Daily Reading

1 Indeed a King will reign according to righteousness, / And the rulers will rule according to justice.

2 And a man will be like a refuge from the wind / And a covering from the tempest, / Like streams of water in a dry place, / Like the shadow of a massive rock in a wasted land.

3 And the eyes of those who see will not be dim, / And the ears of those who hear will attend.

4 And the heart of the hasty will understand knowledge, / And the tongue of those who stammer will hasten to speak elegantly.

5 The fool will no longer be called noble, / Nor will the cheat be said to be generous;

6 For the fool will speak foolishness, / And his heart will commit iniquity / By committing profaneness / And by speaking error against Jehovah, / By leaving the soul of the hungry empty / And by causing drink for the thirsty to fail.

7 And as for the cheat, his tools are evil; / He devises wicked schemes / To destroy the poor with false words / Even when the needy speaks rightly.

8 But the noble man devises noble things, / And upon noble things he stands.

9 Rise up, O women who are at ease, / And hear my voice; / O daughters of complacency, / Hearken to my words.

10 In a year and some days / You will be troubled, O complacent ones; / For the vintage is at its end; / The ingathering will not come.

11 Tremble, O women at ease; / Be troubled, O complacent ones. / Strip yourselves and be bare, / And gird your loins with sackcloth.

12 They beat their breasts / For the pleasant fields, / For the fruitful vine.

13 Upon the land of my people / Will come up thorns and briers, / Indeed upon all the jubilant houses / In the exultant city.

14 Because the palace will be abandoned; / The multitude of the city will be forsaken; / The Hill and the watchtower / Will become caves forever, / A joy for wild asses, / A pasture for flocks;

15 Until the Spirit is poured upon us from on high, / And the wilderness becomes a fruitful field, / And the fruitful field is considered to be a forest.

16 Then justice will dwell in the wilderness, / And righteousness will remain in the fruitful field;

17 And the work of righteousness will be peace, / And the result of righteousness, quietness and assurance forever.

18 And my people will live in a peaceful habitation / And in secure dwellings and carefree resting places.

19 And it will hail when the forest comes down, / And the city will be utterly laid low.

20 Blessed are you who sow beside all the water, / Who send there the feet of the ox and the donkey.

1 Woe to you who destroy and were not destroyed, / And to him who deals unfaithfully and was not dealt with unfaithfully! / When you have finished destroying, you will be destroyed; / And when you cease to deal unfaithfully, they will deal unfaithfully with you.

2 O Jehovah, be gracious to us; we have waited for You; / Be our arm every morning, / Our salvation also in the time of distress.

3 At the noise of the tumult the peoples flee; / At the lifting up of Yourself the nations were scattered.

4 And your spoil will be gathered as the caterpillar gathers; / As locusts rush to and fro, men will rush to and fro upon it.

5 Jehovah is exalted, for He dwells on high; / He has filled Zion with justice and righteousness.

6 And there will be stability for your times: / A wealth of salvation, wisdom, and knowledge; / The fear of Jehovah is his treasure.

7 Indeed their heroes cry in the streets; / The ambassadors of peace weep bitterly.

8 The highways are desolate; / The traveler ceases to travel. / He has broken the covenant; he despises the cities; / He does not regard man.

9 The land mourns and languishes; / Lebanon is ashamed and withers away; / Sharon is like a desert, / And Bashan and Carmel shake off their leaves.

10 Now I will arise, says Jehovah, / Now I will be exalted; now I will be lifted up.

11 You will conceive chaff; you will give birth to stubble; / Your own breath, like fire, will devour you;

12 And the peoples will be like the burning of lime, / Like cut down thorns that are burned in the fire.

13 Hear, you who are far off, what I have done; / And know, you who are near, My might.

14 The sinners in Zion are terrified; / Trembling has seized the profane: / Who among us can dwell with consuming fire? / Who among us can dwell with everlasting burning?

15 He who walks in righteousness and speaks uprightness; / He who rejects gains seized by extortion; / He who shakes his hands lest they hold on to a bribe, / Who stops his ears so as not to hear of bloodshed / And shuts his eyes so as not to look at evil.

16 This one will dwell on the heights; / His lofty retreat will be the rocky strongholds; / His bread will be given to him; his water will be sure.

17 Your eyes will see the King in His beauty; / They will behold a land that is very far away.

18 Your heart will meditate on terror: / Where is he who counts? Where is he who weighs? / Where is he who counts the towers?

19 You will not see a fierce people, / A people of unintelligible speech, hardly audible, / Of a stammering tongue which cannot be understood.

20 Look upon Zion, the city of our appointed feasts; / Your eyes will see Jerusalem, / A secure habitation, a tent that will not be removed; / Its stakes will never be pulled up, / And none of its cords will be torn apart.

21 But there the Majestic, Jehovah, will be for us / A place of rivers and broad streams, / On which no boat with oars will go / And no majestic ship will pass.

22 For Jehovah is our Judge, / Jehovah is our Lawmaker, / Jehovah is our King; He will save us.

23 Your tackle has been slackened; / It does not support its mast firmly, / Nor does it spread out the sail. / Then the prey of abundant spoil is divided; / The lame take the plunder.

24 And the inhabitant will not say, I am sick; / The people who dwell there will be forgiven their iniquity.

1 Draw near, O nations, to hear; / And listen, O peoples! / Let the earth and all that fills it hear, / The world and all that springs forth from it.

2 For Jehovah’s indignation is upon all the nations, / And His wrath is upon all their armies; / He has utterly destroyed them; / He has delivered them unto the slaughter.

