Day 120 reading

Wisdom·Psalm 73:21–28

²¹When my heart was grieved and I was pierced within, ²²I was senseless and ignorant; I was a brute beast before You. ²³Yet I am always with You; You hold my right hand. ²⁴You guide me with Your counsel, and later receive me in glory. ²⁵Whom have I in heaven but You? And on earth I desire no one besides You. ²⁶My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. ²⁷Those far from You will surely perish; You destroy all who are unfaithful to You. ²⁸But as for me, it is good to draw near to God. I have made the Lord GOD my refuge, that I may proclaim all Your works.

New Testament·Luke 19:12–33

¹²So He said, “A man of noble birth went to a distant country to lay claim to his kingship and then return. ¹³Beforehand, he called ten of his servants and gave them ten minas. ‘Conduct business with this until I return,’ he said. ¹⁴But his subjects hated him and sent a delegation after him to say, ‘We do not want this man to rule over us.’ ¹⁵When he returned from procuring his kingship, he summoned the servants to whom he had given the money, to find out what each one had earned. ¹⁶The first servant came forward and said, ‘Master, your mina has produced ten more minas.’ ¹⁷His master replied, ‘Well done, good servant! Because you have been faithful in a very small matter, you shall have authority over ten cities.’ ¹⁸The second servant came and said, ‘Master, your mina has made five minas.’ ¹⁹And to this one he said, ‘You shall have authority over five cities.’ ²⁰Then another servant came and said, ‘Master, here is your mina, which I have laid away in a piece of cloth. ²¹For I was afraid of you, because you are a harsh man. You withdraw what you did not deposit and reap what you did not sow.’ ²²His master replied, ‘You wicked servant, I will judge you by your own words. So you knew that I am a harsh man, withdrawing what I did not deposit and reaping what I did not sow? ²³Why then did you not deposit my money in the bank, and upon my return I could have collected it with interest?’ ²⁴Then he told those standing by, ‘Take the mina from him and give it to the one who has ten minas.’ ²⁵‘Master,’ they said, ‘he already has ten!’ ²⁶He replied, ‘I tell you that everyone who has will be given more; but the one who does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him. ²⁷And these enemies of mine who were unwilling for me to rule over them, bring them here and slay them in front of me.’” ²⁸After Jesus had said this, He went on ahead, going up to Jerusalem. ²⁹As He approached Bethphage and Bethany at the Mount of Olives, He sent out two of His disciples, ³⁰saying, “Go into the village ahead of you, and as you enter it, you will find a colt tied there, on which no one has ever sat. Untie it and bring it here. ³¹If anyone asks, ‘Why are you untying it?’ tell him, ‘The Lord needs it.’” ³²So those who were sent went out and found it just as Jesus had told them. ³³As they were untying the colt, its owners asked, “Why are you untying the colt?”

Old Testament·Joshua 23–24

¹A long time after the LORD had given Israel rest from all the enemies around them, when Joshua was old and well along in years, ²he summoned all Israel, including its elders, leaders, judges, and officers. “I am old and well along in years,” he said, ³“and you have seen everything that the LORD your God has done to all these nations for your sake, because it was the LORD your God who fought for you. ⁴See, I have allotted as an inheritance to your tribes these remaining nations, including all the nations I have already cut off, from the Jordan westward to the Great Sea. ⁵The LORD your God will push them out of your way and drive them out before you, so that you can take possession of their land, as the LORD your God promised you. ⁶Be very strong, then, so that you can keep and obey all that is written in the Book of the Law of Moses, not turning aside from it to the right or to the left. ⁷So you are not to associate with these nations that remain among you. You must not call on the names of their gods or swear by them, and you must not serve them or bow down to them. ⁸Instead, you shall hold fast to the LORD your God, as you have done to this day. ⁹The LORD has driven out great and powerful nations before you, and to this day no one can stand against you. ¹⁰One of you can put a thousand to flight, because the LORD your God fights for you, just as He promised. ¹¹Therefore watch yourselves carefully, that you love the LORD your God. ¹²For if you turn away and cling to the rest of these nations that remain among you, and if you intermarry and associate with them, ¹³know for sure that the LORD your God will no longer drive out these nations before you. Instead, they will become for you a snare and a trap, a scourge in your sides and thorns in your eyes, until you perish from this good land that the LORD your God has given you. ¹⁴Now behold, today I am going the way of all the earth, and you know with all your heart and soul that not one of the good promises the LORD your God made to you has failed. Everything was fulfilled for you; not one promise has failed. ¹⁵But just as every good thing the LORD your God promised you has come to pass, likewise the LORD will bring upon you the calamity He has threatened, until He has destroyed you from this good land He has given you. ¹⁶If you transgress the covenant of the LORD your God, which He commanded you, and go and serve other gods and bow down to them, then the anger of the LORD will burn against you, and you will quickly perish from this good land He has given you.”

