Professor Horner’s Reading Plan

¹“Take care not to practice your righteousness in the sight of people, to be noticed by them; otherwise you have no reward with your Father who is in heaven.

²“So when you give to the poor, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, so that they will be praised by people. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full.

³But when yougive to the poor, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing,

⁴so that your charitable giving will be in secret; and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.

⁵“And when you pray, you are not to be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on the street corners so that they will be seen by people. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full.

⁶But as for you, when you pray, go into your inner room, close your door, and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.

⁷“And when you are praying, do not use thoughtless repetition as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard because of their many words.

⁸So do not be like them; for your Father knows what you need before you ask Him.

⁹“Pray, then, in this way: ‘Our Father, who is in heaven, Hallowed be Your name.

¹⁰Your kingdom come. Your will be done, On earth as it is in heaven.

¹¹Give us this day our daily bread.

¹²And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.

¹³And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from evil. ’

¹⁴For if you forgive other people for their offenses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.

¹⁵But if you do not forgive other people, then your Father will not forgive youroffenses.

¹⁶“Now whenever you fast, do not make a gloomy face as the hypocrites do, for they distort their faces so that they will be noticed by people when they are fasting. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full.

¹⁷But as for you, when you fast,anoint your head and wash your face,

¹⁸so that your fasting will not be noticed by people but by your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.

¹⁹“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal.

²⁰But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal;

²¹for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

²²“The eye is the lamp of the body; so then, if your eye is clear, your whole body will be full of light.

²³But if your eye isbad, your whole body will be full of darkness. So if the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!

²⁴“No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.

²⁵“For this reason I say to you, do not be worried about your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink; nor for your body, as to what you will put on. Is life not more than food, and the body more than clothing?

²⁶Look at the birds of the sky, that they do not sow, nor reap, nor gather crops into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more important than they?

²⁷And which of you by worrying can add a singleday to hislife’s span?

²⁸And why are you worried about clothing? Notice how the lilies of the field grow; they do not labor nor do they spin thread for cloth,

²⁹yet I say to you that not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these.

³⁰But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, will He not much more clothe you? You of little faith!

³¹Do not worry then, saying, ‘What are we to eat?’ or ‘What are we to drink?’ or ‘What are we to wear for clothing?’

³²For the Gentiles eagerly seek all these things; for your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.

³³Butseek firstHis kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will beprovided to you.

³⁴“So do not worry about tomorrow; for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

¹Now it came about, when mankind began to multiply on the face of the land, and daughters were born to them,

²that the sons of God saw that the daughters of mankind were beautiful; and they took wives for themselves, whomever they chose.

³Then the LORD said, “My Spirit will not remain with man forever, because he is also flesh; nevertheless his days shall be 120 years.”

⁴The Nephilim were on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of mankind, and they bore children to them. Those were the mighty men who were of old, men of renown.

⁵Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of mankind was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continually.

⁶So the LORD was sorry that He had made mankind on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart.

⁷Then the LORD said, “I will wipe out mankind whom I have created from the face of the land; mankind, and animals as well, and crawling things, and the birds of the sky. For I am sorry that I have made them.”

⁸But Noah found favor in the eyes of the LORD.

⁹These are the records of the generations of Noah. Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his generation. Noah walked with God.

¹⁰And Noah fathered three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

¹¹Now the earth was corrupt in the sight of God, and the earth was filled with violence.

¹²And God looked on the earth, and behold, it was corrupt; for humanity had corrupted its way upon the earth.

¹³Then God said to Noah, “The end of humanity has come before Me; for the earth is filled with violence because of people; and behold, I am about to destroy them with the earth.

¹⁴Make for yourself an ark of gopher wood; you shall make the ark with compartments, and cover it inside and out with pitch.

¹⁵This is how you shall make it: the length of the ark shall be three hundred cubits, its width fifty cubits, and its height thirty cubits.

¹⁶You shall make a window for the ark, and finish it to a cubit from the top; and put the door of the ark on the side; you shall make it with lower, second, and third decks.

¹⁷Now behold, I Myself am bringing the flood of water upon the earth, to destroy all flesh in which there is the breath of life, from under heaven; everything that is on the earth shall perish.

