M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan
16 1-2 After Aaron’s two sons died before the Lord, the Lord said to Moses, “Warn your brother Aaron not to enter into the Holy Place behind the veil, where the Ark and the place of mercy are, just whenever he chooses. The penalty for intrusion is death. For I myself am present in the cloud above the place of mercy.
3 “Here are the conditions for his entering there: He must bring a young bull for a sin offering, and a ram for a burnt offering. 4 He must bathe himself and put on the sacred linen coat, shorts, belt, and turban. 5 The people of Israel shall then bring him two male goats for their sin offering, and a ram for their burnt offering. 6 First he shall present to the Lord the young bull as a sin offering for himself, making atonement for himself and his family. 7 Then he shall bring the two goats before the Lord at the entrance of the Tabernacle, 8 and cast lots to determine which is the Lord’s and which is to be sent away.[a] 9 The goat allotted to the Lord shall then be sacrificed by Aaron as a sin offering. 10 The other goat shall be kept alive and placed before the Lord. The rite of atonement shall be performed over it, and it shall then be sent out into the desert as a scapegoat.
11 “After Aaron has sacrificed the young bull as a sin offering for himself and his family, 12 he shall take a censer full of live coals from the altar of the Lord, and fill his hands with sweet incense beaten into fine powder, and bring it inside the veil. 13 There before the Lord he shall put the incense upon the coals, so that a cloud of incense will cover the mercy place above the Ark (containing the stone tablets of the Ten Commandments); thus he will not die. 14 And he shall bring some of the blood of the young bull and sprinkle it with his finger upon the east side of the mercy place, and then seven times in front of it.
15 “Then he must go out[b] and sacrifice the people’s sin offering goat, and bring its blood within the veil, and sprinkle it upon the place of mercy and in front of it, just as he did with the blood of the young bull. 16 Thus he shall make atonement for the holy place because it is defiled by the sins of the people of Israel, and for the Tabernacle, located right among them and surrounded by their defilement. 17 Not another soul shall be inside the Tabernacle when Aaron enters to make atonement in the Holy Place—not until after he comes out again and has made atonement for himself and his household and for all the people of Israel. 18 Then he shall go out to the altar before the Lord and make atonement for it. He must smear the blood of the young bull and the goat on the horns of the altar, 19 and sprinkle blood upon the altar seven times with his finger, thus cleansing it from the sinfulness of Israel and making it holy.[c]
20 “When he has completed the rite of atonement for the Holy Place, the entire Tabernacle, and the altar, he shall bring the live goat and, 21 laying both hands upon its head, confess over it all the sins of the people of Israel. He shall lay all their sins upon the head of the goat and send it into the desert, led by a man appointed for the task. 22 So the goat shall carry all the sins of the people into a land where no one lives,[d] and the man shall let it loose in the wilderness.
23 “Then Aaron shall go into the Tabernacle again and take off the linen garments he wore when he went behind the veil, and leave them there in the Tabernacle. 24 Then he shall bathe in a sacred place, put on his clothes again, and go out and sacrifice his own burnt offering for the people, making atonement for himself and for them. 25 He shall also burn upon the altar the fat for the sin offering.
26 “The man who took the goat out into the desert[e] shall afterwards wash his clothes and bathe himself and then come back into the camp. 27 And the young bull and the goat used for the sin offering (their blood was taken into the Holy Place by Aaron, to make atonement) shall be carried outside the camp and burned, including the hides and internal organs. 28 Afterwards, the person doing the burning shall wash his clothes and bathe himself and then return to camp.
29-30 “This is a permanent law: You must do no work on the twenty-fifth day of September,[f] but must spend the day in self-examination and humility. This applies whether you are born in the land or are a foreigner living among the people of Israel; for this is the day commemorating the atonement, cleansing you in the Lord’s eyes from all of your sins. 31 It is a Sabbath of solemn rest for you, and you shall spend the day in quiet humility;[g] this is a permanent law. 32 This ceremony, in later generations, shall be performed by the anointed High Priest, consecrated in place of his ancestor Aaron; he shall be the one to put on the holy linen garments, 33 and make atonement for the holy sanctuary, the Tabernacle, the altar, the priests, and the people. 34 This shall be an everlasting law for you, to make atonement for the people of Israel once each year, because of their sins.”
And Aaron followed all these instructions that the Lord gave to Moses.
19 The heavens are telling the glory of God; they are a marvelous display of his craftsmanship. 2 Day and night they keep on telling about God. 3-4 Without a sound or word, silent in the skies, their message reaches out to all the world. The sun lives in the heavens where God placed it 5 and moves out across the skies as radiant as a bridegroom[a] going to his wedding, or as joyous as an athlete looking forward to a race! 6 The sun crosses the heavens from end to end, and nothing can hide from its heat.
7-8 God’s laws are perfect. They protect us, make us wise, and give us joy and light. 9 God’s laws are pure, eternal, just.[b] 10 They are more desirable than gold. They are sweeter than honey dripping from a honeycomb. 11 For they warn us away from harm and give success to those who obey them.
12 But how can I ever know what sins are lurking in my heart? Cleanse me from these hidden faults. 13 And keep me from deliberate wrongs; help me to stop doing them. Only then can I be free of guilt and innocent of some great crime.
