M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan
David’s Unauthorized Census
24 Now the anger of Adonai again flared up against Israel, so He incited David against them saying, “Go, number Israel and Judah.” 2 The king said to Joab the commander of the army who was with him, “Go about now through all the tribes of Israel, from Dan to Beersheba, and number the people, so that I may know the sum of the people.”
3 But Joab said to the king, “May Adonai your God add to the people a hundred times as many as they are, while the eyes of my lord the king looks on! But why does my lord the king desire such a thing?”
4 Nevertheless, the king’s command to Joab and the army generals remained firm. So Joab and the army generals went out from the king’s presence to number the people of Israel. 5 They crossed over the Jordan and camped in Aroer, on the right side of the town that is in the middle of the valley of Gad, and toward Jazer. 6 Then they went to Gilead and to the land of Tahtim-hodshi. Then they came to Dan-jaan and round about to Sidon, 7 and came to the stronghold of Tyre, to all the cities of the Hivites and the Canaanites. Then they went out to the south of Judah, to Beersheba. 8 So when they had gone throughout all the land, they came back to Jerusalem at the end of nine months and 20 days. 9 Joab reported the sum of the numbering of the people to the king: there were in Israel 800,000 valiant men who drew the sword and the men of Judah were 500,000 men.
10 But David’s heart troubled him after he had numbered the people. So David prayed to Adonai, “I have sinned greatly in what I have done! But now, Adonai, please take away the iniquity of Your servant, for I have acted very foolishly.”
11 When David rose up in the morning, the word of Adonai came to the prophet Gad, David’s seer, saying: 12 “Go and speak to David, thus says Adonai: ‘Three things I am proposing to you—choose one of them and I will bring it upon you.’” 13 So Gad came to David and told him, saying to him, “Shall seven years of famine come on you in your land? Or will you flee from your adversary for three months while he is pursuing you? Or shall there be three days of pestilence in your land? Now consider and see what answer I should return to Him who sent me.”
14 Then David said to Gad, “I am in a great distress. Let us now fall into the hand of Adonai, for His mercies are great, and let me not fall into the hand of man.” 15 So Adonai sent a pestilence upon Israel from the morning until the appointed time, so that 70,000 men of the people died from Dan to Beersheba. 16 When the angel stretched out his hand toward Jerusalem to destroy it, Adonai relented from the calamity and said to the angel who was destroying the people, “Enough! Now withdraw your hand.” The angel of Adonai was then by the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.
17 When David saw the angel that was striking down the people, he spoke to Adonai saying, “Behold, it is I who have sinned, and it is I who have done wrong! But these sheep, what have they done? Please, let Your hand be against me and against my father’s house.”
18 On that day Gad came to David and said to him, “Go up, set up an altar to Adonai on the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.” 19 So David went up according to the word of Gad, as Adonai had commanded. 20 Now when Araunah looked down and saw the king and his courtiers crossing over toward him, Araunah went out and bowed down before the king with his face to the ground. 21 Then Araunah said, “Why has my lord the king come to his servant?”
David said, “To buy the threshing floor from you in order to build an altar to Adonai, so that the plague may be held back from the people.”
22 Then Araunah said to David, “Let my lord the king take and offer up what seems good in his eyes. Look here, the oxen for the burnt offering, as well as the threshing sledges and the ox yokes for the wood. 23 All this Araunah gives to the king.” Araunah said further to the king, “May Adonai your God accept you.”
24 But the king said to Araunah, “No, but I will surely buy it from you at a price. I will not offer burnt offerings to Adonai my God that cost me nothing.” So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen for 50 shekels of silver. 25 Then David built there an altar to Adonai, and offered burnt offerings and fellowship offerings. So Adonai was moved by prayer of entreaty for the land, and restrained the plague from Israel.
Living as Heirs
4 Now I am saying, so long as the heir is underage, he is no different from a slave, even though he is the owner of everything. 2 Instead, he is under guardians and managers until the date set by the father. 3 So also, when we were underage, we were subservient to the basic principles of the world. 4 But when the fullness of time came, God sent out His Son, born of a woman and born under law— 5 to free those under law, so we might receive adoption as sons. 6 Now because you are sons, God sent the Ruach of His Son into our hearts, who cries out, “Abba! Father!” 7 So you are no longer a slave but a son—and if a son, also an heir through God. [a] 8 But at that time, when you did not know God, you served those who by nature are not gods at all. 9 But now you have come to know God—or rather you have come to be known by God. So how can you turn back again to those weak and worthless principles? Do you want to be enslaved to them all over again? 10 You observe days and months and seasons and years. 11 I fear for you, that perhaps I have labored over you in vain!
12 I plead with you, brothers and sisters, become like me, for I became like you. You have done me no wrong— 13 you know it was because of a physical ailment that I proclaimed the Good News to you the first time; 14 and though my physical condition was a trial to you, you did not hate or reject me. No, you welcomed me as a messenger of God—or even as Messiah Yeshua. 15 So where is your sense of joy? For I testify that you would have torn out your eyes and given them to me, if possible. 16 So have I become your enemy by telling you the truth?! 17 Others zealously court you—not in a good way, but they wish to shut you out so that you will court them. 18 To be courted is good, but let it always be in a good way—and not just when I am there with you. 19 My dear children! Again I suffer labor pains until Messiah is formed in you. 20 I wish I could be with you now and change my tone, for I don’t know what to make of you.
