M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan
Chapter 20
Rules of Battle. 1 When you go out to fight your enemies and you see horses and chariots and more troops than you have, do not be afraid of them on account of the Lord, your God, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. 2 When you are about to go into battle, have the priest approach and speak to the people. 3 He is to say to them, “Hear, O Israel, you are about to go into battle today against your enemies. Do not be fainthearted or afraid. Do not tremble or panic before them. 4 The Lord, your God, goes forth with you to fight against your enemies to deliver you.” 5 The officers will then say to the people: “If anyone has built a house and not yet dedicated it, he is to go home lest he die in battle and another dedicate it. 6 And if anyone has planted a vineyard and has not yet enjoyed its fruit, let him go home lest he die in battle and another eat its fruit. 7 And if anyone has become betrothed to a woman and has not yet married her, let him go home lest he die in battle and another marry her.”[a] 8 Even then the officers will say to the people, “If anyone is fearful or fainthearted, let him go home lest his brethren become fainthearted as well.”
9 When the officers have finished speaking to the people, they are to appoint commanders to lead the people. 10 When you approach a city to do battle with it, offer it terms of peace. 11 If they accept your terms of peace and open their gates to you, then all the people who live there shall be subject to forced labor done on your behalf. 12 If they refuse your terms of peace, then you will do battle with them, besieging that city. 13 When the Lord, your God, delivers it into your hands, you shall put every man in it to death. 14 The women, the children, the cattle, and everything else in the city will be plunder to you. You may take as your own the spoil of your enemies that the Lord, your God, has delivered over to you.
15 This is how you are to deal with all the distant cities, the cities that do not belong to these nations. 16 But in these cities that the Lord, your God, is giving you as an inheritance, you are not to leave anything alive. 17 Wipe them out, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, just as the Lord, your God, has commanded you. 18 Otherwise they will teach you to perform the abominations that they practice when they worship their gods, and you would be sinning against the Lord, your God.
19 Preserving Trees. When you besiege a city and it lasts a long time, and you do battle with it and capture it, do not cut down its trees with an ax, for you can eat their fruit. Do not cut them down! Are trees in the field like people that you would lay siege to them? 20 However, you can cut down those trees that are not fruit trees to use on the siege-works until the city you are fighting falls.
Book V—Psalms 107–150[a]
Psalm 107[b]
God, Savior of Those in Distress
1 “Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good;
his kindness[c] endures forever.”
2 Let this be the prayer of the redeemed of the Lord,
those he redeemed from the hand of the foe
3 and gathered together from the lands,[d]
from east and west, north and south.
4 [e]Some wandered in a barren wilderness,
unable to discover a path to an inhabited city.
5 They were hungry and thirsty,
and their life was wasting away.
6 Then they cried out to the Lord in their anguish,
and he saved them from their distress.
7 He led them by a direct route
to a city in which they could dwell.
8 Let them give thanks to the Lord for his kindness[f]
and for the wonders he does for people.
9 He has satisfied the thirsty
and filled the hungry with good things.
10 [g]Some sat in darkness and the shadow of death,[h]
bound in misery and in chains,
11 because they had rebelled against the words of God
and spurned the plan of the Most High.
12 He humbled their hearts with hard labor;[i]
when they stumbled, no one was there to offer help.
13 Then they cried out to the Lord in their need,
and he rescued them from their distress.
14 He brought them forth from darkness and the shadow of death
and tore their chains to pieces.
15 Let them give thanks to the Lord for his kindness
and for the wonders he does for people.
16 He has broken down gates of bronze
and cut through iron bars.
17 [j]Some were made foolish by their wicked ways
and were afflicted because of their iniquities.
18 All types of food became loathsome to them,
and they were nearing the gates of death.[k]
19 Then they cried out to the Lord in their anguish,
and he rescued them from their distress.
20 He sent forth his word[l] and healed them,
saving them from the grave.
21 Let them give thanks to the Lord for his kindness
and for the wonders he does for people.
22 Let them offer sacrifices in thanksgiving
and recount his deeds with jubilation.
23 [m]Some went down to the sea in ships
and engaged in commerce on the mighty waters.
24 [n]They beheld the works of the Lord
and his wonders in the deep.
25 He spoke and raised up a storm wind
that stirred up the waves of the sea.
26 They were lifted up to the heavens, then cast down to the depths;
their courage melted away in their plight.
27 They reeled and staggered like drunkards,
and they were at their wits’ end.
28 They cried out to the Lord in their anguish,
and he delivered them from their distress.
29 He reduced the storm to a whisper,
and the waves of the sea were hushed.
30 They rejoiced because of the calm,
and he guided them to the port they sought.
31 Let them give thanks to the Lord for his kindness
and for the wonders he does for people.
32 Let them exalt him in the assembly of the people
and praise him in the council of the elders.[o]
33 [p]He turns rivers into wasteland,
springs of water into parched ground,[q]
34 and fertile land into a salt waste,
because of the wickedness of those who live there.[r]
35 He turns the wasteland into pools of water
and the parched ground into bubbling springs.
36 [s]There he provides the hungry with a home,
and they build a city where they can settle.
37 They sow fields and plant vineyards
that yield crops for the harvest.
