M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan

Elkanah and His Family at Shiloh

1 There was a man named Elkanah, from the tribe of Ephraim, who lived in the town of Ramah in the hill country of Ephraim. He was the son of Jeroham and grandson of Elihu, and belonged to the family of Tohu, a part of the clan of Zuph. ² Elkanah had two wives, Hannah and Peninnah. Peninnah had children, but Hannah did not. ³ Every year Elkanah went from Ramah to worship and offer sacrifices to the Lord Almighty at Shiloh, where Hophni and Phinehas, the two sons of Eli, were priests of the Lord. ⁴ Each time Elkanah offered his sacrifice, he would give one share of the meat to Peninnah and one share to each of her children. ⁵ And even though he loved Hannah very much he would give her only one share, because^[a] the Lord had kept her from having children. ⁶ Peninnah, her rival, would torment and humiliate her, because the Lord had kept her childless. ⁷ This went on year after year; whenever they went to the house of the Lord, Peninnah would upset Hannah so much that she would cry and refuse to eat anything. ⁸ Her husband Elkanah would ask her, “Hannah, why are you crying? Why won't you eat? Why are you always so sad? Don't I mean more to you than ten sons?”

Hannah and Eli

^9-10 One time, after they had finished their meal in the house of the Lord at Shiloh, Hannah got up. She was deeply distressed, and she cried bitterly as she prayed to the Lord. Meanwhile, Eli the priest was sitting in his place by the door. ^11 (A)Hannah made a solemn promise: “Lord Almighty, look at me, your servant! See my trouble and remember me! Don't forget me! If you give me a son, I promise that I will dedicate him to you for his whole life and that he will never have his hair cut.”^[b]

¹² Hannah continued to pray to the Lord for a long time, and Eli watched her lips. ¹³ She was praying silently; her lips were moving, but she made no sound. So Eli thought that she was drunk, ¹⁴ and he said to her, “Stop making a drunken show of yourself Stop your drinking and sober up!”

¹⁵ “No, I'm not drunk, sir,” she answered. “I haven't been drinking! I am desperate, and I have been praying, pouring out my troubles to the Lord. ¹⁶ Don't think I am a worthless woman. I have been praying like this because I'm so miserable.”

¹⁷ “Go in peace,” Eli said, “and may the God of Israel give you what you have asked him for.”

¹⁸ “May you always think kindly of me,” she replied. Then she went away, ate some food, and was no longer sad.

Samuel's Birth and Dedication

¹⁹ The next morning Elkanah and his family got up early, and after worshiping the Lord, they went back home to Ramah. Elkanah had intercourse with his wife Hannah, and the Lord answered her prayer. ²⁰ So it was that she became pregnant and gave birth to a son. She named him Samuel,^[c] and explained, “I asked the Lord for him.”

²¹ The time came again for Elkanah and his family to go to Shiloh and offer to the Lord the yearly sacrifice and the special sacrifice he had promised. ²² But this time Hannah did not go. She told her husband, “As soon as the child is weaned, I will take him to the house of the Lord, where he will stay all his life.”

²³ Elkanah answered, “All right, do whatever you think best; stay at home until you have weaned him. And may the Lord make your^[d] promise come true.” So Hannah stayed at home and nursed her child.

²⁴ After she had weaned him, she took him to Shiloh, taking along a three-year-old bull,^[e] a bushel of flour, and a leather bag full of wine. She took Samuel, young as he was, to the house of the Lord at Shiloh. ²⁵ After they had killed the bull, they took the child to Eli. ²⁶ Hannah said to him, “Excuse me, sir. Do you remember me? I am the woman you saw standing here, praying to the Lord. ²⁷ I asked him for this child, and he gave me what I asked for. ²⁸ So I am dedicating him to the Lord. As long as he lives, he will belong to the Lord.”

Then they^[f] worshiped the Lord there.

1 From Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus and an apostle chosen and called by God to preach his Good News.

² The Good News was promised long ago by God through his prophets, as written in the Holy Scriptures. ³ It is about his Son, our Lord Jesus Christ: as to his humanity, he was born a descendant of David; ⁴ as to his divine holiness, he was shown with great power to be the Son of God by being raised from death. ⁵ Through him God gave me the privilege of being an apostle for the sake of Christ, in order to lead people of all nations to believe and obey. ⁶ This also includes you who are in Rome, whom God has called to belong to Jesus Christ.

⁷ And so I write to all of you in Rome whom God loves and has called to be his own people:

May God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ give you grace and peace.

Prayer of Thanksgiving

⁸ First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because the whole world is hearing about your faith. ⁹ God is my witness that what I say is true—the God whom I serve with all my heart by preaching the Good News about his Son. God knows that I remember you ¹⁰ every time I pray. I ask that God in his good will may at last make it possible for me to visit you now. ¹¹ For I want very much to see you, in order to share a spiritual blessing with you to make you strong. ¹² What I mean is that both you and I will be helped at the same time, you by my faith and I by yours.

