The Bible Reading Plan

Exodus Chapter 19

⁷Moses came and called for the elders of the people, and set before them all these words which Yahweh commanded him. ⁸All the people answered together, and said, "All that Yahweh has said we will do." Moses reported the words of the people to Yahweh. ⁹Yahweh said to Moses, "Behold, I come to you in a thick cloud, that the people may hear when I speak with you, and may also believe you forever." Moses told the words of the people to Yahweh. ¹⁰Yahweh said to Moses, "Go to the people, and sanctify them today and tomorrow, and let them wash their garments, ¹¹and be ready for the third day; for on the third day Yahweh will come down in the sight of all the people on Mount Sinai. ¹²Set bounds to the people all around, saying, 'Be careful that you don't go up onto the mountain, or touch its border. Whoever touches the mountain will be surely put to death. ¹³Let no hand touch him, but he must surely be stoned or shot through; whether it is animal or man, he may not live.' When the trumpet sounds long, they may approach the mountain."

¹⁴Moses went down from the mountain to the people, and sanctified the people; and they washed their clothes. ¹⁵He said to the people, "Be ready by the third day. Don't have sexual relations with a woman."

¹⁶On the third day, when it was morning, there were thunders and lightnings, and a thick cloud on the mountain, and the sound of an exceedingly loud trumpet; and all the people who were in the camp trembled. ¹⁷Moses led the people from the camp to meet God; and they stood at the lower part of the mountain. ¹⁸All of Mount Sinai smoked, because Yahweh descended on it in fire; and its smoke ascended like the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mountain quaked greatly. ¹⁹When the sound of the trumpet grew louder and louder, Moses spoke, and God answered him by a voice. ²⁰Yahweh came down on Mount Sinai, to the top of the mountain. Yahweh called Moses to the top of the mountain, and Moses went up.

²¹Yahweh said to Moses, "Go down, warn the people, lest they break through to Yahweh to gaze, and many of them perish. ²²Let the priests also, who come near to Yahweh, sanctify themselves, lest Yahweh break out on them."

²³Moses said to Yahweh, "The people can't come up to Mount Sinai, for you warned us, saying, 'Set bounds around the mountain, and sanctify it.'"

²⁴Yahweh said to him, "Go down! Bring Aaron up with you, but don't let the priests and the people break through to come up to Yahweh, in case he breaks out against them."

²⁵So Moses went down to the people, and told them.

1 Kings Chapter 9

¹When Solomon had finished building the house of Yahweh, and the king's house, and all Solomon's desire which he was pleased to do, ²Yahweh appeared to Solomon the second time, as he had appeared to him at Gibeon. ³Yahweh said to him, "I have heard your prayer and your supplication, that you have made before me. I have made this house holy, which you have built, to put my name there forever; and my eyes and my heart shall be there perpetually. ⁴As for you, if you will walk before me, as David your father walked, in integrity of heart, and in uprightness, to do exactly as I have commanded you, and will keep my statutes and my ordinances; ⁵then I will establish the throne of your kingdom over Israel forever, according as I promised to David your father, saying, 'There shall not fail you a man on the throne of Israel.' ⁶But if you turn away from following me, you or your children, and not keep my commandments and my statutes which I have set before you, but shall go and serve other gods, and worship them; ⁷then I will cut off Israel out of the land which I have given them; and this house, which I have made holy for my name, I will throw out of my sight; and Israel shall be a proverb and a byword among all peoples. ⁸Though this house is so high, yet shall everyone who passes by it be astonished, and shall hiss; and they shall say, 'Why has Yahweh done this to this land, and to this house?' ⁹and they shall answer, 'Because they abandoned Yahweh their God, who brought their fathers out of the land of Egypt, and laid hold of other gods, and worshiped them, and served them. Therefore Yahweh has brought all this evil on them.'"

¹⁰At the end of twenty years, in which Solomon had built the two houses, the house of Yahweh and the king's house ¹¹(now Hiram the king of Tyre had furnished Solomon with cedar trees and fir trees, and with gold, according to all his desire), then king Solomon gave Hiram twenty cities in the land of Galilee. ¹²Hiram came out from Tyre to see the cities which Solomon had given him; and they didn't please him. ¹³He said, "What cities are these which you have given me, my brother?" He called them the land of Cabul to this day. ¹⁴Hiram sent to the king one hundred twenty talents of gold.

¹⁵This is the reason of the levy which king Solomon raised, to build the house of Yahweh, and his own house, and Millo, and the wall of Jerusalem, and Hazor, and Megiddo, and Gezer. ¹⁶Pharaoh king of Egypt had gone up, and taken Gezer, and burned it with fire, and slaughtered the Canaanites who lived in the city, and given it for a portion to his daughter, Solomon's wife. ¹⁷Solomon built Gezer, and Beth Horon the lower, ¹⁸and Baalath, and Tamar in the wilderness, in the land, ¹⁹and all the storage cities that Solomon had, and the cities for his chariots, and the cities for his horsemen, and what Solomon desired to build for his pleasure in Jerusalem, and in Lebanon, and in all the land of his dominion. ²⁰As for all the people who were left of the Amorites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, who were not of the children of Israel; ²¹their children who were left after them in the land, whom the children of Israel were not able utterly to destroy, of them Solomon raised a levy of slaves to this day. ²²But of the children of Israel Solomon made no slaves; but they were the men of war, and his servants, and his princes, and his captains, and rulers of his chariots and of his horsemen. ²³These were the chief officers who were over Solomon's work, five hundred fifty, who bore rule over the people who labored in the work.

