M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan
God gives water out of a rock
17 Then all the Israelites continued to travel on from the desert called Sin. They moved from one place to another, as the Lord told them. When they arrived at Rephidim, they put up their tents there. But there was no water for the people to drink. 2 Because of this, the people quarrelled with Moses. They said, ‘Give us water to drink!’ Moses said to them, ‘You should not quarrel with me! You should not try to test the Lord!’
3 But the people needed water to drink. They complained against Moses. They said, ‘You should not have brought us out of Egypt! You will kill us and our children and our animals. We will all die, because we have no water to drink.’
4 Then Moses called to the Lord for help. He said, ‘What can I do with these people? They will soon be throwing stones at me to kill me.’
5 The Lord said to Moses, ‘Take some of the leaders of the Israelites with you and go in front of the people. Take your stick in your hand. Take the stick that you used to hit the Nile river. Now go! 6 I will stand there, in front of you, by the rock at Sinai. Hit the rock with your stick, and water will come out of it. Then the people can drink.’ So Moses did this, while the leaders of the Israelites watched him.
7 Moses called that place Massah and Meribah, because the Israelites quarrelled there. They tried to test the Lord to see what he would do. They said, ‘Let us see if the Lord is really with us. Will he help us, or not?’[a]
The Israelites fight the Amalekites
8 At Rephidim, the Amalekites came and they fought against the Israelites. 9 Moses said to Joshua, ‘Choose some of our men. Then go out with them and fight against the Amalekites. Tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill, and I will hold God's stick in my hand.’
10 So Joshua fought against the Amalekites. He did what Moses had told him to do. Moses, Aaron and Hur went up to the top of the hill. 11 When Moses lifted up his hands, the Israelites were winning in the fight. But when Moses brought his hands down, the Amalekites were winning. 12 Moses' hands became very tired. So Aaron and Hur put a big stone under Moses for him to sit on. Then Aaron and Hur held up Moses' hands. Aaron stood on one side of Moses, and Hur stood on the other side. They held his hands up, until sunset. 13 As a result, Joshua and his men destroyed the Amalekite army in the fight.
14 Then the Lord said to Moses, ‘Write down what happened here in a book. Then people will remember it. Read it aloud for Joshua to hear. Say that I will completely destroy all the Amalekites. Nobody in the whole world will remember them any more.’
15 Then Moses used big stones to build an altar. He called it ‘The Lord is my flag in war’.[b] 16 Moses said, ‘Take hold of the Lord's flag! The Lord will always continue to fight against the Amalekites.’
Jesus talks about his authority
20 One day, Jesus was teaching people in the yard of the temple. He was telling people the good news about God. Then the leaders of the priests and the teachers of God's Law came to him. With them were some other important Jews. 2 They asked him, ‘Tell us what authority you have to do these things? Who gave you the authority to do them?’
3 Jesus replied, ‘I also will ask you a question. Tell me the answer. 4 John baptized people. Did God give him the authority to do this? Or did men tell him to do it?’
5 The Jewish leaders talked to each other about Jesus' question. ‘We could say that God gave John his authority. But if we say that, Jesus will say to us, “Then you should have believed John.” 6 But we do not want to say that only men gave John his authority. Then all the people would throw stones at us to kill us. They are sure that John really was a prophet from God.’ 7 So the Jewish leaders answered Jesus, ‘We do not know who gave John his authority.’
8 Jesus said to them, ‘You will not answer my question. So I will not tell you what authority I have to do these things.’
Jesus tells a story about farmers
9 Then Jesus began to tell this story to the people. He said, ‘A man planted vines in his garden to grow grapes there. He found some farmers to work in the garden for him. Then he went away to another country and he stayed there for a long time.
10 At the time for the harvest, the man sent a servant to speak to the farmers. He wanted them to give him some fruit from the garden.
But the farmers hit the servant with sticks and they sent him away with nothing.
11 The master sent another servant to go to the farmers. They hit him with sticks too, and they did other bad things to him. They also sent him away with nothing. 12 The master then sent a third servant to the farmers. They hurt him badly too, and they threw him out of the garden.
13 Then the master of the garden said to himself, “I know what I will do. I will send my own son to go to them. I love him very much. Perhaps they will respect him.” 14 But the farmers saw him coming. They said to each other, “This is the son of our master. When our master dies, the garden will belong to his son. So we should kill the son and then the garden will be ours.”
15 So they threw the son out of the garden and they killed him.’
Jesus went on to ask, ‘Then what will the master of the garden do to those farmers? 16 I tell you, he will come to those farmers and he will kill them. Then he will give the garden to other people to take care of it.’
