M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan
False Prophets
13 Prophets or those who tell the future with dreams might come to you and say they will show you a miracle or a sign. 2 The miracle or sign might even happen, and then they might say, “Let’s serve other gods” (gods you have not known) “and let’s worship them.” 3 But you must not listen to those prophets or dreamers. The Lord your God is testing you, to find out if you love him with your whole being. 4 Serve only the Lord your God. Respect him, keep his commands, and obey him. Serve him and be loyal to him. 5 The prophets or dreamers must be killed, because they said you should turn against the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt and saved you from the land where you were slaves. They tried to turn you from doing what the Lord your God commanded you to do. You must get rid of the evil among you.
6 Someone might try to lead you to serve other gods—it might be your brother, your son or daughter, the wife you love, or a close friend. The person might say, “Let’s go and worship other gods.” (These are gods that neither you nor your ancestors have known, 7 gods of the people who live around you, either nearby or far away, from one end of the land to the other.) 8 Do not give in to such people. Do not listen or feel sorry for them, and do not let them go free or protect them. 9 You must put them to death. You must be the first one to start to kill them, and then everyone else must join in. 10 You must throw stones at them until they die, because they tried to turn you away from the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, where you were slaves. 11 Then everyone in Israel will hear about this and be afraid, and no one among you will ever do such an evil thing again.
Cities to Destroy
12 The Lord your God is giving you cities in which to live, and you might hear something about one of them. Someone might say 13 that evil people have moved in among you. And they might lead the people of that city away from God, saying, “Let’s go and worship other gods.” (These are gods you have not known.) 14 Then you must ask about it, looking into the matter and checking carefully whether it is true. If it is proved that a hateful thing has happened among you, 15 you must kill with a sword everyone who lives in that city. Destroy the city completely and kill everyone in it, as well as the animals, with a sword. 16 Gather up everything those people owned, and put it in the middle of the city square. Then completely burn the city and everything they owned as a burnt offering to the Lord your God. That city should never be rebuilt; let it be ruined forever. 17 Don’t keep for yourselves any of the things found in that city, so the Lord will not be angry anymore. He will give you mercy and feel sorry for you, and he will make your nation grow larger, as he promised to your ancestors. 18 You will have obeyed the Lord your God by keeping all his commands that I am giving to you today, and you will be doing what the Lord says is right.
God’s Special People
14 You are the children of the Lord your God. When someone dies, do not cut yourselves or shave your heads to show your sadness. 2 You are holy people, who belong to the Lord your God. He has chosen you from all the people on earth to be his very own.
3 Do not eat anything the Lord hates. 4 These are the animals you may eat: oxen, sheep, goats, 5 deer, gazelle, roe deer, wild goats, ibex, antelope, and mountain sheep. 6 You may eat any animal that has a split hoof and chews the cud, 7 but you may not eat camels, rabbits, or rock badgers. These animals chew the cud, but they do not have split hoofs, so they are unclean for you. 8 Pigs are also unclean for you; they have split hoofs, but they do not chew the cud. Do not eat their meat or touch their dead bodies.
9 There are many things that live in the water. You may eat anything that has fins and scales, 10 but do not eat anything that does not have fins and scales. It is unclean for you.
11 You may eat any clean bird. 12 But do not eat these birds: eagles, vultures, black vultures, 13 red kites, falcons, any kind of kite, 14 any kind of raven, 15 horned owls, screech owls, sea gulls, any kind of hawk, 16 little owls, great owls, white owls, 17 desert owls, ospreys, cormorants, 18 storks, any kind of heron, the hoopoes, or bats.
19 All insects with wings are unclean for you; do not eat them. 20 Other things with wings are clean, and you may eat them.
21 Do not eat anything you find that is already dead. You may give it to a foreigner living in your town, and he may eat it, or you may sell it to a foreigner. But you are holy people, who belong to the Lord your God.
Do not cook a baby goat in its mother’s milk.
Giving One-Tenth
22 Be sure to save one-tenth of all your crops each year. 23 Take it to the place the Lord your God will choose where he is to be worshiped. There, where you will be together with the Lord, eat the tenth of your grain, new wine, and oil, and eat the animals born first to your herds and flocks. Do this so that you will learn to respect the Lord your God always. 24 But if the place the Lord will choose to be worshiped is too far away and he has blessed you so much you cannot carry a tenth, 25 exchange your one-tenth for silver. Then take the silver with you to the place the Lord your God shall choose. 26 Use the silver to buy anything you wish—cattle, sheep, wine, beer, or anything you wish. Then you and your family will eat and celebrate there before the Lord your God. 27 Do not forget the Levites in your town, because they have no land of their own among you.