Midrash on Abraham’s Two Sons
21 Tell me, you who want to be under Torah, don’t you understand[b] the Torah? 22 For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by the slave woman and one by the free woman. [c] 23 But one—the son by the slave woman—was born naturally;[d] while the other—the son by the free woman—was through the promise. 24 Now these things are being treated allegorically, for these are two covenants. One is from Mount Sinai, giving birth to slavery—this is Hagar. 25 But this Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia and corresponds to the present Jerusalem, for she is in slavery along with her children. 26 But the Jerusalem above is free—she is our mother. 27 For it is written:
“Rejoice, O barren woman
who bears no children.
Break forth and shout,
you who suffer no labor pains.
For more are the children of the desolate
than of the one who has a husband.”[e]
28 Now you, brothers and sisters—like Isaac, you are children of promise. 29 But just as at that time the one born according to the flesh persecuted the one born according to the Ruach, so it is now. 30 But what does the Scripture say? “Drive out the slave woman and her son, for the son of the slave woman shall not inherit with the son”[f] of the free woman. 31 So then, brothers and sisters, we are not children of the slave woman but of the free woman.
Fall of the Haughty Cedar
31 On the first day of the third month of the eleventh year, the word of Adonai came to me saying: 2 “Son of man, say to Pharaoh king of Egypt and to his multitude:
‘Who is like you in your greatness?
3 Behold, Assyria was a cedar in Lebanon,
with beautiful branches shadowing the forest,
of lofty height.
Its top was in leafy branches.
4 Water nourished it,
the deep made it tall,
with its rivers going around its planting
as it sent out its water-courses
to all the trees of the field.
5 Therefore its height was loftier
than all the trees of the field.
Its branches multiplied
and its boughs became long
because of the abundant water in its shoots.
6 All the birds of the sky nested in its branches.
All the beasts of the field gave birth to their young under its branches.
All great nations lived under its shade.
7 It was beautiful in its greatness,
in the length of its branches,
for its root was in abundant water.
8 The cedars in the garden of God
could not compare with it.
No cypress trees could rival its boughs.
No plane-trees could match its branches.
No tree in the garden of God
could compare to its beauty.
9 I made it beautiful with its many limbs.
All the trees of Eden in God’s garden envied it.’”
10 Therefore thus says Adonai Elohim:
“Because you were exalted in height
—its top set up among leafy branches,
its heart haughty in its height—
11 I gave it into the hand of a ruler of nations,
who surely dealt with it.
I drove it out
as befits its wickedness.
12 Ruthless barbarians from the nations cut it down. They cast it down on the mountains and in all the valleys its branches fell. Its branches have laid broken in all the streambeds of the land. All the people of the earth have come out from its shade and abandoned it.
13 All the birds of the sky lived on its fallen trunk and all the beasts of the field upon its fallen branches.
14 So none of all the trees by the water should exalt themselves in their height or set their top among the leafy boughs. None of their well-watered mighty ones should attain their height.
For they have all been given to death, to the lowest regions under the earth, among the children of men who go down to the Pit.”
15 Thus says Adonai Elohim:
“In the day when he went down to Sheol
I caused the deep to mourn
and cover itself for him.
I restrained his rivers,
so the great waters were stopped.
I made Lebanon mourn for him.
All the trees of the field wilt away for it.
16 I made the nations tremble at the sound of its fall,
when I cast him down to Sheol with those who descend into the Pit.
All the well-watered trees of Eden,
the choice and best of Lebanon,
were comforted in the lowest parts of the earth.
17 They also went down with him to Sheol,
to those slain by the sword,
those who were his mighty arm,
who lived in his shadow among the nations.
18 ‘Who is like you in glory and greatness among the trees of Eden? You will be brought down with the trees of Eden to the lowest parts of the earth. You will lie among the uncircumcised, with those slain by the sword.’
This is Pharaoh and all his multitude.”
It is a declaration of Adonai.
A Lament Over Jerusalem
Psalm 79
1 A Psalm of Asaph.
God, the nations have invaded Your inheritance,
defiled Your holy Temple,
and reduced Jerusalem to ruins.
2 They gave the carcasses of Your servants as food to the birds of the skies,
the flesh of Your kedoshim to the beasts of the earth.
3 They poured out their blood like water all around Jerusalem,
and there was no one to bury them.
4 We have become a taunt to our neighbors,
a scorn and derision to those around us.
5 How long, Adonai, will You be angry?
Forever?
Will Your jealousy keep blazing like fire?
6 Pour out Your wrath
on the nations that do not acknowledge You,
on the kingdoms that do not call on Your name.
7 For they have devoured Jacob
and laid waste his country.
8 Do not hold against us the sins of our fathers.
May Your mercies come quickly to meet us,
for we are brought very low.
9 Help us, God of our salvation—
for the sake of the glory of Your Name.
Deliver us, and atone for our sins—
for Your name’s sake.
10 Why should the nations say:
“Where is their God?”
Before our eyes, let it be known among the nations
that You avenge the shed blood of Your servants.
11 Let the prisoner’s groan come to You.
By Your great arm preserve those who are doomed to die.
12 Pay back into the midst of our neighbors sevenfold their reproach—
the reproach they hurled at You, my Lord.
13 So we, Your people, the flock of Your pasture,
will praise You forever.
From generation to generation
we will recount Your praise.
Tree of Life (TLV) Translation of the Bible. Copyright © 2015 by The Messianic Jewish Family Bible Society.