14 May my spoken words and unspoken thoughts be pleasing even to you, O Lord my Rock and my Redeemer.
30 These are the messages of Agur, son of Jakeh, addressed to Ithiel and Ucal:
2 I am tired out, O God, and ready to die. I am too stupid even to call myself a human being! 3 I cannot understand man,[a] let alone God. 4 Who else but God goes back and forth to heaven? Who else holds the wind in his fists and wraps up the oceans in his cloak? Who but God has created the world? If there is any other, what is his name—and his Son’s name—if you know it?
5 Every word of God proves true. He defends all who come to him for protection. 6 Do not add to his words, lest he rebuke you, and you be found a liar.
7 O God, I beg two favors from you before I die: 8 First, help me never to tell a lie. Second, give me neither poverty nor riches! Give me just enough to satisfy my needs! 9 For if I grow rich, I may become content without God. And if I am too poor, I may steal and thus insult God’s holy name.
10 Never falsely accuse a man to his employer, lest he curse you for your sin.
11-12 There are those who curse their father and mother and feel themselves faultless despite their many sins. 13-14 They are proud beyond description, arrogant, disdainful. They devour the poor with teeth as sharp as knives!
15-16 There are two things never satisfied, like a leech forever craving more: no, three things! no, four! Hell, the barren womb, a barren desert, fire.
17 A man who mocks his father and despises his mother shall have his eye plucked out by ravens and eaten by vultures.
18-19 There are three things too wonderful for me to understand—no, four!
How an eagle glides through the sky.
How a serpent crawls upon a rock.
How a ship finds its way across the heaving ocean.
The growth of love between a man and a girl.[b]
20 There is another thing too: how a prostitute can sin and then say, “What’s wrong with that?”
21-23 There are three things that make the earth tremble—no, four it cannot stand:
A slave who becomes a king.
A rebel who prospers.
A bitter woman when she finally marries.
A servant girl who marries the husband of her mistress.[c]
24-28 There are four things that are small but unusually wise:
Ants: they aren’t strong, but store up food for the winter.
Cliff badgers: delicate little animals who protect themselves by living among the rocks.
The locusts: though they have no leader, they stay together in swarms.
The lizards: they are easy to catch and kill, yet are found even in king’s palaces!
29-31 There are three stately monarchs in the earth—no, four:
The lion, king of the animals. He won’t turn aside for anyone.
The peacock.
The male goat.
A king as he leads his army.
32 If you have been a fool by being proud or plotting evil, don’t brag about it—cover your mouth with your hand in shame.
33 As the churning of cream yields butter, and a blow to the nose causes bleeding, so anger causes quarrels.
1 From: Paul, a missionary of Jesus Christ, sent out by the direct command of God our Savior and by Jesus Christ our Lord—our only hope.
2 To: Timothy.
Timothy, you are like a son to me in the things of the Lord. May God our Father and Jesus Christ our Lord show you his kindness and mercy and give you great peace of heart and mind.
3-4 As I said when I left for Macedonia, please stay there in Ephesus and try to stop the men who are teaching such wrong doctrine. Put an end to their myths and fables, and their idea of being saved by finding favor with an endless chain of angels leading up to God—wild ideas that stir up questions and arguments instead of helping people accept God’s plan of faith. 5 What I am eager for is that all the Christians there will be filled with love that comes from pure hearts, and that their minds will be clean and their faith strong.
6 But these teachers have missed this whole idea and spend their time arguing and talking foolishness. 7 They want to become famous as teachers of the laws of Moses when they haven’t the slightest idea what those laws really show us. 8 Those laws are good when used as God intended. 9 But they were not made for us, whom God has saved; they are for sinners who hate God, have rebellious hearts, curse and swear, attack their fathers and mothers, and murder. 10-11 Yes, these laws are made to identify as sinners all who are immoral and impure: homosexuals, kidnappers, liars, and all others who do things that contradict the glorious Good News of our blessed God, whose messenger I am.
12 How thankful I am to Christ Jesus our Lord for choosing me as one of his messengers, and giving me the strength to be faithful to him, 13 even though I used to scoff at the name of Christ. I hunted down his people, harming them in every way I could. But God had mercy on me because I didn’t know what I was doing, for I didn’t know Christ at that time. 14 Oh, how kind our Lord was, for he showed me how to trust him and become full of the love of Christ Jesus.
15 How true it is, and how I long that everyone should know it, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—and I was the greatest of them all. 16 But God had mercy on me so that Christ Jesus could use me as an example to show everyone how patient he is with even the worst sinners, so that others will realize that they, too, can have everlasting life. 17 Glory and honor to God forever and ever. He is the King of the ages, the unseen one who never dies; he alone is God, and full of wisdom. Amen.
18 Now, Timothy, my son, here is my command to you: Fight well in the Lord’s battles, just as the Lord told us through his prophets that you would. 19 Cling tightly to your faith in Christ and always keep your conscience clear, doing what you know is right. For some people have disobeyed their consciences and have deliberately done what they knew was wrong. It isn’t surprising that soon they lost their faith in Christ after defying God like that. 20 Hymenaeus and Alexander are two examples of this. I had to give them over to Satan to punish them until they could learn not to bring shame to the name of Christ.
The Living Bible copyright © 1971 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.