28 At the end of every third year, everyone should bring one-tenth of that year’s crop and store it in your towns. 29 This is for the Levites so they may eat and be full. (They have no land of their own among you.) It is also for strangers, orphans, and widows who live in your towns so that all of them may eat and be full. Then the Lord your God will bless you and all the work you do.
The Lord, the Fair and Holy King
99 The Lord is king.
Let the peoples shake with fear.
He sits between the gold creatures with wings.
Let the earth shake.
2 The Lord in Jerusalem is great;
he is supreme over all the peoples.
3 Let them praise your name;
it is great, holy and to be feared.
4 The King is powerful and loves justice.
Lord, you made things fair;
you have done what is fair and right
for the people of Jacob.
5 Praise the Lord our God,
and worship at the Temple, his footstool.
He is holy.
6 Moses and Aaron were among his priests,
and Samuel was among his worshipers.
They called to the Lord,
and he answered them.
7 He spoke to them from the pillar of cloud.
They kept the rules and laws he gave them.
8 Lord our God, you answered them.
You showed them that you are a forgiving God,
but you punished them for their wrongs.
9 Praise the Lord our God,
and worship at his holy mountain,
because the Lord our God is holy.
A Call to Praise the Lord
A psalm of thanks.
100 Shout to the Lord, all the earth.
2 Serve the Lord with joy;
come before him with singing.
3 Know that the Lord is God.
He made us, and we belong to him;
we are his people, the sheep he tends.
4 Come into his city with songs of thanksgiving
and into his courtyards with songs of praise.
Thank him and praise his name.
5 The Lord is good. His love is forever,
and his loyalty goes on and on.
A Promise to Rule Well
A psalm of David.
101 I will sing of your love and fairness;
Lord, I will sing praises to you.
2 I will be careful to live an innocent life.
When will you come to me?
I will live an innocent life in my house.
3 I will not look at anything wicked.
I hate those who turn against you;
they will not be found near me.
4 Let those who want to do wrong stay away from me;
I will have nothing to do with evil.
5 If anyone secretly says things against his neighbor,
I will stop him.
I will not allow people
to be proud and look down on others.
6 I will look for trustworthy people
so I can live with them in the land.
Only those who live innocent lives
will be my servants.
7 No one who is dishonest will live in my house;
no liars will stay around me.
8 Every morning I will destroy the wicked in the land.
I will rid the Lord’s city of people who do evil.
The Lord Will Help Israel
41 The Lord says, “Faraway countries, listen to me.
Let the nations become strong.
Come to me and speak;
we will meet together to decide who is right.
2 “Who caused the one to come from the east?
Who gives him victories everywhere he goes?
The one who brought him gives nations over to him
and defeats kings.
He uses his sword, and kings become like dust.
He uses his bow, and they are blown away like chaff.
3 He chases them and is never hurt,
going places he has never been before.
4 Who caused this to happen?
Who has controlled history since the beginning?
I, the Lord, am the one. I was here at the beginning,
and I will be here when all things are finished.”
5 All you faraway places, look and be afraid;
all you places far away on the earth, shake with fear.
Come close and listen to me.
6 The workers help each other
and say to each other, “Be strong!”
7 The craftsman encourages the goldsmith,
and the workman who smooths the metal with a hammer encourages the one who shapes the metal.
He says, “This metal work is good.”
He nails the statue to a base so it can’t fall over.
Only the Lord Can Save Us
8 The Lord says, “People of Israel, you are my servants.
People of Jacob, I chose you.
You are from the family of my friend Abraham.
9 I took you from places far away on the earth
and called you from a faraway country.
I said, ‘You are my servants.’
I have chosen you and have not turned against you.
10 So don’t worry, because I am with you.
Don’t be afraid, because I am your God.
I will make you strong and will help you;
I will support you with my right hand that saves you.
11 “All those people who are angry with you
will be ashamed and disgraced.
Those who are against you
will disappear and be lost.
12 You will look for your enemies,
but you will not find them.
Those who fought against you
will vanish completely.
13 I am the Lord your God,
who holds your right hand,
and I tell you, ‘Don’t be afraid.
I will help you.’
14 You few people of Israel who are left,
do not be afraid even though you are weak as a worm.
I myself will help you,” says the Lord.
“The one who saves you is the Holy One of Israel.
15 Look, I have made you like a new threshing board
with many sharp teeth.
So you will walk on mountains and crush them;
you will make the hills like chaff.
16 You will throw them into the air, and the wind will carry them away;
a windstorm will scatter them.
Then you will be happy in the Lord;
you will be proud of the Holy One of Israel.
