M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan
War against Benjamin's tribe
20 Then all the Israelites agreed to come together. They came from everywhere in Israel, from Dan in the north as far as Beersheba in the south. They also came from the Gilead region on the east side of the Jordan River. They all came together at Mizpah, to meet with the Lord. 2 The leaders of all Israel's tribes stood there with the people of God. There were 400,000 Israelite men who had their weapons, ready to fight. 3 By this time, the people of Benjamin's tribe had heard the news that the other tribes were meeting in Mizpah.
Then the Israelites asked, ‘Tell us how this evil thing happened.’
4 So the Levite, the husband of the dead woman, told them. He said, ‘My slave wife and I arrived in Gibeah to sleep there for the night. It is a town that belongs to the people of Benjamin's tribe. 5 That night some important men of Gibeah came to the house to attack me. They stood all around the house. They wanted to kill me, but they took hold of my wife instead. They made her have sex with them, and she died. 6 I took her body home and I cut it into 12 pieces. I sent the pieces everywhere in the land of Israel. I did this to show what a terrible thing these men had done. 7 So now all you people of Israel must decide what you will do about it.’
8 All the people stood up together. They all promised, ‘None of us will go home. Not one of us will return to his house. 9 Instead, this is what we will do to the people of Gibeah. We will use lots to decide who should attack the city. 10 We will take ten men from every 100 men in each tribe. We will take 100 men from every 1,000 men, and 1,000 men from every 10,000 men. Those men will find food for the other soldiers. That will be their job. Then the other soldiers will be able to attack Gibeah. They will punish Gibeah's people as they deserve for the terrible thing that they have done.’ 11 So all the Israelites agreed together that they would attack Gibeah, in the land of Benjamin.
12 The Israelite tribes sent men with a message to all the places in Benjamin. They said, ‘You must know that some of your men have done an evil thing. 13 Send those wicked men of Gibeah out to us. We must punish them with death. Only that will remove this terrible sin from Israel.’
But the people of Benjamin did not agree to do that. 14 Instead, they came from all their towns and they met together at Gibeah to fight against the other Israelites. 15 26,000 soldiers came to Gibeah with their weapons, ready to fight. There were also 700 brave soldiers already in Gibeah. 16 In Benjamin's army there were 700 men who used their left hands to fight. Each of them could use a sling to throw a stone at a very small thing. They could even hit a hair!
17 The other Israelite tribes, without Benjamin, had an army of 400,000 soldiers who knew how to use their weapons. 18 They went to Bethel.[a] They asked God which tribe should go first to attack Benjamin's army. The Lord replied, ‘Judah must go first.’
19 The next morning, the Israelites got up and they prepared to attack Gibeah. 20 The Israelite army marched forward to fight against Benjamin's army. They stood in their places around the city. 21 Benjamin's soldiers came out of Gibeah to attack. They killed 22,000 Israelites in the battle that day.
22-23 The Israelite soldiers told each other to be brave. They went to meet with the Lord and they wept until the evening. They asked the Lord, ‘Should we march out again to fight against our relatives, the men of Benjamin?’ The Lord said, ‘Yes, attack them.’ So they went to stand in the same places around the city as they had done the day before.
24 The Israelites went to fight against Benjamin's army on the second day. 25 This time, when the soldiers of Benjamin came out of Gibeah to attack them, they killed another 18,000 Israelite soldiers in the battle.
26 Then the whole Israelite army went back to Bethel to meet with the Lord. They sat there and they wept. They did not eat any food that day until evening. They offered burnt offerings and peace offerings to the Lord.
27-28 The Covenant Box was in Bethel at that time. Phinehas, son of Eleazar and grandson of Aaron, was the priest who served the Lord there. The Israelites asked the Lord, ‘Should we march out to fight against our relatives, the men of Benjamin, again? Or should we leave them?’ The Lord said, ‘Attack them. Tomorrow I will put them under your power.’
29 This time, the Israelites made some of their soldiers hide in places around Gibeah. 30 On the third day, their other soldiers stood in the same places as before. They were ready to fight. 31 The soldiers of Benjamin came out of Gibeah to attack them. But the Israelites moved away from the city so that Benjamin's soldiers chased after them. The men of Benjamin began to kill the Israelites, as they had done before. They killed about 30 Israelites in the fields and on the roads that went to Bethel and Gibeah.
