Deuteronomy 8

• 1. Be careful to follow every command I am giving you today, so that you may live and increase and may enter and possess the land that the LORD promised on oath to your forefathers.
• 2. Remember how the LORD your God led you all the way in the desert these forty years, to humble you and to test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands.
• 3. He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your fathers had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD.
• 4. Your clothes did not wear out and your feet did not swell during these forty years.
• 5. Know then in your heart that as a man disciplines his son, so the LORD your God disciplines you.
• 6. Observe the commands of the LORD your God, walking in his ways and revering him.
• 7. For the LORD your God is bringing you into a good land-a land with streams and pools of water, with springs flowing in the valleys and hills;
• 8. a land with wheat and barley, vines and fig trees, pomegranates, olive oil and honey;
• 9. a land where bread will not be scarce and you will lack nothing; a land where the rocks are iron and you can dig copper out of the hills.
• 10. When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise the LORD your God for the good land he has given you.
• 11. Be careful that you do not forget the LORD your God, failing to observe his commands, his laws and his decrees that I am giving you this day.
• 12. Otherwise, when you eat and are satisfied, when you build fine houses and settle down,
• 13. and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold increase and all you have is multiplied,
• 14. then your heart will become proud and you will forget the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
• 15. He led you through the vast and dreadful desert, that thirsty and waterless land, with its venomous snakes and scorpions. He brought you water out of hard rock.
• 16. He gave you manna to eat in the desert, something your fathers had never known, to humble and to test you so that in the end it might go well with you.
• 17. You may say to yourself, "My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me."
• 18. But remember the LORD your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth, and so confirms his covenant, which he swore to your forefathers, as it is today.
• 19. If you ever forget the LORD your God and follow other gods and worship and bow down to them, I testify against you today that you will surely be destroyed.
• 20. Like the nations the LORD destroyed before you, so you will be destroyed for not obeying the LORD your God.

Psalms 91

• 1. He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.
• 2. I will say of the LORD, "He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust."
• 3. Surely he will save you from the fowler's snare and from the deadly pestilence.
• 4. He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.
• 5. You will not fear the terror of night, nor the arrow that flies by day,
• 6. nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness, nor the plague that destroys at midday.
• 7. A thousand may fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand, but it will not come near you.
• 8. You will only observe with your eyes and see the punishment of the wicked.
• 9. If you make the Most High your dwelling- even the LORD, who is my refuge-
• 10. then no harm will befall you, no disaster will come near your tent.
• 11. For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways;
• 12. they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.
• 13. You will tread upon the lion and the cobra; you will trample the great lion and the serpent.
• 14. "Because he loves me," says the LORD, "I will rescue him; I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name.
• 15. He will call upon me, and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble, I will deliver him and honor him.
• 16. With long life will I satisfy him and show him my salvation."

Isaiah 36

• 1. In the fourteenth year of King Hezekiah's reign, Sennacherib king of Assyria attacked all the fortified cities of Judah and captured them.
• 2. Then the king of Assyria sent his field commander with a large army from Lachish to King Hezekiah at Jerusalem. When the commander stopped at the aqueduct of the Upper Pool, on the road to the Washerman's Field,
• 3. Eliakim son of Hilkiah the palace administrator, Shebna the secretary, and Joah son of Asaph the recorder went out to him.
• 4. The field commander said to them, "Tell Hezekiah, "'This is what the great king, the king of Assyria, says: On what are you basing this confidence of yours?
• 5. You say you have strategy and military strength-but you speak only empty words. On whom are you depending, that you rebel against me?
• 6. Look now, you are depending on Egypt, that splintered reed of a staff, which pierces a man's hand and wounds him if he leans on it! Such is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who depend on him.
• 7. And if you say to me, "We are depending on the LORD our God"-isn't he the one whose high places and altars Hezekiah removed, saying to Judah and Jerusalem, "You must worship before this altar"?
• 8. "'Come now, make a bargain with my master, the king of Assyria: I will give you two thousand horses-if you can put riders on them!
• 9. How then can you repulse one officer of the least of my master's officials, even though you are depending on Egypt for chariots and horsemen?
• 10. Furthermore, have I come to attack and destroy this land without the LORD? The LORD himself told me to march against this country and destroy it.'"
• 11. Then Eliakim, Shebna and Joah said to the field commander, "Please speak to your servants in Aramaic, since we understand it. Don't speak to us in Hebrew in the hearing of the people on the wall."
• 12. But the commander replied, "Was it only to your master and you that my master sent me to say these things, and not to the men sitting on the wall-who, like you, will have to eat their own filth and drink their own urine?"
• 13. Then the commander stood and called out in Hebrew, "Hear the words of the great king, the king of Assyria!
• 14. This is what the king says: Do not let Hezekiah deceive you. He cannot deliver you!
• 15. Do not let Hezekiah persuade you to trust in the LORD when he says, 'The LORD will surely deliver us; this city will not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria.'
• 16. "Do not listen to Hezekiah. This is what the king of Assyria says: Make peace with me and come out to me. Then every one of you will eat from his own vine and fig tree and drink water from his own cistern,
• 17. until I come and take you to a land like your own-a land of grain and new wine, a land of bread and vineyards.
• 18. "Do not let Hezekiah mislead you when he says, 'The LORD will deliver us.' Has the god of any nation ever delivered his land from the hand of the king of Assyria?
• 19. Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim? Have they rescued Samaria from my hand?
• 20. Who of all the gods of these countries has been able to save his land from me? How then can the LORD deliver Jerusalem from my hand?"
• 21. But the people remained silent and said nothing in reply, because the king had commanded, "Do not answer him."
• 22. Then Eliakim son of Hilkiah the palace administrator, Shebna the secretary, and Joah son of Asaph the recorder went to Hezekiah, with their clothes torn, and told him what the field commander had said.

New International Version

150 | 151 | 152 | 153 | 154 | Day 155 | 156 | 157 | 158 | 159 | 160 |