M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan
Birth and Youth of Moses
2 Now a man from the house of Levi went and married a Levite woman.(A) 2 The woman conceived and bore a son, and when she saw that he was a fine baby, she hid him three months.(B) 3 When she could hide him no longer she got a papyrus basket for him and plastered it with bitumen and pitch; she put the child in it and placed it among the reeds on the bank of the river. 4 His sister stood at a distance, to see what would happen to him.(C)
5 The daughter of Pharaoh came down to bathe at the river, while her attendants walked beside the river. She saw the basket among the reeds and sent her maid to bring it. 6 When she opened it, she saw the child. He was crying, and she took pity on him. “This must be one of the Hebrews’ children,” she said. 7 Then his sister said to Pharaoh’s daughter, “Shall I go and get you a nurse from the Hebrew women to nurse the child for you?” 8 Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Yes.” So the girl went and called the child’s mother. 9 Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Take this child and nurse it for me, and I will give you your wages.” So the woman took the child and nursed it. 10 When the child grew up, she brought him to Pharaoh’s daughter, and he became her son. She named him Moses,[a] “because,” she said, “I drew him out of the water.”(D)
Moses Flees to Midian
11 One day after Moses had grown up, he went out to his people and saw their forced labor. He saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his own people.(E) 12 He looked this way and that, and seeing no one he killed the Egyptian and hid him in the sand. 13 When he went out the next day, he saw two Hebrews fighting, and he said to the one who was in the wrong, “Why do you strike your fellow Hebrew?”(F) 14 He answered, “Who made you a ruler and judge over us? Do you mean to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?” Then Moses was afraid and thought, “Surely the thing is known.”(G) 15 When Pharaoh heard of it, he sought to kill Moses.
So Moses fled from Pharaoh. He settled in the land of Midian and sat down by a well.(H) 16 The priest of Midian had seven daughters. They came to draw water and filled the troughs to water their father’s flock. 17 But some shepherds came and drove them away. Moses got up and came to their defense and watered their flock.(I) 18 When they returned to their father Reuel, he said, “How is it that you have come back so soon today?”(J) 19 They said, “An Egyptian helped us against the shepherds; he even drew water for us and watered the flock.” 20 He said to his daughters, “Where is he? Why did you leave the man? Invite him to share a meal.”(K) 21 Moses agreed to stay with the man, and he gave Moses his daughter Zipporah in marriage.(L) 22 She bore a son, and he named him Gershom,[b] for he said, “I have been an alien residing in a foreign land.”(M)
23 After a long time the king of Egypt died. The Israelites groaned under their slavery and cried out. Their cry for help rose up to God from their slavery.(N) 24 God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.(O) 25 God looked upon the Israelites, and God took notice of them.(P)
Jesus Calls the First Disciples
5 Once while Jesus[a] was standing beside the Lake of Gennesaret and the crowd was pressing in on him to hear the word of God, 2 he saw two boats there at the shore of the lake; the fishermen had gotten out of them and were washing their nets. 3 He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little way from the shore. Then he sat down and taught the crowds from the boat.(A) 4 When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch.”(B) 5 Simon answered, “Master, we have worked all night long but have caught nothing. Yet if you say so, I will let down the nets.”(C) 6 When they had done this, they caught so many fish that their nets were beginning to burst. 7 So they signaled their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both boats, so that they began to sink. 8 But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’s knees, saying, “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!” 9 For he and all who were with him were astounded at the catch of fish that they had taken, 10 and so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. Then Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people.”(D) 11 When they had brought their boats to shore, they left everything and followed him.(E)
Jesus Cleanses a Man with a Skin Disease
12 Once when he was in one of the cities, a man covered with a skin disease was there. When he saw Jesus, he bowed with his face to the ground and begged him, “Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.”(F) 13 Then Jesus[b] stretched out his hand, touched him, and said, “I am willing. Be made clean.” Immediately the skin disease left him. 14 And he ordered him to tell no one. “But go, show yourself to the priest, and, as Moses commanded, make an offering for your cleansing, as a testimony to them.”(G) 15 But now more than ever the word about Jesus[c] spread abroad; many crowds were gathering to hear him and to be cured of their diseases.(H) 16 Meanwhile, he would slip away to deserted places and pray.(I)
Jesus Heals a Paralytic
17 One day while he was teaching, Pharisees and teachers of the law who had come from every village of Galilee and Judea and from Jerusalem were sitting nearby, and the power of the Lord was with him to heal.[d](J) 18 Just then some men came carrying a paralyzed man on a stretcher. They were trying to bring him in and lay him before Jesus,[e] 19 but, finding no way to bring him in because of the crowd, they went up on the roof and let him down on the stretcher through the tiles into the middle of the crowd[f] in front of Jesus.(K) 20 When he saw their faith, he said, “Friend,[g] your sins are forgiven you.”(L) 21 Then the scribes and the Pharisees began to question, “Who is this who is speaking blasphemies? Who can forgive sins but God alone?”(M) 22 When Jesus perceived their questionings, he answered them, “Why do you raise such questions in your hearts? 23 Which is easier: to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven you,’ or to say, ‘Stand up and walk’? 24 But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”—he said to the one who was paralyzed—“I say to you, stand up and take your stretcher and go to your home.” 25 Immediately he stood up before them, took what he had been lying on, and went to his home, glorifying God. 26 Amazement seized all of them, and they glorified God and were filled with fear, saying, “We have seen incredible things today.”(N)
Jesus Calls Levi
27 After this he went out and saw a tax collector named Levi sitting at the tax-collection station, and he said to him, “Follow me.” 28 And he got up, left everything, and followed him.(O)
29 Then Levi gave a great banquet for him in his house, and there was a large crowd of tax collectors and others reclining at the table with them.(P) 30 The Pharisees and their scribes were complaining to his disciples, saying, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?”(Q) 31 Jesus answered them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician but those who are sick; 32 I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.”(R)
The Question about Fasting
33 Then they said to him, “John’s disciples, like the disciples of the Pharisees, frequently fast and pray, but your disciples eat and drink.”(S) 34 Jesus said to them, “You cannot make wedding attendants fast while the bridegroom is with them, can you? 35 The days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast in those days.”(T) 36 He also told them a parable: “No one tears a piece from a new garment and sews it on an old garment; otherwise, not only will one tear the new garment, but the piece from the new will not match the old garment. 37 Similarly, no one puts new wine into old wineskins; otherwise, the new wine will burst the skins and will spill out, and the skins will be ruined. 38 But new wine must be put into fresh wineskins.[h] 39 And no one after drinking old wine desires new wine but says, ‘The old is good.’ ”[i]
Job Replies: I Know That My Vindicator Lives
19 Then Job answered:
2 “How long will you torment me
and break me in pieces with words?