32 The soldiers of Benjamin were saying, ‘We are winning against them, as we have done before!’ But the Israelites were saying, ‘We will continue to run away so that their soldiers chase us. We will lead them away from the city onto the roads.’
33 When the men of Israel reached Baal Tamar, they stopped there. They stood in their places, ready to fight. At the same time, the Israelite soldiers who had hidden themselves on the west side of Gibeah ran out of their places. 34 10,000 Israelite soldiers who knew how to fight well attacked Gibeah. There was a big battle. The men of Benjamin did not realize that they were in a lot of trouble.
35 The Lord destroyed Benjamin's army as the Israelites attacked them. Israel's soldiers killed more than 25,000 soldiers of Benjamin's army that day. 36 Finally, the men of Benjamin realized that they had lost the battle.
This is how it happened: Israel's soldiers let Benjamin's army chase after them. They trusted the soldiers who were hiding around Gibeah to attack the city. 37-38 The Israelites had agreed a sign with their men who were hiding. When those men ran into Gibeah and they destroyed everything there, they would make the sign. They would light a big fire so that the smoke went up into the sky. 39 Then the other Israelite soldiers would turn round to attack the soldiers who were chasing them.
Benjamin's soldiers had begun to kill the Israelites. When they had killed about 30 of them, they said, ‘Look! We are winning again, as we always do!’ 40 Then they turned and they saw the tall pillar of smoke. It was rising from their city up to the sky. 41 The Israelite soldiers saw the sign and they attacked the soldiers of Benjamin. The men of Benjamin suddenly became very afraid. They realized that they were in a lot of trouble. 42 So they ran away on the road towards the desert while the Israelites chased after them. But they could not escape from the Israelites. Israelite men came out from their towns and killed them in the battle. 43 They attacked Benjamin's soldiers from all sides and they continued to chase them. They were killing them all the way to a place on the east of Gibeah.
44 They killed 18,000 strong soldiers of Benjamin's tribe. 45 The rest of Benjamin's soldiers ran towards the desert, as far as the rock of Rimmon. The Israelites killed 5,000 of them as they ran along the roads. They chased them to Gidom, and they killed 2,000 more of Benjamin's soldiers there.
46 On that day, 25,000 soldiers of Benjamin's tribe died. They were all brave men who knew how to fight well. 47 But 600 soldiers turned and ran away to the rock of Rimmon. They stayed there for four months.
48 The Israelites returned to the land that belonged to Benjamin's tribe. They killed the people and animals in all the towns there. As they came to each town, they destroyed it with fire.
The Jews say bad things about Paul
24 Five days after that, Ananias, the leader of the priests, went to Caesarea. Some important Jews went with him. A man called Tertullus also went with them. He was a lawyer. All these people went to meet with Felix, the ruler. They told Felix what Paul had done. Felix would judge who was right. 2 Felix told a soldier to bring Paul to the meeting. Then Tertullus began to speak against Paul. He said, ‘Sir, you have ruled us well for many years. Because of you, our country has had no wars for a long time. You have made new laws that are good for our country. You have thought well about how you should lead us. 3 Everywhere, the people are happy about what you have done. So we want to thank you very much for all these good things. 4 I do not want you to sit here for a long time. So I will speak for a short time about our problem. Please be kind to us and listen to me.
5 We know that this man brings trouble everywhere. Anywhere in the world that Jewish people live, he makes them angry. Then they all fight each other. He is the leader of a group called the Nazarenes.’[a]
6 ‘He also did bad things in the temple that are against our laws. So we took hold of him.[b] [We wanted to judge him by what our own law says. 7 But Lysias, the leader of the soldiers, came to us. He attacked us and he took Paul away from us. 8 Then he told us to come and to speak to you about it.] You should ask this man some questions about what he has done. You will find out that what we say against him is true.’
9 The other Jews that were there also spoke against Paul. They said, ‘All these things that Tertullus has said are true.’
