Genesis 16

• 1. But Sarai, Abram's wife, had no children. So Sarai took her servant, an Egyptian woman named Hagar,
• 2. and gave her to Abram so she could bear his children. "The LORD has kept me from having any children," Sarai said to Abram. "Go and sleep with my servant. Perhaps I can have children through her." And Abram agreed.
• 3. So Sarai, Abram's wife, took Hagar the Egyptian servant and gave her to Abram as a wife. (This happened ten years after Abram first arrived in the land of Canaan.)
• 4. So Abram slept with Hagar, and she became pregnant. When Hagar knew she was pregnant, she began to treat her mistress Sarai with contempt.
• 5. Then Sarai said to Abram, "It's all your fault! Now this servant of mine is pregnant, and she despises me, though I myself gave her the privilege of sleeping with you. The LORD will make you pay for doing this to me! "
• 6. Abram replied, "Since she is your servant, you may deal with her as you see fit." So Sarai treated her harshly, and Hagar ran away.
• 7. The angel of the LORD found Hagar beside a desert spring along the road to Shur.
• 8. The angel said to her, "Hagar, Sarai's servant, where have you come from, and where are you going?I am running away from my mistress," she replied.
• 9. Then the angel of the LORD said, "Return to your mistress and submit to her authority."
• 10. The angel added, "I will give you more descendants than you can count."
• 11. And the angel also said, "You are now pregnant and will give birth to a son. You are to name him Ishmael, for the LORD has heard about your misery.
• 12. This son of yours will be a wild one--free and untamed as a wild donkey! He will be against everyone, and everyone will be against him. Yes, he will live at odds with the rest of his brothers."
• 13. Thereafter, Hagar referred to the LORD, who had spoken to her, as "the God who sees me," for she said, "I have seen the One who sees me!"
• 14. Later that well was named Beer-lahairoi, and it can still be found between Kadesh and Bered.
• 15. So Hagar gave Abram a son, and Abram named him Ishmael.
• 16. Abram was eighty-six years old at that time.

Matthew 15

• 1. Some Pharisees and teachers of religious law now arrived from Jerusalem to interview Jesus.
• 2. "Why do your disciples disobey our age-old traditions?" they demanded. "They ignore our tradition of ceremonial hand washing before they eat."
• 3. Jesus replied, "And why do you, by your traditions, violate the direct commandments of God?
• 4. For instance, God says, 'Honor your father and mother,' and 'Anyone who speaks evil of father or mother must be put to death.'
• 5. But you say, 'You don't need to honor your parents by caring for their needs if you give the money to God instead.'
• 6. And so, by your own tradition, you nullify the direct commandment of God.
• 7. You hypocrites! Isaiah was prophesying about you when he said,
• 8. 'These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far away.
• 9. Their worship is a farce, for they replace God's commands with their own man-made teachings.'"
• 10. Then Jesus called to the crowds and said, "Listen to what I say and try to understand.
• 11. You are not defiled by what you eat; you are defiled by what you say and do. "
• 12. Then the disciples came to him and asked, "Do you realize you offended the Pharisees by what you just said?"
• 13. Jesus replied, "Every plant not planted by my heavenly Father will be rooted up,
• 14. so ignore them. They are blind guides leading the blind, and if one blind person guides another, they will both fall into a ditch."
• 15. Then Peter asked Jesus, "Explain what you meant when you said people aren't defiled by what they eat."
• 16. "Don't you understand?" Jesus asked him.
• 17. "Anything you eat passes through the stomach and then goes out of the body.
• 18. But evil words come from an evil heart and defile the person who says them.
• 19. For from the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, all other sexual immorality, theft, lying, and slander.
• 20. These are what defile you. Eating with unwashed hands could never defile you and make you unacceptable to God!"
• 21. Jesus then left Galilee and went north to the region of Tyre and Sidon.
• 22. A Gentile woman who lived there came to him, pleading, "Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David! For my daughter has a demon in her, and it is severely tormenting her."
• 23. But Jesus gave her no reply--not even a word. Then his disciples urged him to send her away. "Tell her to leave," they said. "She is bothering us with all her begging."
• 24. Then he said to the woman, "I was sent only to help the people of Israel--God's lost sheep--not the Gentiles."
• 25. But she came and worshiped him and pleaded again, "Lord, help me!"
• 26. "It isn't right to take food from the children and throw it to the dogs," he said.
• 27. "Yes, Lord," she replied, "but even dogs are permitted to eat crumbs that fall beneath their master's table."
• 28. "Woman," Jesus said to her, "your faith is great. Your request is granted." And her daughter was instantly healed.
• 29. Jesus returned to the Sea of Galilee and climbed a hill and sat down.
• 30. A vast crowd brought him the lame, blind, crippled, mute, and many others with physical difficulties, and they laid them before Jesus. And he healed them all.
• 31. The crowd was amazed! Those who hadn't been able to speak were talking, the crippled were made well, the lame were walking around, and those who had been blind could see again! And they praised the God of Israel.
• 32. Then Jesus called his disciples to him and said, "I feel sorry for these people. They have been here with me for three days, and they have nothing left to eat. I don't want to send them away hungry, or they will faint along the road."
• 33. The disciples replied, "And where would we get enough food out here in the wilderness for all of them to eat?"
• 34. Jesus asked, "How many loaves of bread do you have?" They replied, "Seven, and a few small fish."
• 35. So Jesus told all the people to sit down on the ground.
• 36. Then he took the seven loaves and the fish, thanked God for them, broke them into pieces, and gave them to the disciples, who distributed the food to the crowd.
• 37. They all ate until they were full, and when the scraps were picked up, there were seven large baskets of food left over!
• 38. There were four thousand men who were fed that day, in addition to all the women and children.
• 39. Then Jesus sent the people home, and he got into a boat and crossed over to the region of Magadan.

