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Daily Readings for December 20
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Job 25
1.Then Bildad the Shuhite answered, 2."Dominion and fear are with him. He makes peace in his high places. 3.Can his armies be counted? On whom does his light not arise? 4.How then can man be just with God? Or how can he who is born of a woman be clean? 5.Behold, even the moon has no brightness, and the stars are not pure in his sight; 6.How much less man, who is a worm, the son of man, who is a worm!"
Job 26
1.Then Job answered, 2."How have you helped him who is without power! How have you saved the arm that has no strength! 3.How have you counseled him who has no wisdom, and plentifully declared sound knowledge! 4.To whom have you uttered words? Whose spirit came forth from you?
5."Those who are deceased tremble, those beneath the waters and all that live in them. 6.Sheol10 is naked before God, and Abaddon11 has no covering. 7.He stretches out the north over empty space, and hangs the earth on nothing. 8.He binds up the waters in his thick clouds, and the cloud is not burst under them. 9.He encloses the face of his throne, and spreads his cloud on it. 10.He has described a boundary on the surface of the waters, and to the confines of light and darkness. 11.The pillars of heaven tremble and are astonished at his rebuke. 12.He stirs up the sea with his power, and by his understanding he strikes through Rahab. 13.By his Spirit the heavens are garnished. His hand has pierced the swift serpent. 14.Behold, these are but the outskirts of his ways. How small a whisper do we hear of him! But the thunder of his power who can understand?"
Job 27
1.Job again took up his parable, and said, 2."As God lives, who has taken away my right, the Almighty, who has made my soul bitter. 3.(For the length of my life is still in me, and the spirit of God is in my nostrils); 4.surely my lips shall not speak unrighteousness, neither shall my tongue utter deceit. 5.Far be it from me that I should justify you. Until I die I will not put away my integrity from me. 6.I hold fast to my righteousness, and will not let it go. My heart shall not reproach me so long as I live.
7."Let my enemy be as the wicked. Let him who rises up against me be as the unrighteous. 8.For what is the hope of the godless, when he is cut off, when God takes away his life? 9.Will God hear his cry when trouble comes on him? 10.Will he delight himself in the Almighty, and call on God at all times? 11.I will teach you about the hand of God. That which is with the Almighty will I not conceal. 12.Behold, all of you have seen it yourselves; why then have you become altogether vain?
13."This is the portion of a wicked man with God, the heritage of oppressors, which they receive from the Almighty. 14.If his children are multiplied, it is for the sword. His offspring shall not be satisfied with bread. 15.Those who remain of him shall be buried in death. His widows shall make no lamentation. 16.Though he heap up silver as the dust, and prepare clothing as the clay; 17.he may prepare it, but the just shall put it on, and the innocent shall divide the silver. 18.He builds his house as the moth, as a booth which the watchman makes. 19.He lies down rich, but he shall not do so again. He opens his eyes, and he is not. 20.Terrors overtake him like waters. A storm steals him away in the night. 21.The east wind carries him away, and he departs. It sweeps him out of his place. 22.For it hurls at him, and does not spare, as he flees away from his hand. 23.Men shall clap their hands at him, and shall hiss him out of his place.
Zechariah 2
1.I lifted up my eyes, and saw, and behold, a man with a measuring line in his hand. 2.Then I asked, "Where are you going?"
He said to me, "To measure Jerusalem, to see what is its breadth and what is its length."
3.Behold, the angel who talked with me went forth, and another angel went out to meet him, 4.and said to him, "Run, speak to this young man, saying, 'Jerusalem will be inhabited as villages without walls, because of the multitude of men and livestock in it. 5.For I,' says Yahweh, 'will be to her a wall of fire around it, and I will be the glory in the midst of her. 6.Come! Come! Flee from the land of the north,' says Yahweh; 'for I have spread you abroad as the four winds of the sky,' says Yahweh. 7.'Come, Zion! Escape, you who dwell with the daughter of Babylon.' 8.For thus says Yahweh of Armies: 'For honor he has sent me to the nations which plundered you; for he who touches you touches the apple of his eye. 9.For, behold, I will shake my hand over them, and they will be a spoil to those who served them; and you will know that Yahweh of Armies has sent me. 10.Sing and rejoice, daughter of Zion; for, behold, I come, and I will dwell in the midst of you,' says Yahweh. 11.Many nations shall join themselves to Yahweh in that day, and shall be my people; and I will dwell in the midst of you, and you shall know that Yahweh of Armies has sent me to you. 12.Yahweh will inherit Judah as his portion in the holy land, and will again choose Jerusalem. 13.Be silent, all flesh, before Yahweh; for he has roused himself from his holy habitation!"
