M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan
Solomon builds the temple
6 In the four hundred eightieth year after the Israelites left Egypt, in the month of Ziv, the second month,[a] in the fourth year of Solomon’s rule over Israel, he built the Lord’s temple. 2 The temple that King Solomon built for the Lord was ninety feet long, thirty feet wide, and forty-five feet high. 3 The porch in front of the temple’s main hall was thirty feet long. It ran across the whole width of the temple and extended fifteen feet in front of the temple. 4 He made recessed and latticed windows[b] for the temple 5 and built side rooms against the temple walls around both the main hall and the most holy place. 6 The lower walls were seven and a half feet wide. At the second floor the walls were nine feet wide, and at the third floor they were ten and a half feet wide. He made niches around the outside of the temple so the beams wouldn’t be inserted into the temple walls.[c] 7 When the temple was built, they did all the stonecutting at the quarry. No hammers, axes, or any iron tools were heard in the temple during its construction. 8 The door to the stairs was at the south side of the temple. Winding stairs went up to the second floor and from there to the third floor. 9 He completed the temple with a roof of cedar beams and cross-planks.[d] 10 Then he built the side rooms all around the temple. They were seven and a half feet high. He attached them to the temple with cedarwood.
11 The Lord’s word came to Solomon, 12 Regarding this temple that you are building: If you follow my laws, enact my regulations, and keep all my commands faithfully, then I will fulfill for you my promise that I made to your father David. 13 I will live among the Israelites. I won’t abandon my people Israel.
14 So Solomon constructed the temple and completed it. 15 He built the walls within the temple with cedar planks, paneled from the floor to the ceiling. He overlaid the floor of the temple with pine planks. 16 At the back of the temple he built thirty feet of cedar panels from the floor to the ceiling. Solomon built the inner sanctuary, the most holy place. 17 In front of this, the main hall was sixty feet. 18 The cedar inside the temple was carved with gourds and blossoming flowers. The whole thing was cedar. No stone was seen. 19 He set up the inner sanctuary inside the temple so that he could put the chest containing the Lord’s covenant there. 20 The inner sanctuary was thirty feet in length, width, and height. Solomon overlaid it with pure gold and covered the altar with cedar.[e] 21 Solomon covered the temple’s interior with pure gold. He placed gold chains in front of the inner sanctuary and covered it with gold. 22 He overlaid the whole temple inside with gold until the temple was completely covered. He covered the whole altar that was in the inner sanctuary with gold. 23 He made two winged creatures of olive wood for the inner sanctuary, each fifteen feet high. 24 The wings of the first winged creature were each seven and a half feet long. It was fifteen feet from the end of one wing to the end of the other. 25 The second winged creature also measured fifteen feet. Both winged creatures had identical measurements and form. 26 The height of both winged creatures was fifteen feet. 27 Solomon placed the winged creatures inside the temple. Their wings spread out so that the wing of the one touched one wall and the wing of the other touched the other wall. In the middle of the temple, the wings of the two winged creatures touched each other. 28 He covered the winged creatures with gold.
29 Solomon carved all the walls of the temple—inner and outer rooms—with engravings of winged creatures, palm trees, and blossoming flowers. 30 He also covered the floor of the temple with gold, in both the inner and the outer rooms. 31 He made the doors of the inner sanctuary from olive wood and carved the doorframes with five recesses.[f] 32 He overlaid the two olive-wood doors with gold-plated carvings of winged creatures, palm trees, and blossoming flowers. 33 He made the door of the main hall with doorframes of olive wood with four recesses.[g] 34 The two doors of pinewood each pivoted on a socket. 35 Solomon carved winged creatures, palm trees, and blossoming flowers, and covered them with gold. 36 He built the inner courtyard with three rows of cut stone followed by one row of trimmed cedar.
37 Solomon laid the foundation of the Lord’s temple in the fourth year in the month of Ziv.[h] 38 He finished the temple in all its details and measurements in the eleventh year during the eighth month, the month of Bul.[i] He built it in seven years.
