M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan
30 Moses gathered the heads of the twelve Israelite tribes and explained vows.
The situation concerning vows with men is clear and straightforward: keep your word. With women, it’s more complicated. The promises made by women have certain restrictions that don’t apply to men’s vows: whatever a woman promises to God or others is subject to review by her father, if she still lives at home, or by her husband, if she’s married. Those men have the power to nullify her promises.
Moses: 2 Whatever a man promises to God or others, whether a vow or a binding oath with a pledge, he must do. He is bound by his word: no excuses and no exceptions.
3-12 If a woman makes such a binding statement in the hearing of her father (if she’s not married) or husband (if she is married), and he keeps quiet, then the promise stands. But if her father or her husband (depending on her marital status) disapproves of what she said, then she’s not bound by whatever she promised, and the Eternal won’t hold it against her. If she gets married after making a vow or pledge (even a rash one) and her husband knows about it but says nothing, then she’s responsible for keeping those promises. But if her husband hears about some rash promise she made and says that he thinks it’s foolish, then he can erase any obligation she had to keep it. The Eternal will forgive her. A woman who’s not connected to any man—a widow or divorcée—must take full responsibility for keeping her promises.[a] 13 Now if a woman is already married and vows to undertake some kind of self-denial, fasting or the like, her husband has the power to either approve or reject it. 14 If he doesn’t say anything about it while she is doing it, then whatever she’s pledged to do is truly binding; he cannot come back later and change his mind about it. 15 If he does require her to break her promise while she’s doing it, then the punishment for breaking it will be on him, not her.
16 This is what the Eternal determined should be the rules for fathers or husbands evaluating a woman’s vows, whether she’s a youngster still living under her father’s roof or has married.
Psalm 74
A contemplative song[a] of Asaph.
This lament was written shortly after the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem and the temple in 586 b.c. Now in exile and separated from God, His city, and His land, the people of God experience pain that is palpable.
1 O True God, why have You turned Your back on us and abandoned us forever?
Why is Your anger seething and Your wrath smoldering against the sheep of Your pasture?
2 Remember the congregation of people You acquired long ago,
the tribe which You redeemed to be Your very own.
Remember Mount Zion, where You have chosen to live!
3 Come, direct Your attention to Your sanctuary;
our enemy has demolished everything and left it in complete ruin.
4 Your enemies roared like lions in Your sacred chamber;
they have claimed it with their own standards as signs.
5 They acted like lumberjacks swinging their axes
to cut down a stand of trees.
6 They hacked up all the beautifully carved items,
smashed them to splinters with their axes and hammers.
7 They have burned Your sanctuary to the ground;
they have desecrated the place where Your holy name lived in honor;
8 They have plotted in their hearts, “We will crush them and bring them to their knees!”
Then they scorched all of the places in the land where the True God met His people.
9 We no longer receive signs,
there are no more prophets who remain,
and not one of us knows how long this situation will last.
10 O True God, how much longer will the enemy mock us?
Will this insult continue against You forever?
11 Why do You stand by and do nothing?
Unleash Your power and finish them off!
12 Even so, the True God is my King from long ago,
bringing salvation to His people throughout the land.
13 You have divided the sea with Your power;
You shattered the skulls of the creatures of the sea;
14 You smashed the heads of Leviathan
and fed his remains to the people of the desert.
15 You broke open the earth and springs burst forth and streams filled the crevices;
You dried up the great rivers.
16 The day and the night are both Yours—
You fashioned the sun, moon, and all the lights that pierce the darkness.
17 You have arranged the earth, set all its boundaries;
You are the Architect of the seasons: summer and winter.
18 Eternal One, do not forget that the enemy has taunted You
and a company of fools has rejected Your name.
19 We are Your precious turtledoves;
don’t surrender our souls to the wild beasts.
Do not forget the lives of Your poor, afflicted, and brokenhearted ones forever.
20 Be mindful of Your covenant with us,
for the dark corners of the land are filled with pockets of violence.
21 Do not allow the persecuted to return without honor;
may the poor, wounded, and needy sing praises to You;
may they bring glory to Your name!
22 O True God, rise up and defend Your cause;
remember how the foolish man insults You every hour of the day.
23 Do not forget the voices of Your enemies,
the commotion and chaos of Your foes, which continually grow.
22 A message about the valley of Vision[a]:
What in the world is wrong with you?
Why have you climbed on your housetops and started celebrating?
2 What noise! The whole city is in an uproar.
Don’t you realize that your fallen comrades didn’t actually die fighting,
3 That your leaders turned tail together and ran,
only to be captured without a fight, without even drawing their weapons?
The rest of you tried to run far away
but were still captured.
4 This is why I said, “Just leave me alone;
let me weep bitterly over this travesty.
Don’t tell me it’s not that bad, or that everything will be all right.
We’re talking about the destruction of my cherished people!”
5 The Lord, the Eternal, Commander of heavenly armies,
determined that this would be the time for destruction—
Smashing and crashing, wreaking havoc and chaos in the valley of Vision,
battering down walls and crying out to the mountains.
6 You tried, but how could you hold off Elam’s skilled archers
with chariots and horsemen and Kir’s soldiers—shields held high.
7 The invader’s chariots overran your pristine valleys,
and their horsemen made their stand at the city gates.
8 But God simply did away with Judah’s defenses.
In that day you put your trust in weapons stored in the armory.
9 You began to fix the many breaks in the walls of the city of David.
You stocked up on water from the lower pool.
10 You took stock of the houses in Jerusalem,
and began to dismantle them stone-by-stone to shore up the city wall.
11 You built a reservoir between two walls to hold the water of the old pool.
But in all this you neglected the One who could really save you;
You failed to consider the One who actually made this place
and established it so long ago.
