M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan
The Lord’s Covenant With David
17 After David was living in his own house, he said to Nathan the prophet, “Look! I am living in a house of cedar, but the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord sits under tent curtains.”
2 Nathan said to David, “Do everything that is in your heart, because God is with you.”
3 But that night the word of God came to Nathan. 4 “Go and tell David my servant these things.”
This is what the Lord says. You will not be the one to build a house for me to live in, 5 for I have not lived in a house from the day when I caused Israel to go up from Egypt until this day, but I have been in a moving tent as my dwelling place.[a] 6 In all my traveling about with all the Israelites, did I ever speak a word with one of the judges of Israel, whom I commanded to shepherd my people, or ask, “Why have you not built a house of cedar for me?”
7 Now you are also to say the following to my servant David:
This is what the Lord of Armies says. I took you from the pastures, from following the sheep, to be ruler over my people Israel. 8 I have been with you wherever you went. I have cut off all your enemies before you. I will make a reputation for you like the reputation of the great ones in the earth. 9 I will establish a place for my people Israel, and I will plant them there. They will dwell there, and they will not be disturbed anymore. I will not allow wicked men to devastate them again as I did in the beginning, 10 and as it happened during the times when I commanded judges over my people Israel, but I will subdue all your enemies.
I declare to you that the Lord will build a house for you. 11 When your days are completed, you will go to be with your fathers. I will raise up your seed[b] after you from among your sons, and I will establish his kingdom. 12 He will build a house for me. I will establish his throne forever. 13 I will be his father, and he will be my son. My mercy I will not take away from him as I took it from the one who was before you. 14 I will cause him to stand in my house and in my kingdom forever. His throne will be established forever.
15 Nathan told David all the words that had been revealed in this vision.
David’s Response to the Covenant
16 Then King David went and sat before the Lord and said:
Who am I, Lord God, and what is my house that you have brought me to this point? 17 Yet this was a small thing in your eyes, God! You have spoken about the house of your servant for a long time into the future. You have revealed to me the course for the man who will arise, Lord God.[c]
18 What more can David add to you for honoring your servant? You know your servant.
19 Lord, for the sake of your servant and according to the plan of your heart, you have carried out this great thing by making known all these great promises. 20 Lord, there is none like you, and there is no God besides you, as is apparent from everything which our ears have heard.
21 Who is like your people Israel? It is the one nation on earth for whom God went out to redeem a people to himself, to make for yourself a great name, by doing great and awe-inspiring things in order to drive out nations in front of your people, whom you redeemed from Egypt. 22 You adopted Israel as your people forever. You, O Lord, became their God.
23 Now, Lord, the word which you have spoken about your servant and about his house will stand firm forever. Do as you have spoken. 24 It will stand firm. Your name will be great forever. It will be said: The Lord of Armies is the God of Israel.[d] The house of David your servant will be established before you.
25 For you, my God, have whispered into the ear[e] of your servant that you would build a house for him. That is why your servant has dared to pray before you. 26 Now, Lord, you are God and have said these good things concerning your servant. 27 Now you have been pleased to bless the house of your servant to be forever before you. For what you, Lord, have blessed is blessed forever.
Do Not Love the World
4 Where do conflicts and quarrels among you come from? Don’t they come from your cravings for pleasure, which are at war in the parts of your body? 2 You want something but do not get it, so you murder. You desire something but cannot obtain it, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask. 3 You ask, and yet do not receive, because you ask wrongly, so that you may spend it on what gives you pleasure.
4 Adulterers,[a] don’t you know that friendship with the world means hostility toward God? So whoever wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. 5 Or, do you think that Scripture has no reason for saying that the Spirit, who lives in us,[b] yearns jealously?[c] 6 But he gives greater grace! That is why it says, “God opposes the proud, but he gives grace to the humble.”[d]
7 So, submit yourselves to God. Resist the Devil, and he will flee from you. 8 Come near to God, and he will come near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded people. 9 Lament, mourn, and weep. Let your laughter be changed into mourning and your joy into gloom. 10 Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he will lift you up.
Let God Be the Judge
11 Do not speak against one another, brothers. The one who speaks against a brother or judges his brother is speaking against the law and judging the law. But if you judge the law, you are not one who does the law, but a judge. 12 There is one lawgiver and judge. He is able to save and to destroy. But who are you to judge your neighbor?
God’s Will Be Done
13 Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into this or that city, spend a year there, do business, and make a profit.” 14 You do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? Indeed, it is[e] a mist that appears for a little while and then disappears. 15 Instead, it is better for you to say, “If it is the Lord’s will, we will live, and we will do this or that.” 16 But right now you are boasting in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. 17 So, for the one who knows the right thing to do and doesn’t do it, this is a sin.
Jonah Disobeys God and Flees
1 So the word of the Lord came to Jonah son of Amittai: 2 “Get up. Go to Nineveh, the great city, and preach against it, for its people’s evil way has come up before me.”
3 But Jonah set out to flee to Tarshish, away from the presence of the Lord. He went down to Joppa and found a ship going to Tarshish.[a] He paid the fare and boarded the ship to go with them to Tarshish, away from the presence of the Lord.
4 But the Lord hurled a great wind onto the sea, and there was such a great storm on the sea that the ship was about to break apart. 5 The sailors were afraid, and each one cried out to his gods. They threw the ship’s cargo into the sea to lighten the ship’s load.
Jonah had gone down into the hold of the ship. He was lying down and sleeping soundly. 6 The captain approached him and said, “How can you be sleeping so soundly? Get up and call on your god! Maybe your god will treat us with favor so that we will not perish.”
7 Then the sailors said to each other, “Come on, let’s cast lots so that we can find out whose fault it is that this disaster has come to us.” So they cast lots, and the lot fell on Jonah.
8 So they said to him, “Please tell us whose fault it is that this disaster has come to us! What is your occupation? Where do you come from? What is your country? What people are you from?”
9 He answered, “I am a Hebrew, and I fear the Lord, the God of Heaven, who made the sea and the dry land.”
10 Then the men were terrified and said to him, “What have you done?” The men already knew that he was fleeing from the presence of the Lord, because he had told them so.
11 Then, because the storm on the sea kept getting worse, they said to him, “What should we do to you, to quiet the sea that is raging against us?”
12 He said to them, “Pick me up and throw me into the sea. Then the sea will calm down for you, for I know that this violent storm striking against you has come about because of me.”
13 Instead, the men rowed hard to return the ship to dry land, but they could not, because the storm on the sea kept getting worse for them. 14 So they cried out to the Lord and said, “Please, Lord, please do not let us perish because of this man’s life, and do not charge innocent blood against us, for you, Lord, have done as you pleased.” 15 So they picked Jonah up and threw him into the sea, and the sea stopped its raging. 16 Then the men feared the Lord greatly, and they offered a sacrifice to the Lord and made vows.
17 Then the Lord provided a large fish to swallow Jonah, and Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights.[b]
Lord of the Sabbath
6 When Jesus was going through the grain fields on a Sabbath day, his disciples were picking heads of grain, rubbing them in their hands, and eating them. 2 But some of the Pharisees said, “Why are you doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?”
3 Jesus answered them, “Haven’t you read what David did when he was hungry (he and his companions)? 4 He went into the house of God, took and ate the Bread of the Presence, which is lawful only for the priests to eat. He also gave some to his companions.” 5 Jesus also said to them, “The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.”
Jesus Heals a Man With a Withered Hand
6 On another Sabbath he went into the synagogue and taught. A man was there whose right hand was withered. 7 The experts in the law and the Pharisees were watching him closely, to see if he would heal on the Sabbath. They wanted to find a reason to accuse him. 8 But he always knew their thoughts. He said to the man with the withered hand, “Stand up and step forward.”[a] He got up and stood there. 9 Then Jesus said to them, “I will ask you something. Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do evil, to save life or to destroy it?” 10 He looked around at all of them and told the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He did, and his hand was restored. 11 They were filled with rage and began discussing with one another what they could do to Jesus.
