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Job 22-24

Eliphaz

22 Then Eliphaz the Temanite replied:

²"Can a man be of benefit to God?
Can even a wise person benefit him?
³What pleasure would it give the Almighty if you were righteous?
What would he gain if your ways were blameless?

⁴"Is it for your piety that he rebukes you
    and brings charges against you?
⁵Is not your wickedness great?
    Are not your sins endless?
⁶You demanded security from your relatives for no reason;
    you stripped people of their clothing, leaving them naked.
⁷You gave no water to the weary
    and you withheld food from the hungry,
⁸though you were a powerful man, owning land—
    an honored man, living on it.
⁹And you sent widows away empty-handed
    and broke the strength of the fatherless.
¹⁰That is why snares are all around you,
    why sudden peril terrifies you,
¹¹why it is so dark you cannot see,
    and why a flood of water covers you.

¹²"Is not God in the heights of heaven?
    And see how lofty are the highest stars!
¹³Yet you say, 'What does God know?
    Does he judge through such darkness?
¹⁴Thick clouds veil him, so he does not see us
    as he goes about in the vaulted heavens.'
¹⁵Will you keep to the old path
    that the wicked have trod?
¹⁶They were carried off before their time,
    their foundations washed away by a flood.
¹⁷They said to God, 'Leave us alone!
    What can the Almighty do to us?'
¹⁸Yet it was he who filled their houses with good things,
    so I stand aloof from the plans of the wicked.
¹⁹The righteous see their ruin and rejoice;
    the innocent mock them, saying,
²⁰'Surely our foes are destroyed,
    and fire devours their wealth.'

²¹"Submit to God and be at peace with him;
    in this way prosperity will come to you.
²²Accept instruction from his mouth
    and lay up his words in your heart.
²³If you return to the Almighty, you will be restored:
    If you remove wickedness far from your tent
²⁴and assign your nuggets to the dust,
    your gold of Ophir to the rocks in the ravines,
²⁵then the Almighty will be your gold,
    the choicest silver for you.
²⁶Surely then you will find delight in the Almighty
    and will lift up your face to God.
²⁷You will pray to him, and he will hear you,
    and you will fulfill your vows.
²⁸What you decide on will be done,
    and light will shine on your ways.
²⁹When people are brought low and you say, 'Lift them up!'
    then he will save the downcast.
³⁰He will deliver even one who is not innocent,
    who will be delivered through the cleanness of your hands."

Job

23 Then Job replied:

²"Even today my complaint is bitter;
    his hand is heavy in spite of my groaning.
³If only I knew where to find him;
    if only I could go to his dwelling!
⁴I would state my case before him
    and fill my mouth with arguments.
⁵I would find out what he would answer me,
    and consider what he would say to me.
⁶Would he vigorously oppose me?
    No, he would not press charges against me.
⁷There the upright can establish their innocence before him,
    and there I would be delivered forever from my judge.

⁸"But if I go to the east, he is not there;
    if I go to the west, I do not find him.
⁹When he is at work in the north, I do not see him;
    when he turns to the south, I catch no glimpse of him.
¹⁰But he knows the way that I take;
    when he has tested me, I will come forth as gold.
¹¹My feet have closely followed his steps;
    I have kept to his way without turning aside.
¹²I have not departed from the commands of his lips;
    I have treasured the words of his mouth more than my daily bread.

¹³"But he stands alone, and who can oppose him?
    He does whatever he pleases.
¹⁴He carries out his decree against me,
    and many such plans he still has in store.
¹⁵That is why I am terrified before him;
    when I think of all this, I fear him.
¹⁶God has made my heart faint;
    the Almighty has terrified me.
¹⁷Yet I am not silenced by the darkness,
    by the thick darkness that covers my face.

24 "Why does the Almighty not set times for judgment?
    Why must those who know him look in vain for such days?
²There are those who move boundary stones;
    they pasture flocks they have stolen.
³They drive away the orphan's donkey
    and take the widow's ox in pledge.
⁴They thrust the needy from the path
    and force all the poor of the land into hiding.
⁵Like wild donkeys in the desert,
    the poor go about their labor of foraging food;
    the wasteland provides food for their children.
⁶They gather fodder in the fields
    and glean in the vineyards of the wicked.
⁷Lacking clothes, they spend the night naked;
    they have nothing to cover themselves in the cold.
⁸They are drenched by mountain rains
    and hug the rocks for lack of shelter.
⁹The fatherless child is snatched from the breast;
    the infant of the poor is seized for a debt.
¹⁰Lacking clothes, they go about naked;
    they carry the sheaves, but still go hungry.
¹¹They crush olives among the terraces;
    they tread the winepresses, yet suffer thirst.
¹²The groans of the dying rise from the city,
    and the souls of the wounded cry out for help.
    But God charges no one with wrongdoing.