¹⁸But I will establish My covenant with you; and you shall enter the ark—you, your sons, your wife, and your sons’ wives with you.

¹⁹And of every living thing of all flesh, you shall bring two of every kind into the ark, to keep them alive with you; they shall be male and female.

²⁰Of the birds according to their kind, and of the animals according to their kind, of every crawling thing of the ground according to its kind, two of every kind will come to you to keep them alive.

²¹As for you, take for yourself some of every food that is edible, and gather it to yourself; and it shall be food for you and them.”

²²So Noah did these things; according to everything that God had commanded him, so he did.

¹What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase?

²Far from it! How shall we who died to sin still live in it?

³Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death?

⁴Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too may walk in newness of life.

⁵For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection,

⁶knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin;

⁷for the one who has died is freed from sin.

⁸Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him,

⁹knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, is never to die again; death no longer is master over Him.

¹⁰For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all time; but the life that He lives, He lives to God.

¹¹So you too, consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus.

¹²Therefore sin is not to reign in your mortal body so that you obey its lusts,

¹³and do not go on presenting the parts of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness; but present yourselves to God as those who are alive from the dead, and your body’s parts as instruments of righteousness for God.

¹⁴For sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under the Law but under grace.

¹⁵What then? Are we to sin because we are not under the Law but under grace? Far from it!

¹⁶Do you not know that the one to whom you present yourselves as slaves for obedience, you are slaves of that same one whom you obey, either of sin resulting in death, or of obedience resulting in righteousness?

¹⁷But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were entrusted,

¹⁸and after being freed from sin, you became slaves to righteousness.

¹⁹I am speaking in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh. For just as you presented the parts of your body as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness, resulting in further lawlessness, so now present your body’s parts as slaves to righteousness, resulting in sanctification.

²⁰For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in relation to righteousness.

²¹Therefore what benefit were you then deriving from the things of which you are now ashamed? For the outcome of those things is death.

²²But now having been freed from sin and enslaved to God, you derive your benefit, resulting in sanctification, and the outcome, eternal life.

²³For the wages of sin is death, but the gracious gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

¹Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy, To the church of the Thessalonians in God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ:

²Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

³We ought always to give thanks to God for you, brothers and sisters, as is only fitting, because your faith is increasing abundantly, and the love of each and every one of you toward one another grows ever greater.

⁴As a result, we ourselves speak proudly of you among the churches of God for your perseverance and faith in the midst of all your persecutions and afflictions which you endure.

⁵This is a plain indication of God’s righteous judgment so that you will be considered worthy of the kingdom of God, for which you indeed are suffering.

⁶For after all it is only right for God to repay with affliction those who afflict you,

⁷and to give relief to you who are afflicted, along with us, when the Lord Jesus will be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels

⁸in flaming fire, dealing out retribution to those who do not know God, and to those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus.

⁹These people will pay the penalty of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power,

¹⁰when He comes to be glorified among His saints on that day, and to be marveled at among all who have believed—because our testimony to you was believed.

¹¹To this end also we pray for you always, that our God will consider you worthy of your calling, and fulfill every desire for goodness and the work of faith with power,

¹²so that the name of our Lord Jesus will be glorified in you, and you in Him, in accordance with the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.

¹Then Job responded,

²“Oh if only my grief were actually weighed And laid in the balances together with my disaster!

³For then it would be heavier than the sand of the seas; For that reason my words have been rash.

⁴For the arrows of the Almighty are within me, My spirit drinks their poison; The terrors of God line up against me.

⁵Does the wild donkey bray over his grass, Or does the ox low over his feed?

⁶Can something tasteless be eaten without salt, Or is there any taste in the juice of an alkanet plant?

⁷My soul refuses to touch them; They are like loathsome food to me.

⁸“Oh, that my request might come to pass, And that God would grant my hope!

⁹Oh, that God would decide to crush me, That He would let loose His hand and cut me off!

¹⁰But it is still my comfort, And I rejoice in unsparing pain, That I have not denied the words of the Holy One.

¹¹What is my strength, that I should wait? And what is my end, that I should endure?