12 Consequently, the Lord, the Eternal, Commander of heavenly armies,
determined that day would be a time of weeping and regret,
A time of shaved heads and donning sackcloth
and a time for mourning.
13 Yet you missed the point and made merry,
slaughtering cattle and sheep for a giant celebration,
Eating and drinking your fill of wine!
People (to each other): Eat up, drink up, for tomorrow we die.[b]
14 Eternal One (to Isaiah): This sin will not be forgiven.
It will stay with you until your dying day.
That’s what the Lord, the Eternal, Commander of heavenly armies, said.
This message beginning with verse 15 is laid on the people of God living in and around Jerusalem. The prophet’s word is a corrective to those who proudly and confidently presume that they enjoy a privileged status with God by virtue of where they live and who their ancestors are. After all, God has pledged to King David that his dynasty will continue. The Judeans assume this means they will not have to worry about their enemies, regardless of how faithful or faithless they are to God. So when the enemy threat materializes on their border and moves right into bowshot, they do what most people do: they make reasonable, defensive preparations. But what they forget to do is key: they forget to turn to God. They put their trust in their weapons and their engineering skills. They ignore the One who established the city and made them a nation in the first place. So God tells Isaiah to have a talk with Shebna, the caretaker of the royal palace. God is about to make a change.
Eternal One:[c] 15 Come on. Go to Shebna, the caretaker of the royal household,
and confront him saying,
16 “Why are you here, anyway? Do you really belong here?
What right do you have to build yourself an elegant tomb
And stone monument here out of the rock on this hill?
17 Look, strong man! The Eternal is about to throw you out,
wildly, violently. With a firm grasp
18 He will crush you like a ball—hurl you deep into a land
far, far away where you go to die.
You will be known as the shame of your master’s house
and your splendid chariots will lie empty.
19 I will see to it that you’re driven from your post, toppled from your position,
with all the disgrace and shame that you deserve.
20 When that day comes, I will summon My faithful servant;
Eliakim the son of Hilkiah will be called
21 To take over and assume your authority and office.
I will clothe him in your royal robes and fasten your sash securely around him.
He will be a father to the people:
He will have authority over Jerusalem and Judah.
22 I will grant him the key to David’s royal house and
no one can shut what he opens;
no one can open what he shuts.
23 I will attach him securely like a peg to that house,
and he will bring honor to his father and his family.
24 On him will hang all the riches,
all the honor, of his family’s future.
25 On the appointed day, the peg that was attached so securely to that house
will become weak, break off, and fall to the ground.
And everything that had been hung on it will fall down and shatter.
The Eternal One, Commander of heavenly armies, has declared it to be so.
3 This is now, my dear friends, my second letter to you. In both of them, I have tried to inspire you to a sincere and pure way of thinking by reminding you of what you already know. 2 Remember the words spoken earlier by God’s holy prophets and the commandment that our Lord and Savior gave to you through your emissaries.[a] 3 Above all, be sure to remember that in the last days mockers will come, following their own desires and taunting you, 4 saying, “So what happened to the promised second coming of Jesus? For everything keeps going just the way it has since our ancestors fell asleep in death; since the beginning of creation, nothing’s changed.”
These believers face persecution every day and eagerly await the day when Jesus will return and judge their enemies. But what is taking so long?
5 When they make fun of you, it’s as if the scoffers are deliberately forgetting that long ago when God spoke the word, the heavens came into existence and the earth formed from water and by water. 6 The waters later flooded and destroyed that world. 7 By that same word, the heavens and earth we see now are being reserved for destruction by fire, preserved until the time comes for the godless on the day of judgment.
8 Don’t imagine, dear friends, that God’s timetable is the same as ours; as the psalm says, for with the Lord, one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years is like one day.[b]
Scoffers use the delay in His second coming to question if He is going to return at all. Peter responds by saying that God’s perspective on time is not like ours. What seems long from a finite, human perspective is incredibly short from an eternal one. Peter also describes how God is not slow, but patient. God wants to allow the time needed for as many sinners as possible to turn from their sinful ways. Unlike some depictions of God as vindictive and enjoying inflicting punishment on people, the God we see here desires that all be saved and not destroyed. If we had true spiritual insight, we would not be amazed by the severity of eternal judgment but by the intensity of God’s mercy.
9 Now the Lord is not slow about enacting His promise—slow is how some people want to characterize it—no, He is not slow but patient and merciful to you, not wanting anyone to be destroyed, but wanting everyone to turn away from following his own path and to turn toward God’s.[c]
10 The day of the Lord will come unexpectedly like a thief in the night; and on that day, the sky will vanish with a roar, the elements will melt with intense heat, and the earth and all the works done on it will be seen as they truly are.[d] 11 Knowing that one day all this will come to pass, think what sort of people you ought to be—how you should be living faithful and godly lives, 12 waiting hopefully for and hastening the coming of God’s day when the heavens will vanish in flames and the elements melt away with intense heat. 13 What will happen next, and what we hope for, is what God promised: a new heaven and a new earth where justice reigns.
14 So, my friends, while we wait for the day of the Lord, work hard to live in peace, without flaw or blemish; 15 and look at the patience of the Lord as your salvation. Our dearly loved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given him, has written about this. 16 He says essentially the same in all of his letters, although uneducated and unstable readers misinterpret the difficult passages, just as they always misread Scripture, to their spiritual ruin.
17 So hear my final words, my friends. Now that I have warned you about what’s ahead, keep up your guard and don’t let unprincipled people pull you away from the sure ground of the truth with their lies and misunderstandings. 18 Instead, grow in grace and in the true knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus, the Anointed, to whom be glory, now and until the coming of the new age. Amen.
The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.