3 These ten times you have cast reproach upon me;
are you not ashamed to wrong me?
4 And even if it is true that I have erred,
my error remains with me.(A)
5 If indeed you magnify yourselves against me
and make my humiliation an argument against me,(B)
6 know then that God has put me in the wrong
and closed his net around me.(C)
7 Even when I cry out, ‘Violence!’ I am not answered;
I call aloud, but there is no justice.(D)
8 He has walled up my way so that I cannot pass,
and he has set darkness upon my paths.(E)
9 He has stripped my glory from me
and taken the crown from my head.(F)
10 He breaks me down on every side, and I am gone;
he has uprooted my hope like a tree.(G)
11 He has kindled his wrath against me
and counts me as his adversary.(H)
12 His troops come on together;
they have thrown up siegeworks[a] against me
and encamp around my tent.(I)
13 “He has put my family far from me,
and my acquaintances are wholly estranged from me.
14 My relatives and my close friends have failed me;
15 the guests in my house have forgotten me;
my female servants count me as a stranger;
I have become an alien in their eyes.(J)
16 I call to my servant, but he gives me no answer;
I must myself plead with him.
17 My breath is repulsive to my wife;
I am loathsome to my own family.
18 Even young children despise me;
when I rise, they talk against me.(K)
19 All my intimate friends abhor me,
and those whom I love have turned against me.(L)
20 My bones cling to my skin and to my flesh,
and I have escaped by the skin of my teeth.(M)
21 Have pity on me, have pity on me, O you my friends,
for the hand of God has touched me!(N)
22 Why do you, like God, pursue me,
never satisfied with my flesh?(O)
23 “O that my words were written down!
O that they were inscribed in a book!(P)
24 O that with an iron pen and with lead
they were engraved on a rock forever!(Q)
25 For I know that my vindicator[b] lives
and that in the end he will stand upon the earth;(R)
26 and after my skin has been destroyed,
then in my flesh I shall see God,(S)
27 whom I shall see on my side,
and my eyes shall behold, and not another.
My heart faints within me!(T)
28 If you say, ‘How we will persecute him!’
and, ‘The root of the matter is found in him,’(U)
29 be afraid of the sword,
for wrath brings the punishment of the sword,
so that you may know there is a judgment.”(V)
Lawsuits among Believers
6 When any of you has a grievance against another, do you dare to take it to court before the unrighteous, instead of taking it before the saints? 2 Do you not know that the saints will judge the world? And if the world is to be judged by you, are you incompetent to try trivial cases?(A) 3 Do you not know that we are to judge angels, to say nothing of ordinary matters? 4 If you have ordinary cases, then, do you appoint as judges those who have no standing in the church? 5 I say this to your shame. Can it be that there is no one person wise enough to decide between brothers and sisters? 6 Instead, brothers and sisters go to court against one another, and this before the unbelievers.(B)
7 In fact, to have lawsuits at all with one another is already a defeat for you. Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be defrauded?(C) 8 But you yourselves wrong and defraud—and brothers and sisters at that.
9 Do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived! The sexually immoral, idolaters, adulterers, male prostitutes,[a] men who engage in illicit sex,[b](D) 10 thieves, the greedy, drunkards, revilers, swindlers—none of these will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And this is what some of you used to be. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ[c] and in the Spirit of our God.(E)
Glorify God in Body and Spirit
12 “All things are permitted for me,” but not all things are beneficial. “All things are permitted for me,” but I will not be dominated by anything. 13 “Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food,”[d] and God will destroy both one and the other. The body is meant not for sexual immorality but for the Lord and the Lord for the body.(F) 14 And God raised the Lord and will also raise us by his power.(G) 15 Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Should I therefore take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? Never!(H) 16 Do you not know that whoever is united to a prostitute becomes one body with her? For it is said, “The two shall be one flesh.”(I) 17 But anyone united to the Lord becomes one spirit with him.(J) 18 Shun sexual immorality![e] Every sin that a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person[f] sins against the body itself.(K) 19 Or do you not know that your body is a temple[g] of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God, and that you are not your own?(L) 20 For you were bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body.(M)
New Revised Standard Version, Updated Edition. Copyright © 2021 National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.