Daily Bible CEV November 19 Scroll

A Living Stone and a Holy Nation

1 Peter 2 Stop being hateful! Quit trying to fool people, and start being sincere. Don't be jealous or say cruel things about others. ²Be like newborn babies who are thirsty for the pure spiritual milk that will help you grow and be saved. ³You have already found out how good the Lord really is.

⁴Come to Jesus Christ. He is the living stone that people have rejected, but which God has chosen and highly honored. ⁵And now you are living stones that are being used to build a spiritual house. You are also a group of holy priests, and with the help of Jesus Christ you will offer sacrifices that please God. ⁶It is just as God says in the Scriptures,

"Look! I am placing in Zion

a choice and precious cornerstone.

No one who has faith in that one will be disappointed."

⁷You are followers of the Lord, and that stone is precious to you. But it isn't precious to those who refuse to follow him. They are the builders who tossed aside the stone that turned out to be the most important one of all. ⁸They disobeyed the message and stumbled and fell over that stone, because they were doomed.

⁹But you are God's chosen and special people. You are a group of royal priests and a holy nation. God has brought you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Now you must tell all the wonderful things that he has done. The Scriptures say,

¹⁰"Once you were nobody. Now you are God's people.

At one time no one had pity on you.

Now God has treated you with kindness.

Live as God's Servants Should

¹¹Dear friends, you are foreigners and strangers on this earth. So I beg you not to surrender to those desires that fight against you. ¹²Always let others see you behaving properly, even though they may still accuse you of doing wrong. Then on the day of judgment, they will honor God by telling the good things they saw you do.

¹³The Lord wants you to obey all human authorities, especially the Emperor, who rules over everyone. ¹⁴You must also obey governors, because they are sent by the Emperor to punish criminals and to praise good citizens. ¹⁵God wants you to silence stupid and ignorant people by doing right. ¹⁶You are free, but still you are God's servants, and you must not use your freedom as an excuse for doing wrong. ¹⁷Respect everyone and show special love for God's people. Honor God and respect the Emperor.

The Example of Christ's Suffering

¹⁸Servants, you must obey your masters and always show respect to them. Do this, not only to those who are kind and thoughtful, but also to those who are cruel. ¹⁹God will bless you, even if others treat you unfairly for being loyal to him. ²⁰You don't gain anything by being punished for some wrong you have done. But God will bless you, if you have to suffer for doing something good. ²¹After all, God chose you to suffer as you follow in the footsteps of Christ, who set an example by suffering for you.

²²Christ did not sin or ever tell a lie.

²³

Although he was abused, he never tried to get even.

And when he suffered, he made no threats.

Instead, he had faith in God, who judges fairly.

²⁴Christ carried the burden of our sins.

He was nailed to the cross, so that we would stop sinning

and start living right.

By his cuts and bruises you are healed.

²⁵You had wandered away like sheep. Now you have returned

to the one who is your shepherd and protector.

The LORD Promises To Give the Land Back to His People

Jeremiah 33 ^1-2I was still being held prisoner in the courtyard of the palace guards when the LORD told me:

I am the LORD, and I created the whole world. ³Ask me, and I will tell you things that you don't know and can't find out.

^4-5Many of the houses in Jerusalem and some of the buildings at the royal palace have been torn down to be used in repairing the walls to keep out the Babylonian attackers. Now there are empty spaces where the buildings once stood. But I am furious, and these spaces will be filled with the bodies of the people I kill. The people of Jerusalem will cry out to me for help, but they are evil, and I will ignore their prayers.

⁶Then someday, I will heal this place and my people as well, and let them enjoy unending peace. ⁷I will give this land to Israel and Judah once again, and I will make them as strong as they were before. ⁸They sinned and rebelled against me, but I will forgive them and take away their guilt. ⁹When that happens, all nations on earth will see the good things I have done for Jerusalem, and how I have given it complete peace. The nations will celebrate and praise and honor me, but they will also tremble with fear.

¹⁰Jeremiah, you say that this land is a desert without people or animals, and for now, you are right. The towns of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem are deserted, and people and animals are nowhere to be seen. But someday you will hear ¹¹happy voices and the sounds of parties and wedding celebrations. And when people come to my temple to offer sacrifices to thank me, you will hear them say:

"We praise you, LORD All-Powerful!

You are good to us, and your love never fails."

The land will once again be productive. ^12-13Now it is empty, without people or animals. But when that time comes, shepherds will take care of their flocks in pastures near every town in the hill country, in the foothills to the west, in the Southern Desert, in the land of the Benjamin tribe, and around Jerusalem and the towns of Judah.

I, the LORD, have spoken.

The LORD's Wonderful Promise

¹⁴The LORD said:

I made a wonderful promise to Israel and Judah, and the days are coming when I will keep it.

¹⁵I promise that the time will come

when I will appoint a king from the family of David,

a king who will be honest and rule with justice.

¹⁶In those days, Judah will be safe;

Jerusalem will have peace and will be named,

"The LORD Gives Justice."

¹⁷The king of Israel will be one of David's descendants, ¹⁸and there will always be priests from the Levi tribe serving at my altar and offering sacrifices to please me and to give thanks.