¹³"There are those who rebel against the light,
    who do not know its ways
    or stay in its paths.
¹⁴When daylight is gone, the murderer rises up,
    kills the poor and needy,
    and in the night steals forth like a thief.
¹⁵The eye of the adulterer watches for dusk;
    he thinks, 'No eye will see me,'
    and he keeps his face concealed.
¹⁶In the dark, thieves break into houses,
    but by day they shut themselves in;
    they want nothing to do with the light.
¹⁷For all of them, midnight is their morning;
    they make friends with the terrors of darkness.

¹⁸"Yet they are foam on the surface of the water;
    their portion of the land is cursed,
    so that no one goes to the vineyards.
¹⁹As heat and drought snatch away the melted snow,
    so the grave snatches away those who have sinned.
²⁰The womb forgets them,
    the worm feasts on them;
the wicked are no longer remembered
    but are broken like a tree.
²¹They prey on the barren and childless woman,
    and to the widow they show no kindness.
²²But God drags away the mighty by his power;
    though they become established, they have no assurance of life.
²³He may let them rest in a feeling of security,
    but his eyes are on their ways.
²⁴For a little while they are exalted, and then they are gone;
    they are brought low and gathered up like all others;
    they are cut off like heads of grain.

²⁵"If this is not so, who can prove me false
and reduce my words to nothing?"

New International Version (NIV)

Acts 11

Peter Explains His Actions

11 The apostles and the believers throughout Judea heard that the Gentiles also had received the word of God. ²So when Peter went up to Jerusalem, the circumcised believers criticized him ³and said, "You went into the house of uncircumcised men and ate with them."

⁴Starting from the beginning, Peter told them the whole story: ⁵"I was in the city of Joppa praying, and in a trance I saw a vision. I saw something like a large sheet being let down from heaven by its four corners, and it came down to where I was. ⁶I looked into it and saw four-footed animals of the earth, wild beasts, reptiles and birds. ⁷Then I heard a voice telling me, 'Get up, Peter. Kill and eat.'

⁸"I replied, 'Surely not, Lord! Nothing impure or unclean has ever entered my mouth.'

⁹"The voice spoke from heaven a second time, 'Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.' ¹⁰This happened three times, and then it was all pulled up to heaven again.

¹¹"Right then three men who had been sent to me from Caesarea stopped at the house where I was staying. ¹²The Spirit told me to have no hesitation about going with them. These six brothers also went with me, and we entered the man's house. ¹³He told us how he had seen an angel appear in his house and say, 'Send to Joppa for Simon who is called Peter. ¹⁴He will bring you a message through which you and all your household will be saved.'

¹⁵"As I began to speak, the Holy Spirit came on them as he had come on us at the beginning. ¹⁶Then I remembered what the Lord had said: 'John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.' ¹⁷So if God gave them the same gift he gave us who believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I to think that I could stand in God's way?"

¹⁸When they heard this, they had no further objections and praised God, saying, "So then, even to Gentiles God has granted repentance that leads to life."

The Church in Antioch

¹⁹Now those who had been scattered by the persecution that broke out when Stephen was killed traveled as far as Phoenicia, Cyprus and Antioch, spreading the word only among Jews. ²⁰Some of them, however, men from Cyprus and Cyrene, went to Antioch and began to speak to Greeks also, telling them the good news about the Lord Jesus. ²¹The Lord's hand was with them, and a great number of people believed and turned to the Lord.

²²News of this reached the church in Jerusalem, and they sent Barnabas to Antioch. ²³When he arrived and saw what the grace of God had done, he was glad and encouraged them all to remain true to the Lord with all their hearts. ²⁴He was a good man, full of the Holy Spirit and faith, and a great number of people were brought to the Lord.

²⁵Then Barnabas went to Tarsus to look for Saul, ²⁶and when he found him, he brought him to Antioch. So for a whole year Barnabas and Saul met with the church and taught great numbers of people. The disciples were called Christians first at Antioch.

²⁷During this time some prophets came down from Jerusalem to Antioch. ²⁸One of them, named Agabus, stood up and through the Spirit predicted that a severe famine would spread over the entire Roman world. (This happened during the reign of Claudius.) ²⁹The disciples, as each one was able, decided to provide help for the brothers and sisters living in Judea. ³⁰This they did, sending their gift to the elders by Barnabas and Saul.

New International Version (NIV)

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Old and New Testament Reading Plan: NIV- July 02, 2023