Daily Bible CEV May 09 Scroll

Paul in Ephesus

Acts 19 While Apollos was in Corinth, Paul traveled across the hill country to Ephesus, where he met some of the Lord's followers. ²He asked them, "When you put your faith in Jesus, were you given the Holy Spirit?"

"No!" they answered. "We have never even heard of the Holy Spirit."

³"Then why were you baptized?" Paul asked.

They answered, "Because of what John taught."

⁴Paul replied, "John baptized people so that they would turn to God. But he also told them that someone else was coming, and that they should put their faith in him. Jesus is the one that John was talking about." ⁵After the people heard Paul say this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. ⁶Then Paul placed his hands on them. The Holy Spirit was given to them, and they spoke unknown languages and prophesied. ⁷There were about twelve men in this group.

⁸For three months Paul went to the Jewish meeting place and talked bravely with the people about God's kingdom. He tried to win them over, ⁹but some of them were stubborn and refused to believe. In front of everyone they said terrible things about God's Way. Paul left and took the followers with him to the lecture hall of Tyrannus. He spoke there every day ¹⁰for two years, until every Jew and Gentile in Asia had heard the Lord's message.

The Sons of Sceva

¹¹God gave Paul the power to work great miracles. ¹²People even took handkerchiefs and aprons that had touched Paul's body, and they carried them to everyone who was sick. All of the sick people were healed, and the evil spirits went out.

¹³Some Jewish men started going around trying to force out evil spirits by using the name of the Lord Jesus. They said to the spirits, "Come out in the name of that same Jesus that Paul preaches about!"

¹⁴Seven sons of a high priest named Sceva were doing this, ¹⁵when an evil spirit said to them, "I know Jesus! And I have heard about Paul. But who are you?" ¹⁶Then the man with the evil spirit jumped on them and beat them up. They ran out of the house, naked and bruised.

¹⁷When the Jews and Gentiles in Ephesus heard about this, they were so frightened that they praised the name of the Lord Jesus. ¹⁸Many who were followers now started telling everyone about the evil things they had been doing. ¹⁹Some who had been practicing witchcraft even brought their books and burned them in public. These books were worth about fifty thousand silver coins. ²⁰So the Lord's message spread and became even more powerful.

Tola

Judges 10 Tola was the next person to rescue Israel. He belonged to the Issachar tribe, but he lived in Shamir, a town in the hill country of Ephraim. His father was Puah, and his grandfather was Dodo. ²Tola was a leader of Israel for twenty-three years, then he died and was buried in Shamir.

Jair

³The next leader of Israel was Jair, who lived in Gilead. He was a leader for twenty-two years. ⁴He had thirty sons, and each son had his own mule and was in charge of one town in Gilead. Those thirty towns are still called The Settlements of Jair. ⁵When he died, he was buried in the town of Kamon.

Israel Is Unfaithful Again

⁶Before long, the Israelites began disobeying the LORD by worshiping Baal, Astarte, and gods from Syria, Sidon, Moab, Ammon, and Philistia.

⁷The LORD was angry at Israel and decided to let Philistia and Ammon conquer them. ⁸So the same year that Jair died, Israel's army was crushed by these two nations. For eighteen years, Ammon was cruel to the Israelites who lived in Gilead, the region east of the Jordan River that had once belonged to the Amorites. ⁹Then the Ammonites began crossing the Jordan and attacking the tribes of Judah, Benjamin, and Ephraim. Life was miserable for the Israelites. ¹⁰They begged the LORD for help and confessed, "We were unfaithful to you, our LORD. We stopped worshiping you and started worshiping idols of Baal."

^11-12The LORD answered:

In the past when you came crying to me for help, I rescued you. At one time or another I've rescued you from the Egyptians, the Amorites, the Ammonites, the Philistines, the Sidonians, the Amalekites, and the Maonites. ^13-14But I'm not going to rescue you any more! You've left me and gone off to worship other gods. If you're in such big trouble, go cry to them for help!

¹⁵"We have been unfaithful," the Israelites admitted. "If we must be punished, do it yourself, but please rescue us from the Ammonites."

¹⁶Then the Israelites got rid of the idols of the foreign gods, and they began worshiping only the LORD. Finally, there came a time when the LORD could no longer stand to see them suffer.

The Ammonites Invade Gilead

¹⁷The rulers of Ammon called their soldiers together and led them to Gilead, where they set up camp.

The Israelites gathered at Mizpah and set up camp there. ¹⁸The leaders of Gilead asked each other, "Who can lead an attack on the Ammonites?" Then they agreed, "If we can find someone who can lead the attack, we'll make him the ruler of Gilead."

Jephthah

Judges 11 ^1-5The leaders of the Gilead clan decided to ask a brave warrior named Jephthah son of Gilead to lead the attack against the Ammonites.

Even though Jephthah belonged to the Gilead clan, he had earlier been forced to leave the region where they had lived. Jephthah was the son of a prostitute, but his half-brothers were the sons of his father's wife.

One day his half-brothers told him, "You don't really belong to our family, so you can't have any of the family property." Then they forced Jephthah to leave home.

Jephthah went to the country of Tob, where he was joined by a number of men who would do anything for money.

So the leaders of Gilead went to Jephthah and said, ⁶"Please come back to Gilead! If you lead our army, we will be able to fight off the Ammonites."

⁷"Didn't you hate me?" Jephthah replied. "Weren't you the ones who forced me to leave my family? You're coming to me now, just because you're in trouble."

⁸"But we do want you to come back," the leaders said. "And if you lead us in battle against the Ammonites, we will make you the ruler of Gilead."

⁹"All right," Jephthah said. "If I go back with you and the LORD lets me defeat the Ammonites, will you really make me your ruler?"

