was wearing expensive clothes? No! People like that do not live in the wilderness. They have many beautiful things and they live in great houses. ²⁶ So what did you go to see? Did you go to see a prophet sent by God? Yes! But I tell you, John was even more important than a prophet. ²⁷ This is what they wrote about him a long time ago in the Bible, when God said:

²⁸ Jesus also said to the people, ‘I tell you, John is greater than any person who has ever lived up to now. But now anyone who belongs in the kingdom of God is greater than John, even the least important of them.’^[d]

²⁹ Many people heard what Jesus said. Even the men who took taxes from people agreed with his message. They had gone to John to baptize them. They all said, ‘What God says about us is right.’ ³⁰ But the Pharisees and the men that studied God's Law had not asked John to baptize them. They did not believe the message that God was giving to them.

³¹ Jesus continued to teach. He said, ‘I will talk to you about the people that are alive today. I will tell you what they are like. ³² They are like children who are sitting in the market place. They are playing games. They shout to other children,

³³ You are like those children. When John the Baptist came to you, he did not eat ordinary food. He never drank wine. So you say that John has a bad spirit in him. ³⁴ Then I, the Son of Man, came. I eat meals with other people and I drink wine. So you say about me, “Look at this man! He eats too much and he drinks too much. He is a friend of bad people and men who take taxes from people.” ³⁵ But God is wise and good. Wise people understand and they show that God is right.’^[e]

A woman pours expensive oil on Jesus

³⁶ One of the Pharisees asked Jesus to eat a meal with him. So Jesus went to the Pharisee's house and sat down to eat. ³⁷ In that town was a woman who had done many wrong things. She heard that Jesus was eating a meal at the house of the Pharisee. So she took a small stone jar with oil in it, and she went there. The oil had a very nice smell. ³⁸ She went into the house and she stood behind Jesus. She was crying and she made his feet wet with her tears. Then she made his feet dry again with her hair and she kissed them. She then poured the oil out of the jar onto his feet. ³⁹ When the Pharisee saw this, he said to himself, ‘This man cannot be a prophet from God. If he were, he would know all about this woman. He would know that she is a very bad person. He would not let her touch him.’

⁴⁰ Jesus said to him, ‘Simon, I want to tell you something.’ Simon replied, ‘Yes, Teacher, tell me.’ So Jesus told him a story about two men:

⁴¹ ‘Someone had lent two men some money. He had lent one of them 500 silver coins. He had lent the other one 50 coins.^{[f] 42} Neither of the men had enough money to pay him back. Then the man that had lent them the money forgave them. “You do not need to pay back my money,” he said to them both.’

Jesus then asked Simon, ‘Which of these two men will love that man most?’ ⁴³ Simon replied, ‘I think that it is the man that needed to pay back the most money.’

‘You are right,’ Jesus said. ⁴⁴ Then he turned towards the woman. ‘You see this woman,’ he said to Simon. ‘When I came into your house, you did not give me water for my feet.^[g] But she has washed my feet with her tears and she has made them dry with her hair. ⁴⁵ You did not say “Hello” to me with a kiss. But this woman began to kiss my feet when she came in. And she has not stopped. ⁴⁶ You did not put oil on my head. But she has brought oil with a nice smell and put it on my feet. ⁴⁷ So I tell you, this woman has done many bad things. But I have forgiven her. She loves me a lot, because I have forgiven her for many bad things. If I only forgive someone a little, that person only loves me a little.’

⁴⁸ Then Jesus said to the woman, ‘Woman, I forgive you for all the bad things that you have done.’

⁴⁹ The other people at the meal talked among themselves. They said, ‘Who is this man? Can he really forgive the bad things that people have done?’

⁵⁰ Jesus said to the woman, ‘You have believed in me, so God has saved you. You may go now, and be happy.’