Jesus Sends Out the Twelve
12 It happened in those days that Jesus went up on the mountain to pray, and he spent all night in prayer to God. 13 When it was day, he summoned his disciples and chose twelve of them, whom he also called apostles: 14 Simon, whom he also named Peter, and his brother Andrew; James and John; Philip and Bartholomew; 15 Matthew and Thomas; James the son of Alphaeus, also Simon, who was called the Zealot; 16 Judas the son of James, and Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor.
Jesus Heals Many
17 He went down with them and stood on a level place with a large crowd of his disciples and a large number of people from all Judea and Jerusalem, as well as from the coastal area of Tyre and Sidon. These people came to listen to him and to be healed of their diseases. 18 Those who were troubled by unclean spirits were also cured. 19 The whole crowd kept trying to touch him, because power was going out from him and healing them all.
Blessings and Woes
20 He lifted up his eyes to his disciples and said:
Blessed are you who are poor,
because yours is the kingdom of God.
21 Blessed are you who hunger now,
because you will be satisfied.
Blessed are you who weep now,
because you will laugh.
22 Blessed are you whenever people hate you,
and whenever they exclude and insult you
and reject your name as evil because of the Son of Man.
23 “Rejoice in that day and leap for joy because of this: Your reward is great in heaven! The fact is, their fathers constantly did the same things to the prophets.”
24 But woe to you who are rich,
because you are receiving your comfort now.
25 Woe to you who are well fed now,
because you will be hungry.
Woe to you who laugh now,
because you will be mourning and weeping.
26 Woe to you when all people speak well of you,
because that is how their fathers constantly treated the
false prophets.
Love Your Enemies
27 “But I say to you who are listening: Love your enemies. Do good to those who hate you. 28 Bless those who curse you. Pray for those who mistreat you. 29 If someone strikes you on one cheek, offer the other too. If someone takes away your coat, do not withhold your shirt. 30 Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes away your things, do not demand them back.
31 “Treat others just as you would want them to treat you. 32 If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? To be sure, even the sinners love those who love them. 33 And if you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? Even the sinners do the same thing. 34 If you lend to those from whom you expect to be repaid, what credit is that to you? Even the sinners lend to sinners in order to be paid back in full. 35 Instead, love your enemies, do good and lend, expecting nothing in return. Your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, because he is kind to the unthankful and the evil. 36 Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.
Consider the Beam in Your Own Eye
37 “Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. 38 Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure pressed down, shaken together, and running over will be poured into your lap. In fact, the measure with which you measure will be measured back to you.”
39 He also told them a parable: “A blind man cannot guide a blind man, can he? Won’t they both fall into a pit? 40 A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone who is fully trained will be like his teacher. 41 Why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but fail to notice the beam in your own eye? 42 Or how can you tell your brother, ‘Brother, let me remove the speck in your eye,’ when you do not see the beam in your own eye? Hypocrite! First remove the beam from your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck in your brother’s eye.
Listen and Do
43 “Certainly a good tree does not produce bad fruit, and a bad tree does not produce good fruit. 44 In fact, each tree is known by its own fruit. For people do not gather figs from thorn bushes, and they do not gather grapes from a bramble bush. 45 The good person brings what is good out of the good stored in his heart, and the evil person brings what is evil out of the evil within.[b] To be sure, what his mouth speaks flows from the heart.
46 “Why do you call me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I say? 47 Everyone who comes to me and listens to my words and does them—I will show you what he is like: 48 He is like a man building a house who dug down deep and laid a foundation on bedrock. When a flood came, the river beat against that house but could not shake it, because it was founded on bedrock.[c] 49 But the one who listened to my words and did not do them is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. When the river broke against it, it fell immediately, and that house was completely destroyed.”
The Holy Bible, Evangelical Heritage Version®, EHV®, © 2019 Wartburg Project, Inc. All rights reserved.