¹⁰"You have our word," the leaders answered. "And the LORD is a witness to what we have said."

¹¹So Jephthah went back to Mizpah with the leaders of Gilead. The people of Gilead gathered at the place of worship and made Jephthah their ruler. Jephthah also made promises to them.

¹²After the ceremony, Jephthah sent messengers to say to the king of Ammon, "Are you trying to start a war? You have invaded my country, and I want to know why!"

¹³The king of Ammon replied, "Tell Jephthah that the land really belongs to me, all the way from the Arnon River in the south, to the Jabbok River in the north, and west to the Jordan River. When the Israelites came out of Egypt, they stole it. Tell Jephthah to return it to me, and there won't be any war."

¹⁴Jephthah sent the messengers back to the king of Ammon, ¹⁵and they told him that Jephthah had said:

Israel hasn't taken any territory from Moab or Ammon. ¹⁶When the Israelites came from Egypt, they traveled in the desert to the Red Sea and then to Kadesh. ¹⁷They sent messengers to the king of Edom and said, "Please, let us go through your country." But the king of Edom refused. They also sent messengers to the king of Moab, but he wouldn't let them cross his country either. And so the Israelites stayed at Kadesh.

¹⁸A little later, the Israelites set out into the desert, going east of Edom and Moab, and camping on the eastern side of the Arnon River gorge. The Arnon is the eastern border of Moab, and since the Israelites didn't cross it, they didn't even set foot in Moab.

¹⁹The Israelites sent messengers to the Amorite King Sihon of Heshbon. "Please," they said, "let our people go through your country to get to our own land."

²⁰Sihon didn't think the Israelites could be trusted, so he called his army together. They set up camp at Jahaz, then they attacked the Israelite camp. ²¹But the LORD God helped Israel defeat Sihon and his army. Israel took over all of the Amorite land where Sihon's people had lived, ²²from the Arnon River in the south to the Jabbok River in the north, and from the desert in the east to the Jordan River in the west.

²³The messengers also told the king of Ammon that Jephthah had said:

The LORD God of Israel helped his nation get rid of the Amorites and take their land. Now do you think you're going to take over that same territory? ²⁴If Chemosh your god takes over a country and gives it to you, don't you have a right to it? And if the LORD takes over a country and gives it to us, the land is ours!

²⁵Are you better than Balak the son of Zippor? He was the king of Moab, but he didn't quarrel with Israel or start a war with us.

²⁶For three hundred years, Israelites have been living in Heshbon and Aroer and the nearby villages, and in the towns along the Arnon River gorge. If the land really belonged to you Ammonites, you wouldn't have waited until now to try to get it back.

²⁷I haven't done anything to you, but it's certainly wrong of you to start a war. I pray that the LORD will show whether Israel or Ammon is in the right.

²⁸But the king of Ammon paid no attention to Jephthah's message.

²⁹Then the LORD's Spirit took control of Jephthah, and Jephthah went through Gilead and Manasseh, raising an army. Finally, he arrived at Mizpah in Gilead, where ³⁰he promised the LORD, "If you will let me defeat the Ammonites ³¹and come home safely, I will sacrifice to you whoever comes out to meet me first."

³²From Mizpah, Jephthah attacked the Ammonites, and the LORD helped him defeat them.

³³Jephthah and his army destroyed the twenty towns between Aroer and Minnith, and others as far as Abel-Keramim. After that, the Ammonites could not invade Israel any more.

The LORD Continues

When Do Mountain Goats Give Birth?

Job 39 When do mountain goats and deer give birth?

Have you been there when their young are born?

^*2How long are they pregnant ³before they deliver?

⁴Soon their young grow strong and then leave

to be on their own.

⁵Who set wild donkeys free?

⁶

I alone help them survive in salty desert sand.

⁷They stay far from crowded cities and refuse to be tamed.

⁸

Instead, they roam the hills, searching for pastureland.

⁹Would a wild ox agree to live in your barn

and labor for you?

¹⁰Could you force him to plow or to drag a heavy log

to smooth out the soil?

¹¹Can you depend on him to use his great strength

and do your heavy work?

¹²Can you trust him to harvest your grain

or take it to your barn from the threshing place?

An Ostrich Proudly Flaps Her Wings

¹³An ostrich proudly flaps her wings,

but not because she loves her young.

¹⁴She abandons her eggs

and lets the dusty ground keep them warm.

¹⁵And she doesn't seem to worry

that the feet of an animal could crush them all.

¹⁶She treats her eggs as though they were not her own,

unconcerned that her work might be for nothing.

¹⁷I myself made her foolish and without common sense.

¹⁸But once she starts running,

she laughs at a rider on the fastest horse.

Did You Give Horses Their Strength?

¹⁹Did you give horses their strength

and the flowing hair along their necks?

²⁰Did you make them able to jump like grasshoppers

or to frighten people with their snorting?

²¹Before horses are ridden into battle,

they paw at the ground, proud of their strength.

²²Laughing at fear, they rush toward the fighting,

²³while the weapons of their riders

rattle and flash in the sun.

²⁴Unable to stand still, they gallop eagerly into battle

when trumpets blast.

²⁵Stirred by the distant smells and sounds of war,

they snort in reply to the trumpet.

²⁶Did you teach hawks to fly south for the winter?

^*27Did you train eagles to build ²⁸their nests on rocky cliffs,

²⁹

where they can look down to spot their next meal?

³⁰Then their young gather to feast wherever the victim lies.

These daily Bible readings from the Contemporary English Version (CEV) are published by BibleNetUSA. The web site and BibleCard® designs are by iCreative. BibleCard® images copyright iCreative. All rights reserved.