Daily Bible CEV November 13 Scroll

JAMES

James 1 From James, a servant of God and of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Greetings to the twelve tribes scattered all over the world.

Faith and Wisdom

²My friends, be glad, even if you have a lot of trouble. ³You know that you learn to endure by having your faith tested. ⁴But you must learn to endure everything, so that you will be completely mature and not lacking in anything.

⁵If any of you need wisdom, you should ask God, and it will be given to you. God is generous and won't correct you for asking. ⁶But when you ask for something, you must have faith and not doubt. Anyone who doubts is like an ocean wave tossed around in a storm. ^7-8If you are that kind of person, you can't make up your mind, and you surely can't be trusted. So don't expect the Lord to give you anything at all.

Poor People and Rich People

⁹Any of God's people who are poor should be glad that he thinks so highly of them. ¹⁰But any who are rich should be glad when God makes them humble. Rich people will disappear like wild flowers ¹¹scorched by the burning heat of the sun. The flowers lose their blossoms, and their beauty is destroyed. That is how the rich will disappear, as they go about their business.

Trials and Temptations

¹²God will bless you, if you don't give up when your faith is being tested. He will reward you with a glorious life, just as he rewards everyone who loves him.

¹³Don't blame God when you are tempted! God cannot be tempted by evil, and he doesn't use evil to tempt others. ¹⁴We are tempted by our own desires that drag us off and trap us. ¹⁵Our desires make us sin, and when sin is finished with us, it leaves us dead.

¹⁶Don't be fooled, my dear friends. ¹⁷Every good and perfect gift comes down from the Father who created all the lights in the heavens. He is always the same and never makes dark shadows by changing. ¹⁸He wanted us to be his own special people, and so he sent the true message to give us new birth.

Hearing and Obeying

¹⁹My dear friends, you should be quick to listen and slow to speak or to get angry. ²⁰If you are angry, you cannot do any of the good things that God wants done. ²¹You must stop doing anything immoral or evil. Instead be humble and accept the message that is planted in you to save you.

²²Obey God's message! Don't fool yourselves by just listening to it. ²³If you hear the message and don't obey it, you are like people who stare at themselves in a mirror ²⁴and forget what they look like as soon as they leave. ²⁵But you must never stop looking at the perfect law that sets you free. God will bless you in everything you do, if you listen and obey, and don't just hear and forget.

²⁶If you think you are being religious, but can't control your tongue, you are fooling yourself, and everything you do is useless. ²⁷Religion that pleases God the Father must be pure and spotless. You must help needy orphans and widows and not let this world make you evil.

The LORD Will Fight against Jerusalem

Jeremiah 21 King Zedekiah of Judah sent for Pashhur son of Malchiah and for a priest named Zephaniah son of Maaseiah. Then he told them,"Talk with Jeremiah for me."

So they came to me and said, ²"King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylonia has attacked Judah. Please ask the LORD to work miracles for our people, as he has done in the past, so that Nebuchadnezzar will leave us alone."

^3-7I told them that the LORD God of Israel had told me to say to King Zedekiah:

The Babylonians have surrounded Jerusalem and want to kill you and your people. You are asking me to save you, but you have made me furious. So I will stretch out my mighty arm and fight against you myself. Your army is using spears and swords to fight the Babylonians, but I will make your own weapons turn and attack you. I will send a horrible disease to kill many of the people and animals in Jerusalem, and there will be nothing left to eat. Finally, I will let King Nebuchadnezzar and his army fight their way to the center of Jerusalem and capture everyone who is left alive, including you and your officials. But Nebuchadnezzar won't be kind or show any mercy--he will have you killed! I, the LORD, have spoken.

⁸Then I told them that the LORD had said:

People of Jerusalem, I, the LORD, give you the choice of life or death. ⁹The Babylonian army has surrounded Jerusalem, so if you want to live, you must go out and surrender to them. But if you want to die because of hunger, disease, or war, then stay here in the city. ¹⁰I have decided not to rescue Jerusalem. Instead, I am going to let the king of Babylonia burn it to the ground. I, the LORD, have spoken.

The LORD Warns the King of Judah

^*11Pay attention, you that belong to the royal family.

¹²Each new day, make sure that justice is done,

and rescue those who are being robbed.

Or else my anger will flame up

like a fire that never goes out.

¹³Jerusalem, from your mountaintop

you look out over the valleys and think you are safe.

But I, the LORD, am angry, ¹⁴and I will punish you

as you deserve.