Paul tells Felix his own story
10 Then Felix raised his hand towards Paul to show that he should speak. So Paul said to Felix, ‘I know that you have judged the people in this region for many years. So now I am happy to tell you everything. 11 I went to Jerusalem less than 12 days ago. You can check that that is true. I went there to worship God. 12 When the Jews saw me in the temple, I was not arguing with anyone. I was not causing trouble among Jewish people in their meeting places. Nor did I cause problems in any other places in Jerusalem. 13 They have said bad things against me. But they cannot show you that these things are true. 14 What I do agree is this: I worship the same God that our Jewish ancestors worshipped. But I do this in the Way that Jesus has taught us. These men say that this is not the right way. But I believe in all God's Law that Moses wrote for us. I also believe in the messages that God's prophets have written in the Bible. 15 I also trust God like these men do. Like them, I believe that people will become alive again after death. God will do this for all people, both good people and bad people. 16 Because of that, I always try to do what is right. I do not want to do anything bad against God or against other people.
17 I had not been to Jerusalem for several years. Now I returned there with a gift of some money. I brought it to give to poor people who are Jews, like me. I also wanted to offer sacrifices to God. 18 I was doing this in the yard of the temple when these men found me. I had obeyed all the rules to make myself clean in front of God. There was no crowd with me. Nobody was arguing or fighting because of me. 19 But there were some Jews there who had come from Asia. They are the people who caused the trouble. Maybe they have something bad to say against me. They themselves should come here to speak to you about it. 20 Or these men here should tell you what wrong thing I have done. I stood in front of the meeting of the Jewish leaders and they asked me questions. 21 When I stood there, I shouted, “I believe that dead people will rise and they will live again. That is the reason why you are judging me today.” They may think that is a wrong thing that I did.’
22 Felix knew much about the Way of the Lord Jesus. He now said that the meeting had finished. He said to Paul, ‘Soon Lysias, the leader of the soldiers, will arrive here. Then I will decide what to do with you.’ 23 He said to the officer who was holding Paul, ‘Continue to guard this man carefully. But his friends can come and see him. They can help him and they can bring things for him.’
Felix and Drusilla listen to Paul
24 After some days, Felix came with Drusilla, his Jewish wife. He told his soldiers to bring Paul to them. Paul talked to them, and they listened to everything that he said. Paul spoke about how people believed in Jesus, the Messiah. 25 Paul continued to speak for some time. He said, ‘People need to do what is right. They need to stop themselves doing wrong things. One day, God will judge people for how they have lived.’
While Paul talked about these things, Felix became afraid. He said to Paul, ‘You can leave us now. At some time I may want to listen to you again. Then I will ask you to come to me again.’ 26 But Felix also hoped that Paul would give him some money.[c] For that reason he often met with Paul and they talked together.
27 This happened for two years. Felix left Paul in the prison, because he wanted to make the Jewish leaders happy. Then Porcius Festus became the ruler instead of Felix.
God warns Zedekiah
34 The Lord spoke to Jeremiah again, while King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon and his army were attacking Jerusalem. Soldiers from all the kingdoms that King Nebuchadnezzar ruled joined with Babylon's own soldiers to make a large army. They were attacking Jerusalem and the towns around it. 2 The Lord, Israel's God, said to Jeremiah, ‘Go to Zedekiah, king of Judah, and give him this message: The Lord says, “I will put this city under the power of the king of Babylon. He will burn it down. 3 You will not be able to escape. Babylon's soldiers will certainly take hold of you. They will take you to the king of Babylon. You will have to stand in front of the king of Babylon and answer his questions. Then you will go to Babylon as his prisoner.
4 But listen to the promise that the Lord makes to you, Zedekiah, king of Judah. I, the Lord, promise you that you will not die in a battle. 5 Instead, you will die with peace in your mind. People will burn incense to give you honour when they bury you. They did that for your ancestors who ruled as kings before you. They will do it for you too. When you die, people will weep because they are sad. They will say, ‘This is terrible! Our king has died!’ That is my promise to you, says the Lord.” ’
6 The prophet Jeremiah told all this to King Zedekiah of Judah, in Jerusalem. 7 This happened when the king of Babylon's army were attacking Jerusalem and the cities of Lachish and Azekah. Those were the only strong cities in Judah that were not yet under his power.
King Zedekiah and the slaves
8 At another time, the Lord gave Jeremiah another message for King Zedekiah. Zedekiah had made an agreement with the people of Jerusalem. They all agreed to let their slaves go free. 9 Everyone in Judah who had a Hebrew slave must let their slave go free, both male and female slaves. Nobody should keep another Israelite person as their slave. 10 All the officers and the people agreed with the king that they would do this. They would not continue to have male or female slaves. They let them go free, as they had promised. 11 But later, they decided that they would not do that. They took the men and women back to work for them as slaves again. They forced them to do that.