Nehemiah 5

• 1. About this time some of the men and their wives raised a cry of protest against their fellow Jews.
• 2. They were saying, "We have such large families. We need more money just so we can buy the food we need to survive."
• 3. Others said, "We have mortgaged our fields, vineyards, and homes to get food during the famine."
• 4. And others said, "We have already borrowed to the limit on our fields and vineyards to pay our taxes.
• 5. We belong to the same family, and our children are just like theirs. Yet we must sell our children into slavery just to get enough money to live. We have already sold some of our daughters, and we are helpless to do anything about it, for our fields and vineyards are already mortgaged to others."
• 6. When I heard their complaints, I was very angry.
• 7. After thinking about the situation, I spoke out against these nobles and officials. I told them, "You are oppressing your own relatives by charging them interest when they borrow money!" Then I called a public meeting to deal with the problem.
• 8. At the meeting I said to them, "The rest of us are doing all we can to redeem our Jewish relatives who have had to sell themselves to pagan foreigners, but you are selling them back into slavery again. How often must we redeem them?" And they had nothing to say in their defense.
• 9. Then I pressed further, "What you are doing is not right! Should you not walk in the fear of our God in order to avoid being mocked by enemy nations?
• 10. I myself, as well as my brothers and my workers, have been lending the people money and grain, but now let us stop this business of loans.
• 11. You must restore their fields, vineyards, olive groves, and homes to them this very day. Repay the interest you charged on their money, grain, wine, and olive oil."
• 12. Then they replied, "We will give back everything and demand nothing more from the people. We will do as you say." Then I called the priests and made the nobles and officials formally vow to do what they had promised.
• 13. I shook out the fold of my robe and said, "If you fail to keep your promise, may God shake you from your homes and from your property!" The whole assembly responded, "Amen," and they praised the LORD. And the people did as they had promised.
• 14. I would like to mention that for the entire twelve years that I was governor of Judah--from the twentieth until the thirty-second year of the reign of King Artaxerxes--neither I nor my officials drew on our official food allowance.
• 15. This was quite a contrast to the former governors who had laid heavy burdens on the people, demanding a daily ration of food and wine, besides a pound of silver. Even their assistants took advantage of the people. But because of my fear of God, I did not act that way.
• 16. I devoted myself to working on the wall and refused to acquire any land. And I required all my officials to spend time working on the wall.
• 17. I asked for nothing, even though I regularly fed 150 Jewish officials at my table, besides all the visitors from other lands!
• 18. The provisions required at my expense for each day were one ox, six fat sheep, and a large number of domestic fowl. And every ten days we needed a large supply of all kinds of wine. Yet I refused to claim the governor's food allowance because the people were already having a difficult time.
• 19. Remember, O my God, all that I have done for these people, and bless me for it.

New Living Translation: 15 of 365 days.