When the people heard this, they replied, ‘That must never happen!’[a]
17 Jesus then looked at the people and he said, ‘You say that this must not happen. But you have read this in the Bible and you should know what it means:
“The builders refused to use a certain stone.
They thought that it had no value.
But now that stone has become the most important stone at the corner of the building.[b]
18 When a person falls onto that stone, it will break his body into pieces. When that stone falls on top of someone, it will destroy him completely.” ’
The leaders ask Jesus a question
19 The teachers of God's Law and the leaders of the priests knew that Jesus had told this story about them. They were the bad farmers in the story. So they wanted to take hold of Jesus immediately. But they did not do it, because they were afraid of the people.
20 So this is what they did to catch Jesus. They sent people to ask him difficult questions. These people pretended to be honest, but they wanted to deceive Jesus. They wanted to make him say something wrong. Then they would take him to the ruler of the city to punish him. 21 So these people went to Jesus. They said, ‘Teacher, everything that you say and everything that you teach is right. We know that. You teach everyone the same true message about what God wants us to do. You do not say something different to an important person to make him happy. 22 So tell us your answer to this question: Should we pay our taxes to the Roman ruler, Caesar? Is it right to give that money to him, or not?’
23 Jesus knew that those men were not really honest. They wanted to make him say the wrong thing. 24 So he said to them, ‘Show me a coin. Tell me, whose picture is on this coin? Whose name is on it?’ 25 The men replied, ‘It is Caesar's picture and Caesar's name.’ Jesus then said to them, ‘So you should give to Caesar the things that belong to him. And give to God the things that belong to God.’
26 So the Jewish leaders could not make Jesus say anything wrong. They were very surprised at his answer to their question. They could not say anything more against him. All the people who were there saw this.
The Sadducees ask Jesus a question
27 Then some of the Sadducees came to see Jesus. The Sadducees do not believe that anyone becomes alive again after they die.
28 They wanted to ask Jesus a question. ‘Teacher,’ they said to him, ‘Moses wrote this in the Bible for us: “A man may die and leave a wife but no children. Then that man's brother must marry the woman. Then their children will be called the children of the brother who died.” 29 But once there were seven brothers. The oldest brother married a woman. Then he died before they had any children. 30 So the second brother married this woman. But he also died without children. 31 Then the third brother married the woman. The same thing happened to all seven brothers. They all died but they had no children. 32 After all this, the woman also died. 33 You teach that one day dead people will become alive again. So, on that day, whose wife will the woman be? She had married all seven of those brothers.’
34 Jesus answered them, ‘Men and women who are alive on earth are the ones who get married. 35 But God has chosen some people to live again with him. He will raise them up after they have died. Those people will not marry. They will not have husbands or wives, 36 and they cannot die any more. This is because they will live as the angels live in heaven. They are children of God. He has made them alive again to live with him. 37 It is true that God makes dead people become alive again. Moses showed us this in his report about the bush in the wilderness. He told us that our Lord God is the God of Abraham. He is the God of Isaac. And he is the God of Jacob.[c] 38 But God is not the God of people who are dead. He is the God of people who are alive. For God, all people continue to be alive.’
39 Some of the teachers of God's Law agreed with Jesus. ‘Teacher,’ they said, ‘that was a very good answer.’ 40 After that, they were all afraid to ask Jesus any more questions.
The Messiah is someone that King David calls his Lord
41 Jesus said to them, ‘Why do people say that the Messiah will be King David's son? 42 David himself said this in the book called Psalms:[d]
“The Lord God said to my Lord,
Sit at my right side until I win against your enemies.
43 Then you will be able to put your feet on them.”
44 You see here that David calls the Messiah his Lord. So can you really say that the Messiah is David's son?’
Jesus speaks against the teachers of God's Law
45 All the people were listening to Jesus. Jesus then said to his disciples, 46 ‘Be careful not to do the same as the teachers of God's Law. They want people to think that they are important. So they walk about in beautiful long clothes. They like people to praise them in the market place. They choose to sit in the best seats in the meeting place. They like to sit in the most important places at special meals. 47 They take things away from women after their husbands have died, even their houses. Then they pray for a long time so that other people will praise them. Because they do these things, God will punish those men much more than other people.’
Elihu continues to speak[a]
35 Elihu continued to speak to Job. This is what he said:
2 ‘The things that you say cannot be true.
You say, “I am more right than God is.”
3 But you also say, “If I do nothing wrong,
God does not bless me.
No good thing comes to me.”
4 Now I will give you an answer.
I will also speak to the friends who are with you.
5 Look up at the sky to see what is there.
Look at the clouds that are so high above you.
6 If you do something that is wrong,
it does not hurt God.
Even if you do many wrong things,
it does nothing to him.
7 If you are righteous,
that does nothing to help God.
He does not receive anything that he needs from you.
8 If you do wicked things,
it is other people who suffer, not God.
And if you do good things,
you are only helping other people.
9 When people suffer,
they call aloud for help.
They cry for help
when powerful people attack them.
10 But none of them says, “I want God to help me.
He made me. He gives me songs to sing in dark nights.
11 God teaches us more things than he teaches to the animals.
He makes us wiser than the birds.”
12 Finally, they call for help.
But God does not answer them,
because they are proud and wicked people.
13 Their prayers mean nothing.
Almighty God does not even listen to them.
14 So God will certainly not listen to you, Job,
when you say that you cannot see him.
You say that you have explained your problem to him.
You are waiting for him to give you an answer.
15 You also say that God does not become angry
with people who do wrong things.
You say that he does not punish bad people.
16 So, Job, you do not understand what you are saying.
You speak a lot of words
but they do not mean anything.’
God has prepared a new body for us
5 Our bodies are like a tent that we live in here on earth. One day, that home will come to an end. But we know that God will give us a new home. It is not a house that a human builder has built. God has built it for us in heaven and we will live there for ever. 2 Now, while we are in our body here on earth, we cry inside ourselves. We want to go and live in our house that is in heaven. 3 That will be like new clothes that we put on. When we go to live there, we will not be without clothes and ashamed.
4 While we still live in our bodies here on earth, we cry inside ourselves. Many difficult things happen to us. We do not really want to take off our old body. But we do want to put on our new body, like new clothes. When that happens, we will no longer need our old body which had to die. Instead we will have a new body that will live for ever. 5 God is the one who has prepared us to have a new life in heaven one day. He has given his Spirit to be with us now. Because of that, we know that we will receive all God's good things one day.
6 Because God's Spirit is with us, we continue to be brave. While we still live here on earth, we know that we are not yet at home with the Lord. 7 As we live here, we have to trust God. We do not yet see the things that belong to heaven. 8 We are brave because we trust God. We would like to go away from our body here on earth. Then we would go to be at home with the Lord. And that would be better! 9 But all the time we want to please the Lord. We want to do that while we are still at home in our body here on earth. We also want to please him when we go away from these bodies. 10 Because all of us must go and stand in front of Christ as our judge. He will decide about the things that we have done during our lives here on earth. Whether we have done good things or bad things, we will receive what is right for us.
God makes us new people in Christ
11 We know that the Lord will judge us, so we are careful to obey him. Because of that, we tell God's message to people. We want them to believe in God. And God himself knows that we try to do what is right. I hope that you know that also, when you think about it.
12 We are not trying again to make you think that our work is good. But we do want to give you the chance to be proud of us. Then you will be able to show the false teachers that they are wrong. They are proud about what they look like on the outside. They do not think about what they are really like inside themselves. 13 To some people, we may seem to be crazy. That is because we want to serve God. But if we seem to be wise, that is to help you.
14 Whatever we do, we do it because Christ loves us. We know that one man, Christ, died on behalf of all people. So we also know that all of us died with him. 15 He died on behalf of all people. So, while we live, we no longer live to please ourselves. Instead, we live to please Christ. He is the one that died on our behalf. He is the one that God raised up, to live again.
16 So that changes how we think about people. We no longer use human ideas to think what they are like. At one time, we thought about Christ as humans think. But now we think about him very differently! 17 When anyone belongs to Christ, they become a new person. Their old way of life has gone. Their new life has begun!
18 All this is what God does for us. Because of what Christ has done, God has brought us back to himself, as his friends. Now he wants us to bring other people to be his friends too. That is the job that he has given to us. 19 God's message is this: By Christ's death, God was bringing people of the world back to himself, as his friends. He would no longer keep their sins in his thoughts. This is the message that God wants us to tell people.
20 So we speak to people on behalf of Christ. It is like this: When we speak, God himself is speaking to you. On behalf of Christ, we say to you, ‘Please come back to God, as his friends!’ 21 Christ never did any wrong thing, but God punished him as if he had. He died as punishment for our sins. As a result, we become right with God when we belong to Christ. We become right, because he is right.
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