Daily Bible GNT May 02 Scroll

The Meeting at Jerusalem

Acts 15 Some men came from Judea to Antioch and started teaching the believers, "You cannot be saved unless you are circumcised as the Law of Moses requires." ²Paul and Barnabas got into a fierce argument with them about this, so it was decided that Paul and Barnabas and some of the others in Antioch should go to Jerusalem and see the apostles and elders about this matter.

³They were sent on their way by the church; and as they went through Phoenicia and Samaria, they reported how the Gentiles had turned to God; this news brought great joy to all the believers. ⁴When they arrived in Jerusalem, they were welcomed by the church, the apostles, and the elders, to whom they told all that God had done through them. ⁵But some of the believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees stood up and said, "The Gentiles must be circumcised and told to obey the Law of Moses."

⁶The apostles and the elders met together to consider this question. ⁷After a long debate Peter stood up and said, "My friends, you know that a long time ago God chose me from among you to preach the Good News to the Gentiles, so that they could hear and believe. ⁸And God, who knows the thoughts of everyone, showed his approval of the Gentiles by giving the Holy Spirit to them, just as he had to us. ⁹He made no difference between us and them; he forgave their sins because they believed. ¹⁰So then, why do you now want to put God to the test by laying a load on the backs of the believers which neither our ancestors nor we ourselves were able to carry? ¹¹No! We believe and are saved by the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they are."

¹²The whole group was silent as they heard Barnabas and Paul report all the miracles and wonders that God had performed through them among the Gentiles. ¹³When they had finished speaking, James spoke up: "Listen to me, my friends! ¹⁴Simon has just explained how God first showed his care for the Gentiles by taking from among them a people to belong to him. ¹⁵The words of the prophets agree completely with this. As the scripture says,

¹⁶'After this I will return, says the Lord,

and restore the kingdom of David.

I will rebuild its ruins

and make it strong again.

¹⁷And so all the rest of the human race will come to me,

all the Gentiles whom I have called to be my own.

¹⁸So says the Lord, who made this known long ago.'

¹⁹"It is my opinion," James went on, "that we should not trouble the Gentiles who are turning to God. ²⁰Instead, we should write a letter telling them not to eat any food that is ritually unclean because it has been offered to idols; to keep themselves from sexual immorality; and not to eat any animal that has been strangled, or any blood. ²¹For the Law of Moses has been read for a very long time in the synagogues every Sabbath, and his words are preached in every town."

Joshua's Farewell Address

Joshua 23 Much later the LORD gave Israel security from their enemies around them. By that time Joshua was very old, ²so he called all Israel, the elders, leaders, judges, and officers of the people, and said, "I am very old now. ³You have seen everything that the LORD your God has done to all these nations because of you. The LORD your God has been fighting for you. ⁴I have assigned as the possession of your tribes the land of the nations that are still left, as well as of all the nations that I have already conquered, from the Jordan River in the east to the Mediterranean Sea in the west. ⁵The LORD your God will make them retreat from you, and he will drive them away as you advance. You shall have their land, as the LORD your God has promised you. ⁶So be careful to obey and do everything that is written in the book of the Law of Moses. Do not neglect any part of it, ⁷and then you will not associate with these peoples left among you or speak the names of their gods or use those names in taking vows or worship those gods or bow down to them. ⁸Instead, be faithful to the LORD, as you have been till now. ⁹The LORD has driven great and powerful nations out as you advanced, and no one has ever been able to stand against you. ¹⁰Any one of you can make a thousand men run away, because the LORD your God is fighting for you, just as he promised. ¹¹Be careful, then, to love the LORD your God. ¹²If you are disloyal and join with the nations that are still left among you and intermarry with them, ¹³you may be sure that the LORD your God will no longer drive these nations out as you advance. Rather, they will be as dangerous for you as a trap or a pit and as painful as a whip on your back or thorns in your eyes. And this will last until none of you are left in this good land which the LORD your God has given you.

¹⁴"Now my time has come to die. Every one of you knows in his heart and soul that the LORD your God has given you all the good things that he promised. Every promise he made has been kept; not one has failed. ¹⁵But just as he kept every promise that he made to you, so he will carry out every threat. ¹⁶If you do not keep the covenant which the LORD your God commanded you to keep and if you serve and worship other gods, then in his anger he will punish you, and soon none of you will be left in this good land that he has given you."

Joshua Speaks to the People at Shechem

Joshua 24 Joshua gathered all the tribes of Israel together at Shechem. He called the elders, the leaders, the judges, and the officers of Israel, and they came into the presence of God. ²Joshua said to all the people, "This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, has to say: 'Long ago your ancestors lived on the other side of the Euphrates River and worshiped other gods. One of those ancestors was Terah, the father of Abraham and Nahor. ³Then I took Abraham, your ancestor, from the land across the Euphrates and led him through the whole land of Canaan. I gave him many descendants. I gave him Isaac, ⁴and to Isaac I gave Jacob and Esau. I gave Esau the hill country of Edom as his possession, but your ancestor Jacob and his children went down to Egypt. ⁵Later I sent Moses and Aaron, and I brought great trouble on Egypt. But I led you out; ⁶I brought your ancestors out of Egypt, and the Egyptians pursued them with chariots and cavalry. But when your ancestors got to the Red Sea ⁷they cried out to me for help, and I put darkness between them and the Egyptians. I made the sea come rolling over the Egyptians and drown them. You know what I did to Egypt.