Zechariah 3
1.He showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of Yahweh, and Satan standing at his right hand to be his adversary. 2.Yahweh said to Satan, "Yahweh rebuke you, Satan! Yes, Yahweh who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you! Isn't this a burning stick plucked out of the fire?"
3.Now Joshua was clothed with filthy garments, and was standing before the angel. 4.He answered and spoke to those who stood before him, saying, "Take the filthy garments off of him." To him he said, "Behold, I have caused your iniquity to pass from you, and I will clothe you with rich clothing."
5.I said, "Let them set a clean turban on his head."
So they set a clean turban on his head, and clothed him; and the angel of Yahweh was standing by. 6.The angel of Yahweh protested to Joshua, saying, 7."Thus says Yahweh of Armies: 'If you will walk in my ways, and if you will follow my instructions, then you also shall judge my house, and shall also keep my courts, and I will give you a place of access among these who stand by. 8.Hear now, Joshua the high priest, you and your fellows who sit before you; for they are men who are a sign: for, behold, I will bring forth my servant, the Branch. 9.For, behold, the stone that I have set before Joshua; on one stone are seven eyes: behold, I will engrave its engraving,' says Yahweh of Armies, 'and I will remove the iniquity of that land in one day. 10.In that day,' says Yahweh of Armies, 'you will invite every man his neighbor under the vine and under the fig tree.'"
Jude 1
1.Jude,1 a servant of Jesus Christ, and brother of James, to those who are called, sanctified by God the Father, and kept for Jesus Christ: 2.Mercy to you and peace and love be multiplied.
3.Beloved, while I was very eager to write to you about our common salvation, I was constrained to write to you exhorting you to contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints. 4.For there are certain men who crept in secretly, even those who were long ago written about for this condemnation: ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into indecency, and denying our only Master, God, and Lord, Jesus Christ.
5.Now I desire to remind you, though you already know this, that the Lord, having saved a people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who didn't believe. 6.Angels who didn't keep their first domain, but deserted their own dwelling place, he has kept in everlasting bonds under darkness for the judgment of the great day. 7.Even as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities around them, having, in the same way as these, given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh, are set forth as an example, suffering the punishment of eternal fire. 8.Yet in the same way, these also in their dreaming defile the flesh, despise authority, and slander celestial beings. 9.But Michael, the archangel, when contending with the devil and arguing about the body of Moses, dared not bring against him an abusive condemnation, but said, "May the Lord rebuke you!" 10.But these speak evil of whatever things they don't know. What they understand naturally, like the creatures without reason, they are destroyed in these things. 11.Woe to them! For they went in the way of Cain, and ran riotously in the error of Balaam for hire, and perished in Korah's rebellion. 12.These are hidden rocky reefs in your love feasts when they feast with you, shepherds who without fear feed themselves; clouds without water, carried along by winds; autumn leaves without fruit, twice dead, plucked up by the roots; 13.wild waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame; wandering stars, for whom the blackness of darkness has been reserved forever. 14.About these also Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied, saying, "Behold, the Lord came with ten thousands of his holy ones, 15.to execute judgment on all, and to convict all the ungodly of all their works of ungodliness which they have done in an ungodly way, and of all the hard things which ungodly sinners have spoken against him." 16.These are murmurers and complainers, walking after their lusts (and their mouth speaks proud things), showing respect of persons to gain advantage.
17.But you, beloved, remember the words which have been spoken before by the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ. 18.They said to you that "In the last time there will be mockers, walking after their own ungodly lusts." 19.These are they who cause divisions, and are sensual, not having the Spirit. 20.But you, beloved, keep building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit. 21.Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to eternal life. 22.On some have compassion, making a distinction, 23.and some save, snatching them out of the fire with fear, hating even the clothing stained by the flesh.
24.Now to him who is able to keep them2 from stumbling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory in great joy, 25.to God our Savior, who alone is wise, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and forever. Amen.