24Then Joshua assembled all the tribes of Israel at Shechem. He summoned the elders, leaders, judges, and officers of Israel, and they presented themselves before God. ²And Joshua said to all the people, “This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: ‘Long ago your fathers, including Terah the father of Abraham and Nahor, lived beyond the Euphrates and worshiped other gods. ³But I took your father Abraham from beyond the Euphrates and led him through all the land of Canaan, and I multiplied his descendants. I gave him Isaac, ⁴and to Isaac I gave Jacob and Esau. I gave Esau Mount Seir to possess, but Jacob and his sons went down to Egypt. ⁵Then I sent Moses and Aaron, and I afflicted the Egyptians by what I did there, and afterward I brought you out. ⁶When I brought your fathers out of Egypt and you reached the Red Sea, the Egyptians pursued them with chariots and horsemen as far as the Red Sea. ⁷So your fathers cried out to the LORD, and He put darkness between you and the Egyptians, over whom He brought the sea and engulfed them. Your very eyes saw what I did to the Egyptians. Then you lived in the wilderness for a long time. ⁸Later, I brought you to the land of the Amorites who lived beyond the Jordan. They fought against you, but I delivered them into your hand, that you should possess their land when I destroyed them before you. ⁹Then Balak son of Zippor, the king of Moab, set out to fight against Israel. He sent for Balaam son of Beor to curse you, ¹⁰but I would not listen to Balaam. So he blessed you again and again, and I delivered you from his hand. ¹¹After this, you crossed the Jordan and came to Jericho. The people of Jericho fought against you, as did the Amorites, Perizzites, Canaanites, Hittites, Girgashites, Hivites, and Jebusites, and I delivered them into your hand. ¹²I sent the hornet ahead of you, and it drove out the two Amorite kings before you, but not by your own sword or bow. ¹³So I gave you a land on which you did not toil and cities that you did not build, and now you live in them and eat from vineyards and olive groves that you did not plant.’ ¹⁴Now, therefore, fear the LORD and serve Him in sincerity and truth; cast aside the gods your fathers served beyond the Euphrates and in Egypt, and serve the LORD. ¹⁵But if it is unpleasing in your sight to serve the LORD, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your fathers served beyond the Euphrates, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living. As for me and my house, we will serve the LORD!” ¹⁶The people replied, “Far be it from us to forsake the LORD to serve other gods! ¹⁷For the LORD our God brought us and our fathers out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, and performed these great signs before our eyes. He also protected us throughout our journey and among all the nations through which we traveled. ¹⁸And the LORD drove out before us all the nations, including the Amorites who lived in the land. We too will serve the LORD, because He is our God!” ¹⁹But Joshua said to the people, “You are not able to serve the LORD, for He is a holy God; He is a jealous God; He will not forgive your rebellion or your sins. ²⁰If you forsake the LORD and serve foreign gods, He will turn and bring disaster on you and consume you, even after He has been good to you.” ²¹“No!” replied the people. “We will serve the LORD!” ²²Then Joshua told them, “You are witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen to serve the LORD.” “We are witnesses!” they said. ²³“Now, therefore,” he said, “get rid of the foreign gods among you and incline your hearts to the LORD, the God of Israel.” ²⁴So the people said to Joshua, “We will serve the LORD our God and obey His voice.” ²⁵On that day Joshua made a covenant for the people, and there at Shechem he established for them a statute and ordinance. ²⁶Joshua recorded these things in the Book of the Law of God. Then he took a large stone and set it up there under the oak that was near the sanctuary of the LORD. ²⁷And Joshua said to all the people, “You see this stone. It will be a witness against us, for it has heard all the words the LORD has spoken to us, and it will be a witness against you if you ever deny your God.” ²⁸Then Joshua sent the people away, each to his own inheritance. ²⁹Some time later, Joshua son of Nun, the servant of the LORD, died at the age of 110. ³⁰And they buried him in the land of his inheritance, at Timnath-serah in the hill country of Ephraim, north of Mount Gaash. ³¹Israel had served the LORD throughout the days of Joshua and of the elders who outlived him and who had experienced all the works that the LORD had done for Israel. ³²And the bones of Joseph, which the Israelites had brought up out of Egypt, were buried at Shechem in the plot of land that Jacob had purchased from the sons of Hamor, Shechem’s father, for a hundred pieces of silver. So it became an inheritance for Joseph’s descendants. ³³Eleazar son of Aaron also died, and they buried him at Gibeah, which had been given to his son Phinehas in the hill country of Ephraim.