²⁴But Pharaoh's daughter came up out of the city of David to her house which [Solomon] had built for her: then he built Millo.

²⁵Three times a year Solomon offered burnt offerings and peace offerings on the altar which he built to Yahweh, burning incense on it before Yahweh. So he finished the house.

²⁶King Solomon made a navy of ships in Ezion Geber, which is beside Eloth, on the shore of the Red Sea, in the land of Edom. ²⁷Hiram sent in the navy his servants, sailors who had knowledge of the sea, with the servants of Solomon. ²⁸They came to Ophir, and fetched from there gold, four hundred and twenty talents, and brought it to king Solomon.

Nehemiah Chapter 4

¹But when Sanballat heard that we were building the wall, he was angry, and was very indignant, and mocked the Jews. ²He spoke before his brothers and the army of Samaria, and said, "What are these feeble Jews doing? Will they fortify themselves? Will they sacrifice? Will they finish in a day? Will they revive the stones out of the heaps of rubbish, since they are burned?"

³Now Tobiah the Ammonite was by him, and he said, "What they are building, if a fox climbed up it, he would break down their stone wall."

⁴"Hear, our God, for we are despised. Turn back their reproach on their own head. Give them up for a plunder in a land of captivity. ⁵Don't cover their iniquity. Don't let their sin be blotted out from before you; for they have insulted the builders."

⁶So we built the wall; and all the wall was joined together to half [its height], for the people had a mind to work.

⁷But when Sanballat, Tobiah, the Arabians, the Ammonites, and the Ashdodites heard that the repairing of the walls of Jerusalem went forward, [and] that the breaches began to be filled, they were very angry; ⁸and they all conspired together to come and fight against Jerusalem, and to cause confusion among us. ⁹But we made our prayer to our God, and set a watch against them day and night because of them.

¹⁰Judah said, "The strength of the bearers of burdens is fading and there is much rubble, so that we are not able to build the wall." ¹¹Our adversaries said, "They will not know or see, until we come in among them and kill them, and cause the work to cease."

¹²When the Jews who lived by them came, they said to us ten times from all places, "Wherever you turn, they will attack us."

¹³Therefore I set guards in the lowest parts of the space behind the wall, in the open places. I set the people by family groups with their swords, their spears, and their bows. ¹⁴I looked, and rose up, and said to the nobles, to the rulers, and to the rest of the people, "Don't be afraid of them! Remember LordOfMine, who is great and awesome, and fight for your brothers, your sons, your daughters, your wives, and your houses."

¹⁵When our enemies heard that it was known to us, and God had brought their counsel to nothing, all of us returned to the wall, everyone to his work. ¹⁶From that time forth, half of my servants did the work, and half of them held the spears, the shields, the bows, and the coats of mail; and the rulers were behind all the house of Judah. ¹⁷Those who built the wall, and those who bore burdens loaded themselves; everyone with one of his hands did the work, and with the other held his weapon.

Luke Chapter 21

⁵As some were talking about the temple and how it was decorated with beautiful stones and gifts, he said, ⁶"As for these things which you see, the days will come, in which there will not be left here one stone on another that will not be thrown down."

⁷They asked him, "Teacher, so when will these things be? What is the sign that these things are about to happen?"

⁸He said, "Watch out that you don't get led astray, for many will come in my name, saying, 'I am he,' and, 'The time is at hand.' So don't follow them. ⁹When you hear of wars and disturbances, don't be terrified, for these things must happen first, but the end won't come immediately."

¹⁰Then he said to them, "Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. ¹¹There will be great earthquakes, famines, and plagues in various places. There will be terrors and great signs from heaven. ¹²But before all these things, they will lay their hands on you and will persecute you, delivering you up to synagogues and prisons, bringing you before kings and governors for my name's sake. ¹³It will turn out as a testimony for you. ¹⁴So settle it in your hearts not to meditate beforehand how to answer, ¹⁵for I will give you a mouth and wisdom which all your adversaries will not be able to withstand or to contradict. ¹⁶You will be handed over even by parents, brothers, relatives, and friends. They will cause some of you to be put to death. ¹⁷You will be hated by all men for my name's sake. ¹⁸And not a hair of your head will perish.

¹⁹"By your endurance you will win your lives.

²⁰"But when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation is at hand. ²¹Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. Let those who are in the middle of her depart. Let those who are in the country not go there. ²²For these are days of vengeance, that all things which are written may be fulfilled. ²³Woe to those who are pregnant and to those who nurse infants in those days! For there will be great distress in the land, and wrath to this people. ²⁴They will fall by the edge of the sword, and will be led captive into all the nations. Jerusalem will be trampled down by the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled.