M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan

Instructions about the red cow and the water of purification

19 The Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron: ² This is the regulation in the Instruction that the Lord commanded. Tell the Israelites that they must bring you a red cow without defect, which is flawless and on which no yoke has been laid. ³ You will give it to Eleazar the priest, and he will take it outside the camp and slaughter it in front of him. ⁴ Eleazar the priest will take some of its blood with his finger and sprinkle it seven times in front of the meeting tent. ⁵ Then he will burn the cow in front of him, its skin, flesh, and blood, with its dung. ⁶ The priest will take cedarwood, hyssop, and crimson cloth and throw them into the fire where the cow is burning. ⁷ Then the priest will wash his clothes and bathe his body in water. Afterward the priest will enter the camp, but he will be unclean until evening. ⁸ The one who burned the cow will wash his clothes in water and bathe his body in water, but he will be unclean until evening. ⁹ A person who is clean will gather the ashes of the cow and place them outside the camp in a clean place. They will be kept for the water of purification for the Israelite community as a purification offering. ¹⁰ The one who gathers the ashes of the cow will wash his clothes but will be unclean until evening. This will be a permanent regulation for the Israelites and for the immigrant who lives among them.

Contact with a dead body

¹¹ The person who touches the dead body of any human will be unclean for seven days. ¹² That person must be cleansed with water on the third and seventh days to be clean. If he fails to be cleansed with water on the third and seventh days, he will not be clean. ¹³ Anyone who touches the body of a human who has died and doesn’t cleanse himself defiles the Lord’s dwelling. Such persons must be cut off from Israel because the water of purification wasn’t sprinkled on them. They remain unclean.

¹⁴ This is the instruction: When anyone dies in a tent, all who go into the tent and all who are in the tent are unclean for seven days. ¹⁵ Any open jar without a sealed cover on it is unclean. ¹⁶ Anyone in the open field who touches a person slain by the sword, or who died naturally, or a human bone or a grave, will be unclean for seven days. ¹⁷ For the unclean person, they will take some of the ashes of the purification offering and place fresh water with it in a jar. ¹⁸ Then a clean person will take hyssop, dip it into the water, and sprinkle it on the tent, on all the jars, on the people who were there, and on anyone who touched bone, the slain, the dead, or the grave. ¹⁹ On the third day and the seventh day the clean person will sprinkle it on the unclean, so that he will have purified him on the seventh day. He will then wash his clothes, bathe in water, and be clean at evening. ²⁰ Any person who is unclean and didn’t cleanse himself will be cut off from the assembly, because he has defiled the Lord’s sanctuary. He didn’t have the water of purification sprinkled on him. He is unclean. ²¹ This will be a permanent regulation for them. The one who sprinkles the water of purification will wash his own clothes. Anyone who touches the water of purification will be unclean until evening. ²² Whoever the unclean person touches will be unclean, and the one who touches the unclean will be unclean until evening.

Psalm 56

For the music leader. According to “The Silent Dove of Distant Places.” A miktam^[a] of David, when the Philistines seized him in Gath.

Psalm 57

For the music leader. Do not destroy. A miktam^[b] of David, when he fled from Saul into the cave.

Isaiah’s testimonies

8 The Lord said to me, “Take a large tablet, and write on it in ordinary letters,^[a] For Maher-shalal-hash-baz.^{[b] 2} Summon trusted people, Uriah the priest and Zechariah, Jeberechiah’s son, to witness it.”

³ I then had sex with the prophetess, and she became pregnant and gave birth to a son. Then the Lord said to me, “Name him Maher-shalal-hash-baz. ⁴ Before the boy knows how to say ‘my father’ and ‘my mother,’ the wealth of Damascus and the spoil of Samaria will be carried away before the king of Assyria.”

⁵ The Lord spoke again to me: ⁶ Since this people has rejected the waters of Shiloah that flow gently, and instead rejoices over^[c] Rezin and Remaliah’s son— ⁷ therefore, look, the Lord is raising up against them the powerful floodwaters of the Euphrates, the king of Assyria and all his glory. It will rise up over all its channels, overflowing all its banks, ⁸ and sweep into Judah, flooding, overflowing, and reaching up to the neck. But God is with us;^[d] the span of his wings will cover the width of the land.

