M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan

48 Awhile later someone told Yosef that his father was ill. He took with him his two sons, M’nasheh and Efrayim. ² Ya‘akov was told, “Here comes your son Yosef.” Isra’el gathered his strength and sat up in bed. ³ Ya‘akov said to Yosef, “El Shaddai appeared to me at Luz in the land of Kena‘an and blessed me, ⁴ saying to me, ‘I will make you fruitful and numerous. I will make of you a group of peoples; and I will give this land to your descendants to possess forever.’ ⁵ Now your two sons, who were born to you in the land of Egypt before I came to you in Egypt, are mine; Efrayim and M’nasheh will be as much mine as Re’uven and Shim‘on are. ⁶ The children born to you after them will be yours, but for purposes of inheritance they are to be counted with their older brothers.

⁷ “Now as for me, when I came from Paddan, Rachel died suddenly, as we were traveling through the land of Kena‘an, while we were still some distance from Efrat; so I buried her there on the way to Efrat (also known as Beit-Lechem).”

⁸ Then Isra’el noticed Yosef’s sons and asked, “Whose are these?” ⁹ Yosef answered his father, “They are my sons, whom God has given me here.” Ya‘akov replied, “I want you to bring them here to me, so that I can bless them.” (ii) ¹⁰ Now Isra’el’s eyes were dim with age, so that he could not see. Yosef brought his sons near to him, and he kissed them and embraced them. ¹¹ Isra’el said to Yosef, “I never expected to see even you again, but God has allowed me to see your children too!” ¹² Yosef brought them out from between his legs and prostrated himself on the ground. ¹³ Then Yosef took them both, Efrayim in his right hand toward Isra’el’s left hand and M’nasheh in his left hand toward Isra’el’s right hand, and brought them near to him. ¹⁴ But Isra’el put out his right hand and laid it on the head of the younger one, Efrayim, and put his left hand on the head of M’nasheh — he intentionally crossed his hands, even though M’nasheh was the firstborn. ¹⁵ Then he blessed Yosef: “The God in whose presence my fathers Avraham and Yitz’chak lived, the God who has been my own shepherd all my life long to this day, ¹⁶ the angel who has rescued me from all harm, bless these boys. May they remember who I am and what I stand for, and likewise my fathers Avraham and Yitz’chak, who they were and what they stood for. And may they grow into teeming multitudes on the earth.”

(iii) ¹⁷ When Yosef saw that his father was laying his right hand on Efrayim’s head, it displeased him, and he lifted up his father’s hand to remove it from Efrayim’s head and place it instead on M’nasheh’s head. ¹⁸ Yosef said to his father, “Don’t do it that way, my father; for this one is the firstborn. Put your right hand on his head.” ¹⁹ But his father refused and said, “I know that, my son, I know it. He too will become a people, and he too will be great; nevertheless his younger brother will be greater than he, and his descendants will grow into many nations.” ²⁰ Then he added this blessing on them that day: “Isra’el will speak of you in their own blessings by saying, ‘May God make you like Efrayim and M’nasheh.’” Thus he put Efrayim ahead of M’nasheh.

²¹ Isra’el then said to Yosef, “You see that I am dying, but God will be with you and will bring you back to the land of your ancestors. ²² Moreover, I am giving to you a sh’khem [shoulder, ridge, share, city of Sh’khem] more than to your brothers; I captured it from the Emori with my sword and bow.”

³⁹ Without delay, Miryam set out and hurried to the town in the hill country of Y’hudah ⁴⁰ where Z’kharyah lived, entered his house and greeted Elisheva. ⁴¹ When Elisheva heard Miryam’s greeting, the baby in her womb stirred. Elisheva was filled with the Ruach HaKodesh ⁴² and spoke up in a loud voice,

⁴³ “But who am I, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? ⁴⁴ For as soon as the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy! ⁴⁵ Indeed you are blessed, because you have trusted that the promise Adonai has made to you will be fulfilled.”

⁴⁶ Then Miryam said,

⁵⁶ Miryam stayed with Elisheva for about three months and then returned home.

⁵⁷ The time arrived for Elisheva to have her baby, and she gave birth to a son. ⁵⁸ Her neighbors and relatives heard how good Adonai had been to her, and they rejoiced with her.

⁵⁹ On the eighth day, they came to do the child’s b’rit-milah. They were about to name him Z’kharyah, after his father, ⁶⁰ when his mother spoke up and said, “No, he is to be called Yochanan.” ⁶¹ They said to her, “None of your relatives has that name,” ⁶² and they made signs to his father to find out what he wanted him called. ⁶³ He motioned for a writing tablet, and to everyone’s surprise he wrote, “His name is Yochanan.” ⁶⁴ At that moment, his power of speech returned, and his first words were a b’rakhah to God. ⁶⁵ All their neighbors were awestruck; and throughout the hill country of Y’hudah, people talked about all these things. ⁶⁶ Everyone who heard of them said to himself, “What is this child going to be?” For clearly the hand of Adonai was with him.

⁶⁷ His father Z’kharyah was filled with the Ruach HaKodesh and spoke this prophecy:

⁸⁰ The child grew and became strong in spirit, and he lived in the wilderness until the time came for him to appear in public to Isra’el.

2 As for me, brothers, when I arrived among you, it was not with surpassing eloquence or wisdom that I came announcing to you the previously concealed truth about God; ² for I had decided that while I was with you I would forget everything except Yeshua the Messiah, and even him only as someone who had been executed on a stake as a criminal. ³ Also I myself was with you as somebody weak, nervous and shaking all over from fear; ⁴ and neither the delivery nor the content of my message relied on compelling words of “wisdom” but on a demonstration of the power of the Spirit, ⁵ so that your trust might not rest on human wisdom but on God’s power.

⁶ Yet there is a wisdom that we are speaking to those who are mature enough for it. But it is not the wisdom of this world or of this world’s leaders, who are in the process of passing away. ⁷ On the contrary, we are communicating a secret wisdom from God which has been hidden until now but which, before history began, God had decreed would bring us glory. ⁸ Not one of this world’s leaders has understood it; because if they had, they would not have executed the Lord from whom this glory flows. ⁹ But, as the Tanakh says,

¹⁰ It is to us, however, that God has revealed these things. How? Through the Spirit. For the Spirit probes all things, even the profoundest depths of God. ¹¹ For who knows the inner workings of a person except the person’s own spirit inside him? So too no one knows the inner workings of God except God’s Spirit. ¹² Now we have not received the spirit of the world but the Spirit of God, so that we might understand the things God has so freely given us. ¹³ These are the things we are talking about when we avoid the manner of speaking that human wisdom would dictate and instead use a manner of speaking taught by the Spirit, by which we explain things of the Spirit to people who have the Spirit. ¹⁴ Now the natural man does not receive the things from the Spirit of God — to him they are nonsense! Moreover, he is unable to grasp them, because they are evaluated through the Spirit. ¹⁵ But the person who has the Spirit can evaluate everything, while no one is in a position to evaluate him.

But we have the mind of the Messiah!