"'You lived in the desert a long time. ⁸Then I brought you to the land of the Amorites, who lived on the east side of the Jordan. They fought you, but I gave you victory over them. You took their land, and I destroyed them as you advanced. ⁹Then the king of Moab, Balak son of Zippor, fought against you. He sent word to Balaam son of Beor and asked him to put a curse on you. ¹⁰But I would not listen to Balaam, so he blessed you, and in this way I rescued you from Balak. ¹¹You crossed the Jordan and came to Jericho. The men of Jericho fought you, as did the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Girgashites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. But I gave you victory over them all. ¹²As you advanced, I threw them into panic in order to drive out the two Amorite kings. Your swords and bows had nothing to do with it. ¹³I gave you a land that you had never worked and cities that you had not built. Now you are living there and eating grapes from vines that you did not plant, and olives from trees that you did not plant.'

¹⁴"Now then," Joshua continued, "honor the LORD and serve him sincerely and faithfully. Get rid of the gods which your ancestors used to worship in Mesopotamia and in Egypt, and serve only the LORD. ¹⁵If you are not willing to serve him, decide today whom you will serve, the gods your ancestors worshiped in Mesopotamia or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are now living. As for my family and me, we will serve the LORD."

¹⁶The people replied, "We would never leave the LORD to serve other gods! ¹⁷The LORD our God brought our fathers and us out of slavery in Egypt, and we saw the miracles that he performed. He kept us safe wherever we went among all the nations through which we passed. ¹⁸As we advanced into this land, the LORD drove out all the Amorites who lived here. So we also will serve the LORD; he is our God."

¹⁹Joshua said to the people, "But you may not be able to serve the LORD. He is a holy God and will not forgive your sins. He will tolerate no rivals, ²⁰and if you leave him to serve foreign gods, he will turn against you and punish you. He will destroy you, even though he was good to you before."

²¹The people said to Joshua, "No! We will serve the LORD."

²²Joshua told them, "You are your own witnesses to the fact that you have chosen to serve the LORD."

"Yes," they said, "we are witnesses."

²³"Then get rid of those foreign gods that you have," he demanded, "and pledge your loyalty to the LORD, the God of Israel."

²⁴The people then said to Joshua, "We will serve the LORD our God. We will obey his commands."

²⁵So Joshua made a covenant for the people that day, and there at Shechem he gave them laws and rules to follow. ²⁶Joshua wrote these commands in the book of the Law of God. Then he took a large stone and set it up under the oak tree in the LORD's sanctuary. ²⁷He said to all the people, "This stone will be our witness. It has heard all the words that the LORD has spoken to us. So it will be a witness against you, to keep you from rebelling against your God." ²⁸Then Joshua sent the people away, and everyone returned to their own part of the land.

Joshua and Eleazar Die

²⁹After that, the LORD's servant Joshua son of Nun died at the age of a hundred and ten. ³⁰They buried him on his own land at Timnath Serah in the hill country of Ephraim north of Mount Gaash.

³¹As long as Joshua lived, the people of Israel served the LORD, and after his death they continued to do so as long as those leaders were alive who had seen for themselves everything that the LORD had done for Israel.

³²The body of Joseph, which the people of Israel had brought from Egypt, was buried at Shechem, in the piece of land that Jacob had bought from the sons of Hamor, the father of Shechem, for a hundred pieces of silver. This land was inherited by Joseph's descendants.

³³Eleazar son of Aaron died and was buried at Gibeah, the town in the hill country of Ephraim which had been given to his son Phinehas.

The Speeches of Elihu
(32.1--37.24)

Job 32 Because Job was convinced of his own innocence, the three men gave up trying to answer him. ²But a bystander named Elihu could not control his anger any longer, because Job was justifying himself and blaming God. (Elihu was the son of Barakel, a descendant of Buz, and belonged to the clan of Ram.) ³He was also angry with Job's three friends. They could not find any way to answer Job, and this made it appear that God was in the wrong. ⁴Because Elihu was the youngest one there, he had waited until everyone finished speaking. ⁵When he saw that the three men could not answer Job, he was angry ⁶and began to speak.

Elihu

I am young, and you are old,

so I was afraid to tell you what I think.

⁷I told myself that you ought to speak,

that you older men should share your wisdom.

⁸But it is the spirit of Almighty God

that comes to us and gives us wisdom.

⁹It is not growing old that makes us wise

or helps us to know what is right.

¹⁰So now I want you to listen to me;

let me tell you what I think.

¹¹I listened patiently while you were speaking

and waited while you searched for wise phrases.

¹²I paid close attention and heard you fail;

you have not disproved what Job has said.

¹³How can you claim you have discovered wisdom?

God must answer Job, for you have failed.

¹⁴Job was speaking to you, not to me,

but I would never answer the way you did.

¹⁵Words have failed them, Job;

they have no answer for you.

¹⁶Shall I go on waiting when they are silent?

They stand there with nothing more to say.

¹⁷No, I will give my own answer now

and tell you what I think.

¹⁸I can hardly wait to speak.

I can't hold back the words.

¹⁹If I don't get a chance to speak,

I will burst like a wineskin full of new wine.

²⁰I can't stand it; I have to speak.

²¹I will not take sides in this debate;

I am not going to flatter anyone.

²²I don't know how to flatter,

and God would quickly punish me if I did.

This reading is from The Holy Bible, Today's English Version, Second Edition copyright © American Bible Society, 1992;
Old Testament copyright © American Bible Society, 1976, 1992; New Testament © American Bible Society, 1966, 1971, 1976, 1992.

These daily Bible readings from the Good News Translation (GNT), formerly the Today's English Version (TEV), are published by BibleNetUSA. The web site and BibleCard® designs are by iCreative. All BibleCard® images are copyrighted by iCreative. All rights reserved.