M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan
24 “If a man doesn’t like something about his wife, he may write a letter stating that he has divorced her, give her the letter, and send her away. 2 If she then remarries 3 and the second husband also divorces her or dies, 4 the former husband may not marry her again, for she has been defiled; this would bring guilt upon the land the Lord your God is giving you.
5 “A newly married man is not to be drafted into the army nor given any other special responsibilities; for a year he shall be free to be at home, happy with his wife.
6 “It is illegal to take a millstone as a pledge, for it is a tool by which its owner gains his livelihood. 7 If anyone kidnaps a brother Israelite and treats him as a slave or sells him, the kidnapper must die, in order to purge the evil from among you.
8 “Be very careful to follow the instructions of the priest in cases of leprosy, for I have given him rules and guidelines you must obey to the letter: 9 Remember what the Lord your God did to Miriam as you were coming from Egypt.
10 “If you lend anything to another man, you must not enter his house to get his security. 11 Stand outside! The owner will bring it out to you. 12-13 If the man is poor and gives you his cloak as security, you are not to sleep in it. Take it back to him at sundown so that he can use it through the night and bless you; and the Lord your God will count it as righteousness for you.
14-15 “Never oppress a poor hired man, whether a fellow Israelite or a foreigner living in your town. Pay him his wage each day before sunset, for since he is poor he needs it right away; otherwise he may cry out to the Lord against you and it would be counted as a sin against you.
16 “Fathers shall not be put to death for the sins of their sons nor the sons for the sins of their fathers; every man worthy of death shall be executed for his own crime.
17 “Justice must be given to migrants and orphans, and you must never accept a widow’s garment in pledge of her debt. 18 Always remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that the Lord your God rescued you; that is why I have given you this command. 19 If, when reaping your harvest, you forget to bring in a sheaf from the field, don’t go back after it. Leave it for the migrants, orphans, and widows; then the Lord your God will bless and prosper all you do. 20 When you beat the olives from your olive trees, don’t go over the boughs twice; leave anything remaining for the migrants, orphans, and widows. 21 It is the same for the grapes in your vineyard; don’t glean the vines after they are picked, but leave what’s left for those in need. 22 Remember that you were slaves in the land of Egypt—that is why I am giving you this command.
114 Long ago when the Israelis escaped from Egypt, from that land of foreign tongue, 2 then the lands of Judah and of Israel became God’s new home and kingdom.
3 The Red Sea saw them coming and quickly broke apart before them. The Jordan River opened up a path for them to cross. 4 The mountains skipped like rams, the little hills like lambs! 5 What’s wrong, Red Sea, that made you cut yourself in two? What happened, Jordan River, to your waters? Why were they held back? 6 Why, mountains, did you skip like rams? Why, little hills, like lambs?
7 Tremble, O earth, at the presence of the Lord, the God of Jacob. 8 For he caused gushing streams to burst from flinty rock.
115 Glorify your name, not ours, O Lord! Cause everyone to praise your loving-kindness and your truth. 2 Why let the nations say, “Their God is dead!”[a]
3 For he is in the heavens and does as he wishes. 4 Their gods are merely man-made things of silver and of gold. 5 They can’t talk or see, despite their eyes and mouths! 6 Nor can they hear, nor smell, 7 nor use their hands or feet, nor speak! 8 And those who make and worship them are just as foolish as their idols are.
9 O Israel, trust the Lord! He is your helper. He is your shield. 10 O priests of Aaron, trust the Lord! He is your helper; he is your shield. 11 All of you, his people, trust in him. He is your helper; he is your shield.
12 Jehovah is constantly thinking about us, and he will surely bless us. He will bless the people of Israel and the priests of Aaron, 13 and all, both great and small, who reverence him.
14 May the Lord richly bless both you and your children. 15 Yes, Jehovah who made heaven and earth will personally bless you! 16 The heavens belong to the Lord, but he has given the earth to all mankind.
17 The dead cannot sing praises to Jehovah here on earth,[b] 18 but we can! We praise him forever! Hallelujah! Praise the Lord!
51 1-2 Listen to me, all who hope for deliverance, who seek the Lord! Consider the quarry from which you were mined, the rock from which you were cut! Yes, think about your ancestors Abraham and Sarah, from whom you came. You worry at being so small and few, but Abraham was only one when I called him. But when I blessed him, he became a great nation. 3 And the Lord will bless Israel again, and make her deserts blossom; her barren wilderness will become as beautiful as the Garden of Eden. Joy and gladness will be found there, thanksgiving and lovely songs.
4 Listen to me, my people; listen, O Israel, for I will see that right prevails. 5 My mercy and justice are coming soon; your salvation is on the way. I will rule the nations; they shall wait for me and long for me to come. 6 Look high in the skies and watch the earth beneath, for the skies shall disappear like smoke, the earth shall wear out like a garment, and the people of the earth shall die like flies. But my salvation lasts forever; my righteous rule will never die nor end.
7 Listen to me, you who know the right from wrong and cherish my laws in your hearts: don’t be afraid of people’s scorn or their slanderous talk. 8 For the moth shall destroy them like garments; the worm shall eat them like wool; but my justice and mercy shall last forever, and my salvation from generation to generation.