Paul, apostle to the Gentiles
3 This is why I, Paul, am a prisoner of Christ for you Gentiles.
2 You’ve heard, of course, about the responsibility to distribute God’s grace, which God gave to me for you, right? 3 God showed me his secret plan[a] in a revelation, as I mentioned briefly before (4 when you read this, you’ll understand my insight into the secret plan[b] about Christ). 5 Earlier generations didn’t know this hidden plan that God has now revealed to his holy apostles and prophets through the Spirit. 6 This plan is that the Gentiles would be coheirs and parts of the same body, and that they would share with the Jews in the promises of God in Christ Jesus through the gospel. 7 I became a servant of the gospel because of the grace that God showed me through the exercise of his power.
8 God gave his grace to me, the least of all God’s people, to preach the good news about the immeasurable riches of Christ to the Gentiles. 9 God sent me to reveal the secret plan[c] that had been hidden since the beginning of time by God, who created everything. 10 God’s purpose is now to show the rulers and powers in the heavens the many different varieties of his wisdom through the church. 11 This was consistent with the plan he had from the beginning of time that he accomplished through Christ Jesus our Lord. 12 In Christ we have bold and confident access to God through faith in him.[d] 13 So then, I ask you not to become discouraged by what I’m suffering for you, which is your glory.
Paul’s prayer for the Ephesians
14 This is why I kneel before the Father. 15 Every ethnic group in heaven or on earth is recognized by him. 16 I ask that he will strengthen you in your inner selves from the riches of his glory through the Spirit. 17 I ask that Christ will live in your hearts through faith. As a result of having strong roots in love, 18 I ask that you’ll have the power to grasp love’s width and length, height and depth, together with all believers. 19 I ask that you’ll know the love of Christ that is beyond knowledge so that you will be filled entirely with the fullness of God.
20 Glory to God, who is able to do far beyond all that we could ask or imagine by his power at work within us; 21 glory to him in the church and in Christ Jesus for all generations, forever and always. Amen.
Mountains of Israel
36 You, human one, prophesy to Israel’s mountains and say, Hear the Lord’s word, mountains of Israel! 2 The Lord God proclaims: The enemy mocked you and said, “The ancient heights belong to us.” 3 Therefore, prophesy and say, The Lord God proclaims: When the surviving nations pressed in and ravaged you from all around to lay claim to you, you became an object of the people’s slander and derision. 4 Hear the Lord God’s word, mountains of Israel! The Lord God proclaims to the mountains and the hills, the watercourses and the valleys, the desolate ruins and the abandoned cities that were contemptuously looted by the surviving nations all around you.
5 So now, says the Lord God, I will speak in my fiery passion against the surviving nations and against Edom, all those who gleefully and spitefully took my land for themselves as a possession only for plunder.[a] 6 Prophesy concerning Israel’s fertile land, and say to the mountains and to the hills, to the ravines and to the valleys, The Lord God proclaims: Because you endured the ridicule of the nations, my passion and fury lead me to speak. 7 So now the Lord God proclaims: I myself swear that the nations round about you will themselves suffer ridicule. 8 But you, mountains of Israel, will extend your branches and bear your fruit for my people Israel, because they will come home very soon. 9 Look, I’m here for you, and I will turn toward you, and you will be farmed and sown. 10 I will populate you with human beings, the whole house of Israel, all of them. The cities will be inhabited, the ruins rebuilt. 11 When I make people and animals increase on you, they will multiply and be fruitful. I will cause you to be inhabited as you were before. I will do more good for you than in the beginning, and you will know that I am the Lord. 12 I will let people walk through you, my people Israel! They will lay claim to you, you will be their inheritance, and you will no longer deprive them of anything.
13 The Lord God proclaims: Because people say, “You are a devourer of human beings” and “You are depriving your nation,” 14 therefore, you will no longer devour human beings or deprive your nation of anything. This is what the Lord God says. 15 You won’t have to listen anymore to the taunts of the nations or endure the scorn of the peoples. And you will no longer deprive your nation of anything. This is what the Lord God says.