17 “The poor and needy people look for water,
but they can’t find any.
Their tongues are dry with thirst.
But I, the Lord, will answer their prayers;
I, the God of Israel, will not leave them to die.
18 I will make rivers flow on the dry hills
and springs flow through the valleys.
I will change the desert into a lake of water
and the dry land into fountains of water.
19 I will make trees grow in the desert—
cedars, acacia, myrtle, and olive trees.
I will put pine, fir, and cypress trees
growing together in the desert.
20 People will see these things and understand;
they will think carefully about these things and learn
that the Lord’s power did this,
that the Holy One of Israel made these things.”
The Lord Challenges False Gods
21 The Lord says, “Present your case.”
The King of Jacob says, “Tell me your arguments.
22 Bring in your idols to tell us
what is going to happen.
Have them tell us what happened in the beginning.
Then we will think about these things,
and we will know how they will turn out.
Or tell us what will happen in the future.
23 Tell us what is coming next
so we will believe that you are gods.
Do something, whether it is good or bad,
and make us afraid.
24 You gods are less than nothing;
you can’t do anything.
Those who worship you should be hated.
25 “I have brought someone to come out of the north[a]
I have called by name a man from the east, and he knows me.
He walks on kings as if they were mud,
just as a potter walks on the clay.
26 Who told us about this before it happened?
Who told us ahead of time so we could say, ‘He was right’?
None of you told us anything;
none of you told us before it happened;
no one heard you tell about it.
27 I, the Lord, was the first one to tell Jerusalem that the people were coming home.
I sent a messenger to Jerusalem with the good news.
28 I look at the idols, but there is not one that can answer.
None of them can give advice;
none of them can answer my questions.
29 Look, all these idols are false.
They cannot do anything;
they are worth nothing.
The Two Witnesses
11 I was given a measuring stick like a rod, and I was told, “Go and measure the temple of God and the altar, and count the people worshiping there. 2 But do not measure the yard outside the temple. Leave it alone, because it has been given to those who are not God’s people. And they will trample on the holy city for forty-two months. 3 And I will give power to my two witnesses to prophesy for one thousand two hundred sixty days, and they will be dressed in rough cloth to show their sadness.”
4 These two witnesses are the two olive trees and the two lampstands that stand before the Lord of the earth. 5 And if anyone tries to hurt them, fire comes from their mouths and kills their enemies. And if anyone tries to hurt them in whatever way, in that same way that person will die. 6 These witnesses have the power to stop the sky from raining during the time they are prophesying. And they have power to make the waters become blood, and they have power to send every kind of trouble to the earth as many times as they want.
7 When the two witnesses have finished telling their message, the beast that comes up from the bottomless pit will fight a war against them. He will defeat them and kill them. 8 The bodies of the two witnesses will lie in the street of the great city where the Lord was killed. This city is named Sodom[a] and Egypt, which has a spiritual meaning. 9 Those from every race of people, tribe, language, and nation will look at the bodies of the two witnesses for three and one-half days, and they will refuse to bury them. 10 People who live on the earth will rejoice and be happy because these two are dead. They will send each other gifts, because these two prophets brought much suffering to those who live on the earth.
11 But after three and one-half days, God put the breath of life into the two prophets again. They stood on their feet, and everyone who saw them became very afraid. 12 Then the two prophets heard a loud voice from heaven saying, “Come up here!” And they went up into heaven in a cloud as their enemies watched.
13 In the same hour there was a great earthquake, and a tenth of the city was destroyed. Seven thousand people were killed in the earthquake, and those who did not die were very afraid and gave glory to the God of heaven.
14 The second trouble is finished. Pay attention: The third trouble is coming soon.
The Seventh Trumpet
15 Then the seventh angel blew his trumpet. And there were loud voices in heaven, saying:
“The power to rule the world now belongs to our Lord and his Christ,
and he will rule forever and ever.”
16 Then the twenty-four elders, who sit on their thrones before God, bowed down on their faces and worshiped God. 17 They said:
“We give thanks to you, Lord God Almighty,
who is and who was,
because you have used your great power
and have begun to rule!
18 The people of the world were angry,
but your anger has come.
The time has come to judge the dead,
and to reward your servants the prophets
and your holy people,
all who respect you, great and small.
The time has come to destroy those who destroy the earth!”
19 Then God’s temple in heaven was opened. The Ark that holds the agreement God gave to his people could be seen in his temple. Then there were flashes of lightning, noises, thunder, an earthquake, and a great hailstorm.
The Holy Bible, New Century Version®. Copyright © 2005 by Thomas Nelson, Inc.