I'll set your palace on fire,

and everything around you will go up in smoke.

The LORD Will Punish the King of Judah

Jeremiah 22 ^1-3The LORD sent me to the palace of the king of Judah to speak to the king, his officials, and everyone else who was there. The LORD told me to say:

I am the LORD, so pay attention! You have been allowing people to cheat, rob, and take advantage of widows, orphans, and foreigners who live here. Innocent people have become victims of violence, and some of them have even been killed. But now I command you to do what is right and see that justice is done. Rescue everyone who has suffered from injustice.

⁴If you obey me, the kings from David's family will continue to rule Judah from this palace. They and their officials will ride in and out on their horses or in their chariots. ⁵But if you ignore me, I promise in my own name that this palace will lie in ruins. ⁶Listen to what I think about it:

The palace of Judah's king is as glorious as Gilead

or Lebanon's highest peaks.

But it will be as empty as a ghost-town

when I'm through with it.

⁷I'll send troops to tear it apart,

and its beautiful cedar beams will be used for firewood.

⁸People from different nations will pass by and ask, "Why did the LORD do this to such a great city as Jerusalem?" ⁹Others will answer, "It's because the people worshiped foreign gods and broke the agreement that the LORD their God had made with them."

King Jehoahaz

The LORD said:

¹⁰King Josiah is dead, so don't cry for him.

Instead, cry for his son King Jehoahaz,

dragged off to another country, never to return.

^11-12Jehoahaz became king of Judah after his father King Josiah died. But Jehoahaz was taken as a prisoner to a foreign country. Now I, the LORD, promise that he will die there without ever seeing his own land again.

King Jehoiakim

The LORD told me to say:

^*13King Jehoiakim, you are doomed!

You built a palace with large rooms upstairs.

¹⁴You put in big windows and used cedar paneling

and red paint.

But you were unfair and forced the builders to work

without pay.

^*15More cedar in your palace doesn't make you a better king

than your father Josiah.

He always did right-- he gave justice to the poor

and was honest.

¹⁶That's what it means to truly know me.

So he lived a comfortable life

and always had enough to eat and drink.

¹⁷But all you think about is how to cheat or abuse or murder

some innocent victim.

¹⁸Jehoiakim, no one will cry at your funeral.

They won't turn to each other and ask,

"Why did our great king have to die?"

¹⁹You will be given a burial fit for a donkey;

your body will be dragged outside the city gates

and tossed in the dirt.

I, the LORD, have spoken.

King Jehoiachin and the People of Jerusalem

The LORD told me to say:

²⁰People of Jerusalem, the nations you trusted

have been crushed.

Go to Lebanon and weep;

cry in the land of Bashan and in Moab.

²¹When times were good, I warned you.

But you ignored me, just as you have done

since Israel was young.

²²Now you will be disgraced because of your sins.

Your leaders will be swept away by the wind,

and the nations you trusted will be captured

and dragged to a foreign country.

²³Those who live in the palace paneled with cedar

will groan with pain like women giving birth.

²⁴King Jehoiachin, son of Jehoiakim, even if you were the ring I wear as the sign of my royal power, I would still pull you from my finger. ²⁵I would hand you over to the enemy you fear, to King Nebuchadnezzar and his army, who want to kill you. ²⁶You and your mother were born in Judah, but I will throw both of you into a foreign country, where you will die, ²⁷longing to return home.

²⁸Jehoiachin, you are unwanted like a broken clay pot.

So you and your children will be thrown

into a country you know nothing about.

²⁹Land of Judah, I am the LORD. Now listen to what I say!

³⁰Erase the names of Jehoiachin's children

from the royal records.

He is a complete failure,

and so none of them will ever be king.

I, the LORD, have spoken.

Psalm 129
[A song for worship.]
A Prayer for Protection

¹Since the time I was young, enemies have often attacked!

Let everyone in Israel say: ²"Since the time I was young,

enemies have often attacked!

But they have not defeated me,

³though my back is like a field

that has just been plowed."

⁴The LORD always does right,

and he has set me free

from the ropes of those cruel people.

⁵I pray that all who hate the city of Zion

will be made ashamed and forced to turn and run.

⁶May they be like grass on the flat roof of a house,

grass that dries up as soon as it sprouts.

⁷Don't let them be like wheat gathered in bundles.

⁸

And don't let anyone who passes by say to them,

"The LORD bless you!

I give you my blessing in the name of the LORD."

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.