A new heart
16 The Lord’s word came to me: 17 Human one, when the house of Israel lived on their fertile land, they polluted it with their ways and deeds. Their ways before me were polluted like the blood of menstruation, 18 and so I poured out my fury on them for all the blood they had poured out on the land and for all the defilement of their idols. 19 When I scattered them to the nations and dispersed them into other lands, I judged them according to their ways and deeds. 20 But then when they entered the other nations, they degraded my holy name because it was said of them, “These are the Lord’s people, yet they had to leave his land.” 21 So I had compassion on my holy name, which the house of Israel degraded among the nations where they had gone.
22 Therefore, say to the house of Israel, The Lord God proclaims: House of Israel, I’m not acting for your sake but for the sake of my holy name, which you degraded among the nations where you have gone. 23 I will make my great name holy, which was degraded among the nations when you dishonored it among them. Then the nations will know that I am the Lord. This is what the Lord God says.
When I make myself holy among you in their sight, 24 I will take you from the nations, I will gather you from all the countries, and I will bring you to your own fertile land. 25 I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be cleansed of all your pollution. I will cleanse you of all your idols. 26 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you. I will remove your stony heart from your body and replace it with a living one, 27 and I will give you my spirit so that you may walk according to my regulations and carefully observe my case laws. 28 Then you will live in the land that I gave to your ancestors, you will be my people, and I will be your God. 29 I will save you from all your uncleanness, and I will summon the grain and make it grow abundantly so that you won’t endure famine. 30 I will make abundant the orchards’ fruit and the fields’ produce so that you will never again endure the shame of famine among the nations. 31 Then you will remember your evil ways and no-good deeds, and you will feel disgust for yourselves because of your sinful and detestable practices. 32 Not for your sake do I act. This is what the Lord God proclaims. Let that be known to you! Be ashamed and be humiliated because of all your ways, house of Israel.
33 The Lord God proclaims: On the day that I cleanse you of all your guilt, I will cause the cities to be inhabited, and the ruins will be rebuilt. 34 The desolate land will be farmed, and it won’t be like it was when it seemed a wasteland to all who passed by. 35 They will say, “This land, which was a desolation, has become like the garden of Eden.” And the cities that were ruined, ravaged, and razed are now fortified and inhabited. 36 The surviving nations around you will know that I, the Lord, have rebuilt what was torn down and have planted what was made desolate. I, the Lord, have spoken, and I will do it.
37 The Lord God proclaims: I will also allow the house of Israel to ask me to do this for them: that I increase them like a human flock. 38 Like the holy flock, like the flock of Jerusalem at its festivals, the ruined cities will be filled with a human flock. Then they will know that I am the Lord.
Psalm 86
A prayer of David.
86 Lord, listen closely to me and answer me,
because I am poor and in need.
2 Guard my life because I am faithful.
Save your servant who trusts in you—you! My God!
3 Have mercy on me, Lord,
because I cry out to you all day long.
4 Make your servant’s life[a] happy again
because, my Lord, I offer my life to you,
5 because, my Lord, you are good and forgiving,
full of faithful love for all those who cry out to you.
6 Listen closely to my prayer, Lord;
pay close attention to the sound of my requests for mercy.
7 Whenever I am in trouble, I cry out to you,
because you will answer me.
8 My Lord! There is no one like you among the gods!
There is nothing that can compare to your works!
9 All the nations that you’ve made will come
and bow down before you, Lord;
they will glorify your name,
10 because you are awesome
and a wonder-worker.
You are God. Just you.
11 Teach me your way, Lord,
so that I can walk in your truth.
Make my heart focused
only on honoring your name.
12 I give thanks to you, my Lord, my God,
with all my heart,
and I will glorify your name forever,
13 because your faithful love toward me is awesome
and because you’ve rescued my life
from the lowest part of hell.[b]
14 The arrogant rise up against me, God.
A gang of violent people want me dead.
They don’t give a thought for you.
15 But you, my Lord,
are a God of compassion and mercy;
you are very patient and full of faithful love.
16 Come back to me! Have mercy on me!
Give your servant your strength;
save this child of your servant!
17 Show me a sign of your goodness
so that those who hate me will see it and be put to shame—
show a sign that you, Lord,
have helped me and comforted me.
Copyright © 2011 by Common English Bible