9 Awake, O Lord! Rise up and robe yourself with strength. Rouse yourself as in the days of old when you slew Egypt, the dragon[a] of the Nile. 10 Are you not the same today, the mighty God who dried up the sea, making a path right through it for your ransomed ones? 11 The time will come when God’s redeemed will all come home again. They shall come with singing to Jerusalem, filled with joy and everlasting gladness; sorrow and mourning will all disappear.
12 I, even I, am he who comforts you and gives you all this joy. So what right have you to fear mere mortal men, who wither like the grass and disappear? 13 And yet you have no fear of God, your Maker—you have forgotten him, the one who spread the stars throughout the skies and made the earth. Will you be in constant dread of men’s oppression, and fear their anger all day long? 14 Soon, soon you slaves shall be released; dungeon, starvation, and death are not your fate. 15 For I am the Lord your God, the Lord Almighty, who dried a path for you right through the sea, between the roaring waves. 16 And I have put my words in your mouth and hidden you safe within my hand. I planted the stars in place and molded all the earth. I am the one who says to Israel, “You are mine.”
17 Wake up, wake up, Jerusalem! You have drunk enough from the cup of the fury of the Lord. You have drunk to the dregs the cup of terror and squeezed out the last drops. 18 Not one of her sons is left alive to help or tell her what to do. 19 These two things have been your lot: desolation and destruction. Yes, famine and the sword. And who is left to sympathize? Who is left to comfort you? 20 For your sons have fainted and lie in the streets, helpless as wild goats caught in a net. The Lord has poured out his fury and rebuke upon them. 21 But listen now to this, afflicted ones—full of troubles and in a stupor (but not from being drunk)— 22 this is what the Lord says, the Lord your God who cares for his people: “See, I take from your hands the terrible cup; you shall drink no more of my fury; it is gone at last. 23 But I will put that terrible cup into the hands of those who tormented you and trampled your souls to the dust and walked upon your backs.”
21 Then I saw a new earth (with no oceans!) and a new sky, for the present earth and sky had disappeared. 2 And I, John, saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven. It was a glorious sight, beautiful as a bride at her wedding.
3 I heard a loud shout from the throne saying, “Look, the home of God is now among men, and he will live with them and they will be his people; yes, God himself will be among them.[a] 4 He will wipe away all tears from their eyes, and there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying, nor pain. All of that has gone forever.”
5 And the one sitting on the throne said, “See, I am making all things new!” And then he said to me, “Write this down, for what I tell you is trustworthy and true: 6 It is finished! I am the A and the Z—the Beginning and the End. I will give to the thirsty the springs of the Water of Life—as a gift! 7 Everyone who conquers will inherit all these blessings, and I will be his God and he will be my son. 8 But cowards who turn back from following me, and those who are unfaithful to me, and the corrupt, and murderers, and the immoral, and those conversing with demons, and idol worshipers and all liars—their doom is in the Lake that burns with fire and sulphur. This is the Second Death.”
9 Then one of the seven angels who had emptied the flasks containing the seven last plagues came and said to me, “Come with me and I will show you the bride, the Lamb’s wife.”
10 In a vision he took me to a towering mountain peak, and from there I watched that wondrous city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of the skies from God. 11 It was filled with the glory of God and flashed and glowed like a precious gem, crystal clear like jasper. 12 Its walls were broad and high, with twelve gates guarded by twelve angels. And the names of the twelve tribes of Israel were written on the gates. 13 There were three gates on each side—north, south, east, and west. 14 The walls had twelve foundation stones, and on them were written the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.
15 The angel held in his hand a golden measuring stick to measure the city and its gates and walls. 16 When he measured it, he found it was a square as wide as it was long; in fact it was in the form of a cube, for its height was exactly the same as its other dimensions—1,500 miles each way. 17 Then he measured the thickness of the walls and found them to be 216 feet across (the angel called out these measurements to me, using standard units).[b]
18-20 The city itself was pure, transparent gold like glass! The wall was made of jasper, and was built on twelve layers of foundation stones inlaid with gems: the first layer[c] with jasper; the second with sapphire; the third with chalcedony; the fourth with emerald; the fifth with sardonyx; the sixth layer with sardus; the seventh with chrysolite; the eighth with beryl; the ninth with topaz; the tenth with chrysoprase; the eleventh with jacinth; the twelfth with amethyst.
21 The twelve gates were made of pearls—each gate from a single pearl! And the main street was pure, transparent gold, like glass.
22 No temple could be seen in the city, for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are worshiped in it everywhere.[d] 23 And the city has no need of sun or moon to light it, for the glory of God and of the Lamb illuminate it. 24 Its light will light the nations of the earth, and the rulers of the world will come and bring their glory to it. 25 Its gates never close; they stay open all day long—and there is no night! 26 And the glory and honor of all the nations shall be brought into it. 27 Nothing evil will be permitted in it—no one immoral or dishonest—but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life.
The Living Bible copyright © 1971 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.