¹²Is my strength the strength of stones, Or is my flesh bronze?

¹³Is it that my help is not within me, And that a good outcome is driven away from me?

¹⁴“For the despairing man there should be kindness from his friend; So that he does not abandon the fear of the Almighty.

¹⁵My brothers have acted deceitfully like a wadi, Like the torrents of wadis which drain away,

¹⁶Which are darkened because of ice, And into which the snow melts.

¹⁷When they dry up, they vanish; When it is hot, they disappear from their place.

¹⁸The paths of their course wind along, They go up into wasteland and perish.

¹⁹The caravans of Tema looked, The travelers of Sheba hoped for them.

²⁰They were put to shame, for they had trusted, They came there and were humiliated.

²¹Indeed, you have now become such, You see terrors and are afraid.

²²Have I said, ‘Give me something,’ Or, ‘Offer a bribe for me from your wealth,’

²³Or, ‘Save me from the hand of the enemy,’ Or, ‘Redeem me from the hand of the tyrants’?

²⁴“Teach me, and I will be silent; And show me how I have done wrong.

²⁵How painful are honest words! But what does your argument prove?

²⁶Do you intend to rebuke my words, When the words of one in despair belong to the wind?

²⁷You would even cast lots for the orphans, And barter over your friend.

²⁸Now please look at me, And see if I am lying to your face.

²⁹Please turn away, let there be no injustice; Turn away, my righteousness is still in it.

³⁰Is there injustice on my tongue? Does my palate not discern disasters?

¹LORD, do not rebuke me in Your anger, Nor discipline me in Your wrath.

²Be gracious to me, LORD, for I am frail; Heal me, LORD, for my bones are horrified.

³And my soul is greatly horrified; But You, LORD—how long?

⁴Return, LORD, rescue my soul; Save me because of Your mercy.

⁵For there is no mention of You in death; In Sheol, who will praise You?

⁶I am weary with my sighing; Every night I make my bed swim, I flood my couch with my tears.

⁷My eye has wasted away with grief; It has grown old because of all my enemies.

⁸Leave me, all you who practice injustice, For the LORD has heard the sound of my weeping.

⁹The LORD has heard my pleading, The LORD receives my prayer.

¹⁰All my enemies will be put to shame and greatly horrified; They shall turn back, they will suddenly be put to shame.

¹My son, if you have become a guarantor for your neighbor, Or have given a handshake for a stranger,

²If you have been ensnared by the words of your mouth, Or caught by the words of your mouth,

³Then do this, my son, and save yourself: Since you have come into the hand of your neighbor, Go, humble yourself, and be urgent with your neighbor to free yourself.

⁴Give no sleep to your eyes, Nor slumber to your eyelids;

⁵Save yourself like a gazelle from the hunter’s hand, And like a bird from the hand of the fowler.

⁶Go to the ant, you lazy one, Observe its ways and be wise,

⁷Which, having no chief, Officer, or ruler,

⁸Prepares its food in the summer And gathers its provision in the harvest.

⁹How long will you lie down, you lazy one? When will you arise from your sleep?

¹⁰“A little sleep, a little slumber, A little folding of the hands to rest,”

¹¹Then your poverty will come in like a drifter, And your need like an armed man.

¹²A worthless person, a wicked man, Is one who walks with a perverse mouth,

¹³Who winks with his eyes, who signals with his feet, Who points with his fingers;

¹⁴Who, with perversion in his heart, continually devises evil, Who spreads strife.

¹⁵Therefore his disaster will come suddenly; Instantly he will be broken and there will be no healing.

¹⁶There are six things that the LORD hates, Seven that are an abomination to Him:

¹⁷Haughty eyes, a lying tongue, And hands that shed innocent blood,

¹⁸A heart that devises wicked plans, Feet that run rapidly to evil,

¹⁹A false witness who declares lies, And one who spreads strife among brothers.

²⁰My son, comply with the commandment of your father, And do not ignore the teaching of your mother;

²¹Bind them continually on your heart; Tie them around your neck.

²²When you walk, they will guide you; When you sleep, they will watch over you; And when you awake, they will talk to you.

²³For the commandment is a lamp and the teaching is light; And rebukes for discipline are the way of life

²⁴To keep you from the evil woman, From the smooth tongue of the foreign woman.

²⁵Do not desire her beauty in your heart, Nor let her capture you with her eyelids.

²⁶For the price of a prostitute reduces one to a loaf of bread, And an adulteress hunts for a precious life.

²⁷Can anyone take fire in his lap And his clothes not be burned?

²⁸Or can a person walk on hot coals And his feet not be scorched?

²⁹So is the one who goes in to his neighbor’s wife; Whoever touches her will not go unpunished.

³⁰People do not despise a thief if he steals To satisfy himself when he is hungry;

³¹But when he is found, he must repay seven times as much; He must give up all the property of his house.

³²One who commits adultery with a woman is lacking sense; He who would destroy himself commits it.

³³He will find wounds and disgrace, And his shame will not be removed.

³⁴For jealousy enrages a man, And he will not have compassion on the day of vengeance.

³⁵He will not accept any settlement, Nor will he be satisfied though you make it a large gift.

¹Now Jericho was tightly shut because of the sons of Israel; no one went out and no one came in.

²But the LORD said to Joshua, “See, I have handed Jericho over to you, with its king and the valiant warriors.

³And you shall march around the city, all the men of war circling the city once. You shall do so for six days.

⁴Also seven priests shall carry seven trumpets of rams’ horns in front of the ark; then on the seventh day you shall march around the city seven times, and the priests shall blow the trumpets.

⁵It shall be that when they make a long blast with the ram’s horn, and when you hear the sound of the trumpet, all the people shall shout with a great shout; and the wall of the city will fall down flat, and the people shall go up, everyone straight ahead.”

⁶So Joshua the son of Nun called the priests and said to them, “Take up the ark of the covenant, and have seven priests carry seven trumpets of rams’ horns in front of the ark of the LORD.”

⁷Then he said to the people, “Go forward and march around the city, and the armed men shall go on ahead of the ark of the LORD.”

⁸And it was so, that when Joshua had spoken to the people, the seven priests carrying the seven trumpets of rams’ horns before the LORD went forward and blew the trumpets; and the ark of the covenant of the LORD followed them.

⁹And the armed men went ahead of the priests who blew the trumpets, and the rear guard came after the ark, while they continued to blow the trumpets.

¹⁰But Joshua commanded the people, saying, “You shall not shout nor let your voice be heard, nor let a word proceed from your mouth, until the day I tell you, ‘Shout!’ Then you shall shout!”

¹¹So he had the ark of the LORD taken around the city, circling it once; then they came into the camp and spent the night in the camp.

¹²Now Joshua got up early in the morning, and the priests took up the ark of the LORD.

¹³Then the seven priests carrying the seven trumpets of rams’ horns in front of the ark of the LORD went on continually, and blew the trumpets; and the armed men went ahead of them, and the rear guard came after the ark of the LORD, while they continued to blow the trumpets.

¹⁴So the second day they marched around the city once and returned to the camp; they did the same for six days.

¹⁵Then on the seventh day they got up early at the dawning of the day and marched around the city in the same way seven times; only on that day did they march around the city seven times.

¹⁶And at the seventh time, when the priests blew the trumpets, Joshua said to the people, “Shout! For the LORD has given you the city.

¹⁷But the city shall be designated for destruction, it and everything that is in it belongs to the LORD; only Rahab the prostitute and all who are with her in the house shall live, because she hid the messengers whom we sent.

¹⁸But as for you, only keep yourselves from the things designated for destruction, so that you do not covet them and take some of the designated things, and turn the camp of Israel into something designated for destruction and bring disaster on it.

¹⁹But all the silver and gold, and articles of bronze and iron are holy to the LORD; they shall go into the treasury of the LORD.”

²⁰So the people shouted, and the priests blew the trumpets; and when the people heard the sound of the trumpet, the people shouted with a great shout, and the wall fell down flat, so that the people went up into the city, everyone straight ahead, and they took the city.

²¹They utterly destroyed everything in the city, both man and woman, young and old, and ox, sheep, and donkey, with the edge of the sword.

²²And Joshua said to the two men who had spied out the land, “Go into the prostitute’s house and bring the woman and all she has out of there, just as you have sworn to her.”

²³So the young men who were spies went in and brought out Rahab, her father, her mother, her brothers, and all she had; they also brought out all her relatives, and placed them outside the camp of Israel.

²⁴Then they burned the city with fire, and all that was in it. Only the silver and gold, and the articles of bronze and iron, they put into the treasury of the house of the LORD.

²⁵However, Rahab the prostitute and her father’s household and all she had, Joshua spared; and she has lived in the midst of Israel to this day, because she hid the messengers whom Joshua sent to spy out Jericho.

²⁶Then Joshua made them take an oath at that time, saying, “Cursed before the LORD is the man who rises up and builds this city Jericho; with the loss of his firstborn he will lay its foundation, and with the loss of his youngest son he will set up its gates.”

²⁷So the LORD was with Joshua, and his fame was in all the land.

¹In the year of King Uzziah’s death I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, lofty and exalted, with the train of His robe filling the temple.

²Seraphim were standing above Him, each having six wings: with two each covered his face, and with two each covered his feet, and with two each flew.

³And one called out to another and said, “Holy, Holy, Holy, is the LORD of armies. The whole earth is full of His glory.”

⁴And the foundations of the thresholds trembled at the voice of him who called out, while the temple was filling with smoke.

⁵Then I said, “Woe to me, for I am ruined! Because I am a man of unclean lips, And I live among a people of unclean lips; For my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of armies.”

⁶Then one of the seraphim flew to me with a burning coal in his hand, which he had taken from the altar with tongs.

⁷He touched my mouth with it and said, “Behold, this has touched your lips; and your guilt is taken away and atonement is made for your sin.”

⁸Then I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for Us?” Then I said, “Here am I. Send me!”

⁹And He said, “Go, and tell this people: ‘Keep on listening, but do not understand; And keep on looking, but do not gain knowledge.’

¹⁰Make the hearts of this people insensitive, Their ears dull, And their eyes blind, So that they will not see with their eyes, Hear with their ears, Understand with their hearts, And return and be healed.”

¹¹Then I said, “Lord, how long?” And He answered, “Until cities are devastated and without inhabitant, Houses are without people And the land is utterly desolate,

¹²The LORD has completely removed people, And there are many forsaken places in the midst of the land.

¹³Yet there will still be a tenth portion in it, And it will again be subject to burning, Like a terebinth or an oak Whose stump remains when it is cut down. The holy seed is its stump.”

¹Now at this time, as the disciples were increasing in number, a complaint developed on the part of the Hellenistic Jews against the native Hebrews, because their widows were being overlooked in the daily serving of food.

²So the twelve summoned the congregation of the disciples and said, “It is not desirable for us to neglect the word of God in order to serve tables.

³Instead, brothers and sisters, select from among you seven men of good reputation, full of the Spirit and of wisdom, whom we may put in charge of this task.

⁴But we will devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word.”

⁵The announcement found approval with the whole congregation; and they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit, and Philip, Prochorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas, and Nicolas, a proselyte from Antioch.

⁶And they brought these men before the apostles; and after praying, they laid their hands on them.

⁷The word of God kept spreading; and the number of the disciples continued to increase greatly in Jerusalem, and a great many of the priests were becoming obedient to the faith.

⁸And Stephen, full of grace and power, was performing great wonders and signs among the people.

⁹But some men from what was called the Synagogue of the Freedmen, including both Cyrenians and Alexandrians, and some from Cilicia and Asia, rose up and argued with Stephen.

¹⁰But they were unable to cope with his wisdom and the Spirit by whom he was speaking.

¹¹Then they secretly induced men to say, “We have heard him speak blasphemous words against Moses and God.”

¹²And they stirred up the people, the elders, and the scribes, and they came up to him and dragged him away, and brought him before the Council.

¹³They put forward false witnesses who said, “This man does not stop speaking against this holy place and the Law;

¹⁴for we have heard him say that this Nazarene, Jesus, will destroy this place and change the customs which Moses handed down to us.”

¹⁵And all who were sitting in the Council stared at him, and they saw his face, which was like the face of an angel.