38 He blesses them and they greatly increase in number,
and he does not let their cattle decrease.
39 Eventually their numbers diminish and they are humbled
because of oppression, adversity, and affliction;
40 he who pours forth his contempt on princes
makes them wander in trackless wastes,
41 while he raises the needy from their misery
and increases their families like flocks.
42 The upright see and exult,
while the wicked[t] are reduced to silence.
43 Let whoever is wise reflect on these things
and understand the merciful love of the Lord.[u]
Chapter 47
The Fall of Babylon
1 Come down and sit in the dust,
O virgin daughter of Babylon.
Sit on the ground without a throne,
O daughter of the Chaldeans.
Never again will you be called
tender and delicate.[a]
2 Take the millstone and grind meal;
remove your veil,
strip off your skirt, bare your legs,
and wade through the rivers.
3 Your nakedness will be exposed
and your shame will be seen.
I will take vengeance,
and I will show clemency to no one.
4 Thus says our redeemer,
the Holy One of Israel,
whose name is the Lord of hosts.
5 Sit in silence and conceal yourself in darkness,
O daughter of the Chaldeans.
For never again will you be called
the mistress of kingdoms.
6 Because I was angry with my people
I profaned my inheritance
and gave them over into your power.
You showed them no mercy,
and you laid a very heavy yoke on the aged.
7 You said, “I will be a queen forever.”
Thus you did not reflect carefully on your actions
or give any consideration to their outcome.
8 Now listen to this, you voluptuous woman,
as you sit securely on your throne,
thinking to yourself,
“I am the only one who matters.
I will never be a widow
or experience the loss of children.”
9 However, both of these things will befall you,
suddenly, in a single day;
both the loss of children and widowhood
will come upon you in full measure
despite all your sorceries
and all your potent spells.
10 You felt secure in your wickedness
as you thought, “No one can see me.”
But your wisdom and your knowledge
led you astray,
and you said to yourself,
“I am the only one who matters.”
11 As a result, evil will come upon you,
and you will not know how to conjure it away,
disaster will befall you
that you will not be able to avert;
complete ruin which you did not foresee
will suddenly afflict you.
12 [b]But continue to persist in your spells
and your many sorceries
in which you have placed your confidence
throughout your life.
Perhaps you can succeed with them;
perhaps you can inspire terror.
13 You have exhausted yourself with consultations
ever since your youth.
Let the astrologers now come forth to save you,
those who seek the future in the stars
and who predict at each new moon
what will befall you next.
14 But they are like stubble;
the fire consumes them.
They cannot even deliver themselves
from the heat of the flames.
These flames are not meant to sit beside;
these glowing embers are not meant for keeping warm.
15 Of absolutely no use to you are your astrologers
upon whom you have depended from your youth.
Each of them follows his own path;
not one of them can save you.
Chapter 17
Babylon the Great, the Infamous Harlot.[a] 1 One of the seven angels who held the seven bowls approached me and said, “Come here and I will show you the judgment on the great harlot who is enthroned over many waters. 2 The kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the inhabitants of the earth have become drunk on the wine of her harlotry.”
3 Then he carried me away in the spirit[b] into the wilderness, and I saw a woman seated on a scarlet beast that had seven heads and ten horns and was covered with blasphemous names. 4 The woman was clothed in purple and scarlet and adorned with gold and jewels and pearls. In her hand she held a gold cup filled with accursed things and the impurities of her harlotry.
5 On her forehead was written a mysterious name: “Babylon the Great, the mother of harlots and of every abomination on the earth.” 6 And I noticed that the woman was drunk with the blood of the saints and the blood of those who had borne witness to Jesus.
When I saw her, I was utterly astounded. 7 But the angel said to me, “Why are you astounded? I will explain to you the mystery of the woman and of the beast with the seven heads and the ten horns that carries her. 8 The beast that you saw was once alive but is now alive no longer. It is about to ascend from the abyss and go to its destruction. All the inhabitants of the earth whose names have not been written in the book of life since the foundation of the world will be astonished when they see the beast, because it was once alive but is now alive no longer, and yet it is still to come.
9 “This calls for a mind with wisdom. The seven heads represent seven hills upon which the woman is seated. They also represent seven kings. 10 Five have already fallen, one is still living, and the other has not yet come. When he does come, he must remain only for a short while. 11 As for the beast that was alive but is now alive no longer, it is at the same time the eighth and one of the seven, and it is headed for destruction.
12 “The ten horns that you saw are ten kings who have not yet begun to reign. They will have royal authority for only a single hour together with the beast. 13 They are all of the same mind and will confer their power and authority on the beast. 14 They will wage war against the Lamb, but because the Lamb is Lord of lords and King of kings,[c] he will overcome them—he and those who are with him, the called, the chosen, and the faithful.”
15 The angel continued, “The waters that you saw, where the harlot sits, represent peoples, multitudes, nations, and languages. 16 The ten horns that you saw and the beast will hate the harlot. They will render her desolate and naked; after they devour her flesh, they will burn her up with fire.
17 “For God has influenced their hearts to carry out his purpose by agreeing to confer their royal powers upon the beast until the words of God will be fulfilled. 18 The woman you saw is the great city that has authority over the kings of the earth.”
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