¹¹ The Lord spoke to me, taking hold of me and warning me not to walk in the way of this people: ¹² Don’t call conspiracy all that this people calls conspiracy. Don’t fear what they fear, and don’t be terrified. ¹³ It is the Lord of heavenly forces whom you should hold sacred, whom you should fear, and whom you should hold in awe.

¹⁶ Bind up the testimony; seal up the teaching among my disciples. ¹⁷ I will wait for the Lord, who has hidden his face from the house of Jacob, and I will hope in God. ¹⁸ Look! I and the children the Lord gave me are signs and wonders in Israel from the Lord of heavenly forces, who lives on Mount Zion.

¹⁹ If they say to you: “Consult the ghosts and the spirits that chirp and mutter. (Shouldn’t a people consult its gods?) Consult the dead on behalf of the living ²⁰ for instruction and for testimony”—they will surely say such things, but they will never see the dawn.^[g]

²¹ They will pass through the land,^[h] dejected and hungry, and when they are hungry, they will be enraged and will curse their king and God. They will turn toward heaven ²² and look to the earth, but they will see only distress and darkness, random movement, and the anguish and doom of banishment.^[i]

A great light

9 ^[j] Nonetheless, those who were in distress won’t be exhausted. At an earlier time, God cursed the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but later he glorified the way of the sea, the far side of the Jordan, and the Galilee of the nations.^[k]

The zeal of the Lord of heavenly forces will do this.

Don’t show favoritism

2 My brothers and sisters, when you show favoritism you deny the faithfulness of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has been resurrected in glory. ² Imagine two people coming into your meeting. One has a gold ring and fine clothes, while the other is poor, dressed in filthy rags. ³ Then suppose that you were to take special notice of the one wearing fine clothes, saying, “Here’s an excellent place. Sit here.” But to the poor person you say, “Stand over there”; or, “Here, sit at my feet.” ⁴ Wouldn’t you have shown favoritism among yourselves and become evil-minded judges?

⁵ My dear brothers and sisters, listen! Hasn’t God chosen those who are poor by worldly standards to be rich in terms of faith? Hasn’t God chosen the poor as heirs of the kingdom he has promised to those who love him? ⁶ But you have dishonored the poor. Don’t the wealthy make life difficult for you? Aren’t they the ones who drag you into court? ⁷ Aren’t they the ones who insult the good name spoken over you at your baptism?

⁸ You do well when you really fulfill the royal law found in scripture, Love your neighbor as yourself.^{[a] 9} But when you show favoritism, you are committing a sin, and by that same law you are exposed as a lawbreaker. ¹⁰ Anyone who tries to keep all of the Law but fails at one point is guilty of failing to keep all of it. ¹¹ The one who said, Don’t commit adultery, also said, Don’t commit murder.^[b] So if you don’t commit adultery but do commit murder, you are a lawbreaker. ¹² In every way, then, speak and act as people who will be judged by the law of freedom. ¹³ There will be no mercy in judgment for anyone who hasn’t shown mercy. Mercy overrules judgment.

Showing faith

¹⁴ My brothers and sisters, what good is it if people say they have faith but do nothing to show it? Claiming to have faith can’t save anyone, can it? ¹⁵ Imagine a brother or sister who is naked and never has enough food to eat. ¹⁶ What if one of you said, “Go in peace! Stay warm! Have a nice meal!”? What good is it if you don’t actually give them what their body needs? ¹⁷ In the same way, faith is dead when it doesn’t result in faithful activity.

¹⁸ Someone might claim, “You have faith and I have action.” But how can I see your faith apart from your actions? Instead, I’ll show you my faith by putting it into practice in faithful action. ¹⁹ It’s good that you believe that God is one. Ha! Even the demons believe this, and they tremble with fear. ²⁰ Are you so slow? Do you need to be shown that faith without actions has no value at all? ²¹ What about Abraham, our father? Wasn’t he shown to be righteous through his actions when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? ²² See, his faith was at work along with his actions. In fact, his faith was made complete by his faithful actions. ²³ So the scripture was fulfilled that says, Abraham believed God, and God regarded him as righteous.^[c] What is more, Abraham was called God’s friend. ²⁴ So you see that a person is shown to be righteous through faithful actions and not through faith alone. ²⁵ In the same way, wasn’t Rahab the prostitute shown to be righteous when she received the messengers as her guests and then sent them on by another road? ²⁶ As the lifeless body is dead, so faith without actions is dead.