^13 (A)You must remember, my friends, that many times I have planned to visit you, but something has always kept me from doing so. I want to win converts among you also, as I have among other Gentiles. ¹⁴ For I have an obligation to all peoples, to the civilized and to the savage, to the educated and to the ignorant. ¹⁵ So then, I am eager to preach the Good News to you also who live in Rome.

The Power of the Gospel

^16 (B)I have complete confidence in the gospel; it is God's power to save all who believe, first the Jews and also the Gentiles. ^17 (C)For the gospel reveals how God puts people right with himself: it is through faith from beginning to end. As the scripture says, “The person who is put right with God through faith shall live.”^[a]

Human Guilt

¹⁸ God's anger is revealed from heaven against all the sin and evil of the people whose evil ways prevent the truth from being known. ¹⁹ God punishes them, because what can be known about God is plain to them, for God himself made it plain. ^20 (D)Ever since God created the world, his invisible qualities, both his eternal power and his divine nature, have been clearly seen; they are perceived in the things that God has made. So those people have no excuse at all! ^21 (E)They know God, but they do not give him the honor that belongs to him, nor do they thank him. Instead, their thoughts have become complete nonsense, and their empty minds are filled with darkness. ²² They say they are wise, but they are fools; ^23 (F)instead of worshiping the immortal God, they worship images made to look like mortals or birds or animals or reptiles.

²⁴ And so God has given those people over to do the filthy things their hearts desire, and they do shameful things with each other. ²⁵ They exchange the truth about God for a lie; they worship and serve what God has created instead of the Creator himself, who is to be praised forever! Amen.

²⁶ Because they do this, God has given them over to shameful passions. Even the women pervert the natural use of their sex by unnatural acts. ²⁷ In the same way the men give up natural sexual relations with women and burn with passion for each other. Men do shameful things with each other, and as a result they bring upon themselves the punishment they deserve for their wrongdoing.

²⁸ Because those people refuse to keep in mind the true knowledge about God, he has given them over to corrupted minds, so that they do the things that they should not do. ²⁹ They are filled with all kinds of wickedness, evil, greed, and vice; they are full of jealousy, murder, fighting, deceit, and malice. They gossip ³⁰ and speak evil of one another; they are hateful to God, insolent,^[b] proud, and boastful; they think of more ways to do evil; they disobey their parents; ³¹ they have no conscience; they do not keep their promises, and they show no kindness or pity for others. ³² They know that God's law says that people who live in this way deserve death. Yet, not only do they continue to do these very things, but they even approve of others who do them.

The Fall of Jerusalem

39 In the tenth month of the ninth year that Zedekiah was king of Judah, King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylonia came with his whole army and attacked Jerusalem. ² On the ninth day of the fourth month of Zedekiah's eleventh year as king, the city walls were broken through.

(³ When Jerusalem was captured,^[a] all the high officials of the king of Babylonia came and took their places at the Middle Gate, including Nergal Sharezer, Samgar Nebo, Sarsechim, and another Nergal Sharezer.^[b])

⁴ When King Zedekiah and all his soldiers saw what was happening, they tried to escape from the city during the night. They left by way of the royal garden, went through the gateway connecting the two walls, and escaped in the direction of the Jordan Valley. ⁵ But the Babylonian army pursued them and captured Zedekiah in the plains near Jericho. Then they took him to King Nebuchadnezzar, who was in the city of Riblah in the territory of Hamath, and there Nebuchadnezzar passed sentence on him. ⁶ At Riblah he put Zedekiah's sons to death while Zedekiah was looking on, and he also had the officials of Judah executed. ⁷ After that, he had Zedekiah's eyes put out and had him placed in chains to be taken to Babylonia. ⁸ Meanwhile, the Babylonians burned down the royal palace and the houses of the people and tore down the walls of Jerusalem. ⁹ Finally Nebuzaradan, the commanding officer, took away as prisoners to Babylonia the people who were left in the city, together with those who had deserted to him. ¹⁰ He left in the land of Judah some of the poorest people, who owned no property, and he gave them vineyards and fields.

Jeremiah's Release

¹¹ But King Nebuchadnezzar commanded Nebuzaradan, the commanding officer, to give the following order: ¹² “Go and find Jeremiah and take good care of him. Do not harm him, but do for him whatever he wants.” ¹³ So Nebuzaradan, together with the high officials Nebushazban and Nergal Sharezer and all the other officers of the king of Babylonia, ¹⁴ had me brought from the palace courtyard. They put me under the care of Gedaliah, the son of Ahikam and grandson of Shaphan, who was to see that I got home safely. And so I stayed there among the people.

Hope for Ebedmelech

¹⁵ While I was still imprisoned in the palace courtyard, the Lord told me ¹⁶ to tell Ebedmelech the Ethiopian^[c] that the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, had said, “Just as I said I would, I am going to bring upon this city destruction and not prosperity. And when this happens, you will be there to see it. ¹⁷ But I, the Lord, will protect you, and you will not be handed over to the people you are afraid of. ¹⁸ I will keep you safe, and you will not be put to death. You will escape with your life because you have put your trust in me. I, the Lord, have spoken.”

A Prayer for Help^[a]

Human Wickedness^[b](A)