12 Then the Lord said to Jeremiah, 13 ‘The Lord, Israel's God, says this to the people: I made a covenant with your ancestors when I brought them out of Egypt. They had been slaves when they were there. 14 I told them, “When any Hebrew slave has worked for you for six years, you must let them go free. In the seventh year after they sold themselves to you, you must set them free.”[a] But your ancestors did not listen to me. They did not obey me. 15 But now, you yourselves agreed to do what pleases me. You decided to obey me. You made a serious agreement with me in the temple which is my home. You let your slaves go free. 16 But now you have turned back to your old ways. You have refused to give me honour. You had let your slaves go free, as they wanted to do. But now you have forced them to work for you as your slaves again.
17 So I, the Lord, tell you this: You have not obeyed me. You have not let your Israelite slaves become free men and women. So now I will make you free! Yes, you will be free to let war, famine or disease kill you. People of all the kingdoms in the world will see how disgusting you are. 18 I will punish the people who did not obey the agreement that they made with me. When they made that agreement, they cut a young cow into two pieces and they walked between the pieces. Because they have not obeyed their agreement, I will now cut them into pieces, like the young cow.[b]
19 I will punish the leaders of Judah and Jerusalem, the king's officers and the priests. I will punish all the people of Judah who refused to obey the agreement that they made with me. 20 I will put them under the power of their enemies. Their enemies will kill them. Birds and wild animals will eat their dead bodies as food.
21 I will also put King Zedekiah of Judah and his officers under the power of their enemies. Their enemies will want to kill them. The king of Babylon's army has stopped attacking Jerusalem for a time. But I will put King Zedekiah and his officers under their power. 22 I will command Babylon's army to return to this city. They will fight against it and they will take it. They will burn the city down. I will also cause the other towns of Judah to become heaps of stones. Nobody will live in them any more.’
Tell the music leader to use flutes.
This is a song that David wrote.
Pray about your enemies[a]
5 Lord, listen to what I say to you.
I am upset, so think about what I am saying.
2 My King and my God, listen to my voice.
I am asking you to help me.
I am praying to you!
3 Lord, every morning you listen to my voice.
At sunrise I will turn to you for help,
and I will wait for you to answer.[b]
4 My God, you do not like anything that is bad.
Evil people cannot live near you.
5 Proud people cannot stand in front of you.
God, you hate everyone who does evil things.
6 You destroy those who tell lies.
The Lord hates murderers,
and those who deceive others.[c]
7 But I will come into your house,
because of your faithful love.
I will bend low in your holy temple,
and I will worship you.
8 Lord, help me to follow your right way.
My enemies are waiting to attack me.
Show the right way clearly to me,
so that I do not go the wrong way.
9 My enemies never speak what is true.
They only want to destroy people.
Their mouth has the smell of an open grave.[d]
Their tongues say nice things,
but they are all lies!
10 God, say that they are guilty!
Let their own wicked ideas bring punishment to them.
Send them away because they do so many bad things.
Yes, they have turned against you.
11 Please make people who turn to you happy.
Make them always sing with joy,
because you keep them safe.
Take care of those who are faithful to you.
Then they will be really happy.
12 Lord, you bless those who live in a right way.
Your love is like a shield that keeps them safe.
This is a song that David wrote.
Tell the music leader, ‘Use harps when you sing this song.’
David prays for health[e]
6 Lord, when you are angry,
please do not punish me.
2 I do not feel strong, Lord,
so please be kind to me.
Lord, please make me well again.
Even my bones are shaking.
3 I am very frightened.
Lord, when will you do something to help me?[f]
4 Lord, turn back to me. Give me back my life.
Make me safe because of your faithful love.
5 If I die, I will no longer remember you.
Nobody can praise you in their grave!
6 I am crying so much that I have no more strength.
My bed becomes wet because I weep all night.
My tears run into my pillow.[g]
7 I am so sad that my eyes do not see well any more.
They are becoming weak because of all my enemies.[h]
8 Go away from me, you people who do wicked things!
Now the Lord has heard me when I weep.[i]
9 I asked the Lord to be kind and to help me.
Now he has answered me!
10 All my enemies will become ashamed!
They will go away from me in fear!
Shame will suddenly come to them!
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