¹⁹Then the LORD told me:

²⁰I, the LORD, have an agreement with day and night, so they always come at the right time. You can't break the agreement I made with them, ²¹and you can't break the agreements I have made with David's family and with the priests from the Levi tribe who serve at my altar. A descendant of David will always rule as king of Israel, ²²and there will be more descendants of David and of the priests from the Levi tribe than stars in the sky or grains of sand on the beach.

²³The LORD also said:

²⁴You've heard foreigners insult my people by saying, "The LORD chose Israel and Judah, but now he has rejected them, and they are no longer a nation."

²⁵Jeremiah, I will never break my agreement with the day and the night or let the sky and the earth stop obeying my commands. ²⁶In the same way, I will never reject the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob or break my promise that they will always have a descendant of David as their king. I will be kind to my people Israel, and they will be successful again.

Jeremiah Warns Zedekiah

Jeremiah 34 King Nebuchadnezzar had a large army made up of people from every kingdom in his empire. He and his army were attacking Jerusalem and all the nearby towns, when the LORD told me ²to say to King Zedekiah:

I am the LORD, and I am going to let Nebuchadnezzar capture this city and burn it down. ³You will be taken prisoner and brought to Nebuchadnezzar, and he will speak with you face to face. Then you will be led away to Babylonia.

⁴Zedekiah, I promise that you won't die in battle. ⁵You will die a peaceful death. People will mourn when you die, and they will light bonfires in your honor, just as they did for your ancestors, the kings who ruled before you.

⁶I went to Zedekiah and told him what the LORD had said. ⁷Meanwhile, the king of Babylonia was trying to break through the walls of Lachish, Azekah, and Jerusalem, the only three towns of Judah that had not been captured.

The People Break a Promise

^8-10King Zedekiah, his officials, and everyone else in Jerusalem made an agreement to free all Hebrew men and women who were slaves. No Jew would keep another as a slave. And so, all the Jewish slaves were given their freedom.

¹¹But those slave owners changed their minds and forced their former slaves back into slavery. ¹²That's when the LORD told me to say to the people:

¹³I am the LORD God of Israel, and I made an agreement with your ancestors when I brought them out of Egypt, where they had been slaves. ¹⁴As part of this agreement, you must let a Hebrew slave go free after six years of service.

Your ancestors did not obey me, ^15-16but you decided to obey me and do the right thing by setting your Hebrew slaves completely free. You even went to my temple, and in my name you made an agreement to set them free. But you have abused my name, because you broke your agreement and forced your former slaves back into slavery.

¹⁷You have disobeyed me by not giving your slaves their freedom. So I will give you freedom--the freedom to die in battle or from disease or hunger. I will make you disgusting to all other nations on earth.

¹⁸You asked me to be a witness when you made the agreement to set your slaves free. And as part of the ceremony you cut a calf into two parts, then walked between the parts. But you people of Jerusalem have broken that agreement as well as my agreement with Israel. So I will do to you what you did to that calf. ^19-20I will let your enemies take all of you prisoner, including the leaders of Judah and Jerusalem, the royal officials, the priests, and everyone else who walked between the two parts of the calf. These enemies will kill you and leave your bodies lying on the ground as food for birds and wild animals.

^21-22These enemies are King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylonia and his army. They have stopped attacking Jerusalem, but they want to kill King Zedekiah and his high officials. So I will command them to return and attack again. This time they will conquer the city and burn it down, and they will capture Zedekiah and his officials. I will also let them destroy the towns of Judah, so that no one can live there any longer.

Psalm 135
In Praise of the LORD's Kindness

¹Shout praises to the LORD!

You are his servants, so praise his name.

²All who serve in the temple of the LORD our God,

come and shout praises.

Praise the name of the LORD! He is kind and good.

⁴He chose the family of Jacob and the people of Israel

for his very own.

⁵The LORD is much greater than any other god.

⁶He does as he chooses in heaven and on earth

and deep in the sea.

⁷The LORD makes the clouds rise

from far across the earth,

and he makes lightning to go with the rain.

Then from his secret place he sends out the wind.

⁸The LORD killed the first-born

of people and animals in the land of Egypt.

⁹God used miracles and wonders

to fight the king of Egypt and all of his officials.

¹⁰He destroyed many nations and killed powerful kings,

¹¹including King Sihon of the Amorites

and King Og of Bashan.

He conquered every kingdom in the land of Canaan

¹²

and gave their property to his people Israel.

¹³The name of the LORD will be remembered forever,

and he will be famous for all time to come.

¹⁴The LORD will bring justice and show mercy

to all who serve him.

¹⁵Idols of silver and gold are made

and worshiped in other nations.

¹⁶They have a mouth and eyes,

but they can't speak or see.

¹⁷They are completely deaf, and they can't breathe.

¹⁸Everyone who makes idols and all who trust them

will end up as helpless as their idols.

¹⁹Everyone in Israel, come praise the LORD!

All the family of Aaron ²⁰and all the tribe of Levi,

come praise the LORD!

All of his worshipers, come praise the LORD.

²¹Praise the LORD from Zion! He lives here in Jerusalem.

Shout praises to 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.