3 Thus their slain are cast away, / And from their corpses their stench will come up; / And the mountains will be melted with their blood.

4 And all the armies of heaven will be dissolved, / And the heavens will be rolled up like a scroll, / And all their host will wither away, / As the leaf withers from the vine, / Or like a leaf withering from the fig tree.

5 For My sword has drunk its fill in heaven. / Now it will descend in judgment upon Edom / And upon the people whom I have devoted to judgment.

6 Jehovah’s sword is full of blood; / It has fattened itself with fat, / With the blood of lambs and goats, / With the fat of the kidneys of rams; / For Jehovah has a sacrifice in Bozrah / And a great slaughter in the land of Edom.

7 Wild oxen will also go down with them, / The young bulls with the bulls; / And their land will drink its fill of their blood, / And their dust will become fat with their fat.

8 For Jehovah has a day of vengeance, / A year of recompense for Zion’s contention.

9 And its streams will be turned into pitch, / And its dust into brimstone; / And its land will become burning pitch.

10 It will not be quenched by night or by day; / Its smoke will go up forever; / It will be desolate from generation to generation; / No one will pass through it forever and ever.

11 But the pelican and the porcupine will inherit it, / And the owl and the raven will dwell in it; / And He will stretch over it / The line of nothingness and the plummet weights of emptiness.

12 As for its nobles, there is no one there whom they may call to assume the kingdom, / And all its princes will be nothing.

13 And thorns will come up in its citadels, / Nettles and thistles in its fortified cities; / And it will be a habitation for jackals, / And an abode for ostriches.

14 Desert animals will meet with hyenas; / And the demon will call to his kind, / Indeed there Lilith will settle / And find a resting place for herself.

15 There the owl will make its nest and lay eggs, / And hatch them and gather them under its protection; / Indeed there the vultures will be gathered together, / Each with its kind.

16 Seek from the book of Jehovah and read. / Not one of these will be missing; / Not one will lack her mate; / For His mouth has commanded it, / And it is His Spirit who has gathered them.

17 And He has cast the lot for them, / And His hand has divided it by line unto them; / They will inherit it forever; / From generation to generation they will dwell in it.

1 The wilderness and the desert will be glad; / And the desert will exult and blossom / Like the rose.

2 It will blossom and blossom, / And even exult with exultation and a ringing shout. / The glory of Lebanon will be given to it, / The splendor of Carmel and Sharon; / They will see the glory of Jehovah, / The splendor of our God.

3 Strengthen the weak hands, / And confirm the shaking knees.

4 Say to those who are of anxious heart, / Be strong; fear not; / Indeed your God / Will come with vengeance, / With the recompense of God; / He will come and save you.

5 Then the eyes of the blind will be opened, / And the ears of the deaf will be unstopped;

6 Then the lame will leap like a hart, / And the tongue of the dumb will give a ringing shout; / For water will break forth in the wilderness, / And streams in the desert.

7 And the desert mirage will become a pool, / And the thirsty ground, springs of water; / In the habitation of jackals, their resting place, / There will be grass with reeds and rushes.

8 And a highway will be there, and a way, / And it will be called, The Way of Holiness. / The unclean will not pass on it, / But it will be for him who walks on the way; / No fools will err in it.

9 There will be no lion there, / Nor will any ravenous animal go up on it; / They will not be found there; / But the redeemed will walk on it.

10 And the ransomed of Jehovah will return / And will come to Zion with a ringing shout, / And eternal joy will be upon their heads. / They will lay hold on gladness and joy, / And sorrow and sighing will flee away.

1 So then, my brothers, beloved and longed for, my joy and crown, in the same way stand firm in the Lord, beloved.

2 I exhort Euodias, and I exhort Syntyche, to think the same thing in the Lord.

3 Yes, I ask you also, genuine yokefellow, assist them, since they contended with me in the gospel, as well as with Clement and the rest of my fellow workers, whose names are in the book of life.

4 Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice.

5 Let your forbearance be known to all men. The Lord is near.

6 In nothing be anxious, but in everything, by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God;

7 And the peace of God, which surpasses every man’s understanding, will guard your hearts and your thoughts in Christ Jesus.

8 Finally, brothers, what things are true, what things are dignified, what things are righteous, what things are pure, what things are lovely, what things are well spoken of, if there is any virtue and if any praise, take account of these things.

9 The things which you have also learned and received and heard and seen in me, practice these things; and the God of peace will be with you.

10 But I rejoiced in the Lord greatly because now at length you have caused your thinking for me to blossom anew; for which matter you had indeed taken thought, but lacked opportunity.

11 Not that I speak according to lack, for I have learned, in whatever circumstances I am, to be content.

12 I know also how to be abased, and I know how to abound; in everything and in all things I have learned the secret both to be filled and to hunger, both to abound and to lack.

13 I am able to do all things in Him who empowers me.

14 Nevertheless you did well to have fellowship with me in my affliction.

15 And you yourselves also know, Philippians, that in the beginning of the gospel, when I went out from Macedonia, no church had fellowship with me in the account of giving and receiving except you only;

16 For even in Thessalonica you sent both once and again to my need.

17 Not that I seek the gift, but I seek the fruit which increases to your account.

18 But I have received in full all things and abound; I have been filled, receiving from Epaphroditus the things from you, a sweet-smelling savor, an acceptable sacrifice, well pleasing to God.

19 And my God will fill your every need according to His riches, in glory, in Christ Jesus.

20 Now to our God and Father be the glory forever and ever. Amen.

21 Greet every saint in Christ Jesus. The brothers who are with me greet you.

22 All the saints greet you, and especially those of Caesar’s household.

23 The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit.