A Family of Prayer

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Don't Let Doubt Take You Out

Always Near: 14 Days of Discovering God’s Presence Every Day

The Year of God's Divine Agenda

In Her Image: Character Study of the Proverbs 31 Woman

There Is No Law Against These Things

Mandates for Men: Serve Others

Sound of Heaven: A 6-Day Devotional by Danny Gokey

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<div class="version vid111 iso6393eng" data-vid="111" data-iso6393="eng">
 <div class="book bkDEU">
 <div class="chapter ch18" data-usfm="DEU.18">
 <div class="label">18</div><div class="s1">Offerings for Priests and Levites</div><div class="p">1The Levitical priests&#8212;indeed, the whole tribe of Levi&#8212;are to have no allotment or inheritance with Israel. They shall live on the food offerings presented to the Lord, for that is their inheritance. 2They shall have no inheritance among their fellow Israelites; the Lord is their inheritance, as he promised them.</div><div class="p">3This is the share due the priests from the people who sacrifice a bull or a sheep: the shoulder, the internal organs and the meat from the head. 4You are to give them the firstfruits of your grain, new wine and olive oil, and the first wool from the shearing of your sheep, 5for the Lord your God has chosen them and their descendants out of all your tribes to stand and minister in the Lord&#8217;s name always.</div><div class="p">6If a Levite moves from one of your towns anywhere in Israel where he is living, and comes in all earnestness to the place the Lord will choose, 7he may minister in the name of the Lord his God like all his fellow Levites who serve there in the presence of the Lord. 8He is to share equally in their benefits, even though he has received money from the sale of family possessions.</div><div class="s1">Occult Practices</div><div class="p">9When you enter the land the Lord your God is giving you, do not learn to imitate the detestable ways of the nations there. 10Let no one be found among you who sacrifices their son or daughter in the fire, who practices divination or sorcery, interprets omens, engages in witchcraft, 11or casts spells, or who is a medium or spiritist or who consults the dead. 12Anyone who does these things is detestable to the Lord; because of these same detestable practices the Lord your God will drive out those nations before you. 13You must be blameless before the Lord your God.</div><div class="s1">The Prophet</div><div class="p">14The nations you will dispossess listen to those who practice sorcery or divination. But as for you, the Lord your God has not permitted you to do so. 15The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your fellow Israelites. You must listen to him. 16For this is what you asked of the Lord your God at Horeb on the day of the assembly when you said, &#8220;Let us not hear the voice of the Lord our God nor see this great fire anymore, or we will die.&#8221;</div><div class="p">17The Lord said to me: &#8220;What they say is good. 18I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their fellow Israelites, and I will put my words in his mouth. He will tell them everything I command him. 19I myself will call to account anyone who does not listen to my words that the prophet speaks in my name. 20But a prophet who presumes to speak in my name anything I have not commanded, or a prophet who speaks in the name of other gods, is to be put to death.&#8221;</div><div class="p">21You may say to yourselves, &#8220;How can we know when a message has not been spoken by the Lord?&#8221; 22If what a prophet proclaims in the name of the Lord does not take place or come true, that is a message the Lord has not spoken. That prophet has spoken presumptuously, so do not be alarmed.</div>
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<div class="version vid111 iso6393eng" data-vid="111" data-iso6393="eng">
 <div class="book bkDEU">
 <div class="chapter ch19" data-usfm="DEU.19">
 <div class="label">19</div><div class="s1">Cities of Refuge</div><div class="p">1When the Lord your God has destroyed the nations whose land he is giving you, and when you have driven them out and settled in their towns and houses, 2then set aside for yourselves three cities in the land the Lord your God is giving you to possess. 3Determine the distances involved and divide into three parts the land the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, so that a person who kills someone may flee for refuge to one of these cities.</div><div class="p">4This is the rule concerning anyone who kills a person and flees there for safety&#8212;anyone who kills a neighbor unintentionally, without malice aforethought. 5For instance, a man may go into the forest with his neighbor to cut wood, and as he swings his ax to fell a tree, the head may fly off and hit his neighbor and kill him. That man may flee to one of these cities and save his life. 6Otherwise, the avenger of blood might pursue him in a rage, overtake him if the distance is too great, and kill him even though he is not deserving of death, since he did it to his neighbor without malice aforethought. 7This is why I command you to set aside for yourselves three cities.</div><div class="p">8If the Lord your God enlarges your territory, as he promised on oath to your ancestors, and gives you the whole land he promised them, 9because you carefully follow all these laws I command you today&#8212;to love the Lord your God and to walk always in obedience to him&#8212;then you are to set aside three more cities. 10Do this so that innocent blood will not be shed in your land, which the Lord your God is giving you as your inheritance, and so that you will not be guilty of bloodshed.</div><div class="p">11But if out of hate someone lies in wait, assaults and kills a neighbor, and then flees to one of these cities, 12the killer shall be sent for by the town elders, be brought back from the city, and be handed over to the avenger of blood to die. 13Show no pity. You must purge from Israel the guilt of shedding innocent blood, so that it may go well with you.</div><div class="p">14Do not move your neighbor&#8217;s boundary stone set up by your predecessors in the inheritance you receive in the land the Lord your God is giving you to possess.</div><div class="s1">Witnesses</div><div class="p">15One witness is not enough to convict anyone accused of any crime or offense they may have committed. A matter must be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.</div><div class="p">16If a malicious witness takes the stand to accuse someone of a crime, 17the two people involved in the dispute must stand in the presence of the Lord before the priests and the judges who are in office at the time. 18The judges must make a thorough investigation, and if the witness proves to be a liar, giving false testimony against a fellow Israelite, 19then do to the false witness as that witness intended to do to the other party. You must purge the evil from among you. 20The rest of the people will hear of this and be afraid, and never again will such an evil thing be done among you. 21Show no pity: life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.</div>
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<div class="version vid111 iso6393eng" data-vid="111" data-iso6393="eng">
 <div class="book bkDEU">
 <div class="chapter ch20" data-usfm="DEU.20">
 <div class="label">20</div><div class="s1">Going to War</div><div class="p">1When you go to war against your enemies and see horses and chariots and an army greater than yours, do not be afraid of them, because the Lord your God, who brought you up out of Egypt, will be with you. 2When you are about to go into battle, the priest shall come forward and address the army. 3He shall say: &#8220;Hear, Israel: Today you are going into battle against your enemies. Do not be fainthearted or afraid; do not panic or be terrified by them. 4For the Lord your God is the one who goes with you to fight for you against your enemies to give you victory.&#8221;</div><div class="p">5The officers shall say to the army: &#8220;Has anyone built a new house and not yet begun to live in it? Let him go home, or he may die in battle and someone else may begin to live in it. 6Has anyone planted a vineyard and not begun to enjoy it? Let him go home, or he may die in battle and someone else enjoy it. 7Has anyone become pledged to a woman and not married her? Let him go home, or he may die in battle and someone else marry her.&#8221; 8Then the officers shall add, &#8220;Is anyone afraid or fainthearted? Let him go home so that his fellow soldiers will not become disheartened too.&#8221; 9When the officers have finished speaking to the army, they shall appoint commanders over it.</div><div class="p">10When you march up to attack a city, make its people an offer of peace. 11If they accept and open their gates, all the people in it shall be subject to forced labor and shall work for you. 12If they refuse to make peace and they engage you in battle, lay siege to that city. 13When the Lord your God delivers it into your hand, put to the sword all the men in it. 14As for the women, the children, the livestock and everything else in the city, you may take these as plunder for yourselves. And you may use the plunder the Lord your God gives you from your enemies. 15This is how you are to treat all the cities that are at a distance from you and do not belong to the nations nearby.</div><div class="p">16However, in the cities of the nations the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, do not leave alive anything that breathes. 17Completely destroy#20:17 The Hebrew term refers to the irrevocable giving over of things or persons to the Lord, often by totally destroying them. them&#8212;the Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites&#8212;as the Lord your God has commanded you. 18Otherwise, they will teach you to follow all the detestable things they do in worshiping their gods, and you will sin against the Lord your God.</div><div class="p">19When you lay siege to a city for a long time, fighting against it to capture it, do not destroy its trees by putting an ax to them, because you can eat their fruit. Do not cut them down. Are the trees people, that you should besiege them?#20:19 Or down to use in the siege, for the fruit trees are for the benefit of people. 20However, you may cut down trees that you know are not fruit trees and use them to build siege works until the city at war with you falls.</div>
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<div class="version vid111 iso6393eng" data-vid="111" data-iso6393="eng">
 <div class="book bk2CO">
 <div class="chapter ch12" data-usfm="2CO.12">
 <div class="label">12</div><div class="s1">Paul&#8217;s Vision and His Thorn</div><div class="p">1I must go on boasting. Although there is nothing to be gained, I will go on to visions and revelations from the Lord. 2I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven. Whether it was in the body or out of the body I do not know&#8212;God knows. 3And I know that this man&#8212;whether in the body or apart from the body I do not know, but God knows&#8212; 4was caught up to paradise and heard inexpressible things, things that no one is permitted to tell. 5I will boast about a man like that, but I will not boast about myself, except about my weaknesses. 6Even if I should choose to boast, I would not be a fool, because I would be speaking the truth. But I refrain, so no one will think more of me than is warranted by what I do or say, 7or because of these surpassingly great revelations. Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. 8Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. 9But he said to me, &#8220;My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.&#8221; Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ&#8217;s power may rest on me. 10That is why, for Christ&#8217;s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.</div><div class="s1">Paul&#8217;s Concern for the Corinthians</div><div class="p">11I have made a fool of myself, but you drove me to it. I ought to have been commended by you, for I am not in the least inferior to the &#8220;super-apostles,&#8221;#12:11 Or the most eminent apostles even though I am nothing. 12I persevered in demonstrating among you the marks of a true apostle, including signs, wonders and miracles. 13How were you inferior to the other churches, except that I was never a burden to you? Forgive me this wrong!</div><div class="p">14Now I am ready to visit you for the third time, and I will not be a burden to you, because what I want is not your possessions but you. After all, children should not have to save up for their parents, but parents for their children. 15So I will very gladly spend for you everything I have and expend myself as well. If I love you more, will you love me less? 16Be that as it may, I have not been a burden to you. Yet, crafty fellow that I am, I caught you by trickery! 17Did I exploit you through any of the men I sent to you? 18I urged Titus to go to you and I sent our brother with him. Titus did not exploit you, did he? Did we not walk in the same footsteps by the same Spirit?</div><div class="p">19Have you been thinking all along that we have been defending ourselves to you? We have been speaking in the sight of God as those in Christ; and everything we do, dear friends, is for your strengthening. 20For I am afraid that when I come I may not find you as I want you to be, and you may not find me as you want me to be. I fear that there may be discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, slander, gossip, arrogance and disorder. 21I am afraid that when I come again my God will humble me before you, and I will be grieved over many who have sinned earlier and have not repented of the impurity, sexual sin and debauchery in which they have indulged.</div>
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<div class="version vid111 iso6393eng" data-vid="111" data-iso6393="eng">
 <div class="book bkMRK">
 <div class="chapter ch12" data-usfm="MRK.12">
 <div class="label">12</div><div class="s1">The Parable of the Tenants</div><div class="p">1Jesus then began to speak to them in parables: &#8220;A man planted a vineyard. He put a wall around it, dug a pit for the winepress and built a watchtower. Then he rented the vineyard to some farmers and moved to another place. 2At harvest time he sent a servant to the tenants to collect from them some of the fruit of the vineyard. 3But they seized him, beat him and sent him away empty-handed. 4Then he sent another servant to them; they struck this man on the head and treated him shamefully. 5He sent still another, and that one they killed. He sent many others; some of them they beat, others they killed.</div><div class="p">6 &#8220;He had one left to send, a son, whom he loved. He sent him last of all, saying, &#8216;They will respect my son.&#8217;</div><div class="p">7 &#8220;But the tenants said to one another, &#8216;This is the heir. Come, let&#8217;s kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.&#8217; 8So they took him and killed him, and threw him out of the vineyard.</div><div class="p">9 &#8220;What then will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and kill those tenants and give the vineyard to others. 10Haven&#8217;t you read this passage of Scripture:</div><div class="q1">&#8220;&#8198;&#8216;The stone the builders rejected</div><div class="q2">has become the cornerstone;</div><div class="q1">11 the Lord has done this,</div><div class="q2">and it is marvelous in our eyes&#8217; #12:11 Psalm 118:22,23 ?&#8221;</div><div class="p">12Then the chief priests, the teachers of the law and the elders looked for a way to arrest him because they knew he had spoken the parable against them. But they were afraid of the crowd; so they left him and went away.</div><div class="s1">Paying the Imperial Tax to Caesar</div><div class="p">13Later they sent some of the Pharisees and Herodians to Jesus to catch him in his words. 14They came to him and said, &#8220;Teacher, we know that you are a man of integrity. You aren&#8217;t swayed by others, because you pay no attention to who they are; but you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth. Is it right to pay the imperial tax#12:14 A special tax levied on subject peoples, not on Roman citizens to Caesar or not? 15Should we pay or shouldn&#8217;t we?&#8221;</div><div class="p">But Jesus knew their hypocrisy. &#8220;Why are you trying to trap me?&#8221; he asked. &#8220;Bring me a denarius and let me look at it.&#8221; 16They brought the coin, and he asked them, &#8220;Whose image is this? And whose inscription?&#8221;</div><div class="p">&#8220;Caesar&#8217;s,&#8221; they replied.</div><div class="p">17Then Jesus said to them, &#8220;Give back to Caesar what is Caesar&#8217;s and to God what is God&#8217;s.&#8221;</div><div class="p">And they were amazed at him.</div><div class="s1">Marriage at the Resurrection</div><div class="p">18Then the Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection, came to him with a question. 19&#8220;Teacher,&#8221; they said, &#8220;Moses wrote for us that if a man&#8217;s brother dies and leaves a wife but no children, the man must marry the widow and raise up offspring for his brother. 20Now there were seven brothers. The first one married and died without leaving any children. 21The second one married the widow, but he also died, leaving no child. It was the same with the third. 22In fact, none of the seven left any children. Last of all, the woman died too. 23At the resurrection#12:23 Some manuscripts resurrection, when people rise from the dead, whose wife will she be, since the seven were married to her?&#8221;</div><div class="p">24Jesus replied, &#8220;Are you not in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God? 25When the dead rise, they will neither marry nor be given in marriage; they will be like the angels in heaven. 26Now about the dead rising&#8212;have you not read in the Book of Moses, in the account of the burning bush, how God said to him, &#8216;I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob&#8217;#12:26 Exodus 3:6? 27He is not the God of the dead, but of the living. You are badly mistaken!&#8221;</div><div class="s1">The Greatest Commandment</div><div class="p">28One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, &#8220;Of all the commandments, which is the most important?&#8221;</div><div class="p">29 &#8220;The most important one,&#8221; answered Jesus, &#8220;is this: &#8216;Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.#12:29 Or The Lord our God is one Lord 30Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.&#8217;#12:30 Deut. 6:4,5 31The second is this: &#8216;Love your neighbor as yourself.&#8217;#12:31 Lev. 19:18 There is no commandment greater than these.&#8221;</div><div class="p">32&#8220;Well said, teacher,&#8221; the man replied. &#8220;You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. 33To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.&#8221;</div><div class="p">34When Jesus saw that he had answered wisely, he said to him, &#8220;You are not far from the kingdom of God.&#8221; And from then on no one dared ask him any more questions.</div><div class="s1">Whose Son Is the Messiah?</div><div class="p">35While Jesus was teaching in the temple courts, he asked, &#8220;Why do the teachers of the law say that the Messiah is the son of David? 36David himself, speaking by the Holy Spirit, declared:</div><div class="q1">&#8220;&#8198;&#8216;The Lord said to my Lord:</div><div class="q2">&#8220;Sit at my right hand</div><div class="q1">until I put your enemies</div><div class="q2">under your feet.&#8221;&#8198;&#8217; #12:36 Psalm 110:1</div><div class="m">37 David himself calls him &#8216;Lord.&#8217; How then can he be his son?&#8221;</div><div class="p">The large crowd listened to him with delight.</div><div class="s1">Warning Against the Teachers of the Law</div><div class="p">38As he taught, Jesus said, &#8220;Watch out for the teachers of the law. They like to walk around in flowing robes and be greeted with respect in the marketplaces, 39and have the most important seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at banquets. 40They devour widows&#8217; houses and for a show make lengthy prayers. These men will be punished most severely.&#8221;</div><div class="s1">The Widow&#8217;s Offering</div><div class="p">41Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury. Many rich people threw in large amounts. 42But a poor widow came and put in two very small copper coins, worth only a few cents.</div><div class="p">43Calling his disciples to him, Jesus said, &#8220;Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. 44They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything&#8212;all she had to live on.&#8221;</div>
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