Midday Devotion

A Song of Ascents.
¹ I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come?
² My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth.
³ He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber.
⁴ Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.
⁵ The LORD is your keeper; the LORD is your shade on your right hand.
⁶ The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night.
⁷ The LORD will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life.
⁸ The LORD will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore. (ESV)

To the choirmaster: according to Shushan Eduth. A Miktam of David; for instruction; when he strove with Aram-naharaim and with Aram-zobah, and when Joab on his return struck down twelve thousand of Edom in the Valley of Salt.
¹ O God, you have rejected us, broken our defenses; you have been angry; oh, restore us.
² You have made the land to quake; you have torn it open; repair its breaches, for it totters.
³ You have made your people see hard things; you have given us wine to drink that made us stagger.
⁴ You have set up a banner for those who fear you, that they may flee to it from the bow. Selah
⁵ That your beloved ones may be delivered, give salvation by your right hand and answer us!
⁶ God has spoken in his holiness: “With exultation I will divide up Shechem and portion out the Vale of Succoth.
⁷ Gilead is mine; Manasseh is mine; Ephraim is my helmet; Judah is my scepter.
⁸ Moab is my washbasin; upon Edom I cast my shoe; over Philistia I shout in triumph.”
⁹ Who will bring me to the fortified city? Who will lead me to Edom?
¹⁰ Have you not rejected us, O God? You do not go forth, O God, with our armies.
¹¹ Oh, grant us help against the foe, for vain is the salvation of man!
¹² With God we shall do valiantly; it is he who will tread down our foes. (ESV)

¹³ Then one of the elders addressed me, saying, “Who are these, clothed in white robes, and from where have they come?”
¹⁴ I said to him, “Sir, you know.” And he said to me, “These are the ones coming out of the great tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.
¹⁵ “Therefore they are before the throne of God, and serve him day and night in his temple; and he who sits on the throne will shelter them with his presence.
¹⁶ They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat.
¹⁷ For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of living water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.” (ESV)

¹ “But now, hear my speech, O Job, and listen to all my words.
² Behold, I open my mouth; the tongue in my mouth speaks.
³ My words declare the uprightness of my heart, and what my lips know they speak sincerely.
⁴ The Spirit of God has made me, and the breath of the Almighty gives me life.
⁵ Answer me, if you can; set your words in order before me; take your stand.
⁶ Behold, I am toward God as you are; I too was pinched off from a piece of clay.
⁷ Behold, no fear of me need terrify you; my pressure will not be heavy upon you.
⁸ “Surely you have spoken in my ears, and I have heard the sound of your words.
⁹ You say, ‘I am pure, without transgression; I am clean, and there is no iniquity in me.
¹⁰ Behold, he finds occasions against me, he counts me as his enemy,
¹¹ he puts my feet in the stocks and watches all my paths.’
¹² “Behold, in this you are not right. I will answer you, for God is greater than man.
¹³ Why do you contend against him, saying, ‘He will answer none of man’s words’?
¹⁴ For God speaks in one way, and in two, though man does not perceive it.
¹⁵ In a dream, in a vision of the night, when deep sleep falls on men, while they slumber on their beds,
¹⁶ then he opens the ears of men and terrifies them with warnings,
¹⁷ that he may turn man aside from his deed and conceal pride from a man;
¹⁸ he keeps back his soul from the pit, his life from perishing by the sword. (ESV)

²² At that time the Feast of Dedication took place at Jerusalem. It was winter,
²³ and Jesus was walking in the temple, in the colonnade of Solomon.
²⁴ So the Jews gathered around him and said to him, “How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.”
²⁵ Jesus answered them, “I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father’s name bear witness about me,
²⁶ but you do not believe because you are not among my sheep.
²⁷ My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me.
²⁸ I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.
²⁹ My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.
³⁰ I and the Father are one.”
³¹ The Jews picked up stones again to stone him.
³² Jesus answered them, “I have shown you many good works from the Father; for which of them are you going to stone me?”
³³ The Jews answered him, “It is not for a good work that we are going to stone you but for blasphemy, because you, being a man, make yourself God.”
³⁴ Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your Law, ‘I said, you are gods’?
³⁵ If he called them gods to whom the word of God came—and Scripture cannot be broken—
³⁶ do you say of him whom the Father consecrated and sent into the world, ‘You are blaspheming,’ because I said, ‘I am the Son of God’?
³⁷ If I am not doing the works of my Father, then do not believe me;
³⁸ but if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I am in the Father.”
³⁹ Again they sought to arrest him, but he escaped from their hands.
⁴⁰ He went away again across the Jordan to the place where John had been baptizing at first, and there he remained.
⁴¹ And many came to him. And they said, “John did no sign, but everything that John said about this man was true.”
⁴² And many believed in him there. (ESV)

¹⁴ The LORD spoke to Moses, saying,
¹⁵ “If anyone commits a breach of faith and sins unintentionally in any of the holy things of the LORD, he shall bring to the LORD as his compensation, a ram without blemish out of the flock, valued in silver shekels, according to the shekel of the sanctuary, for a guilt offering.
¹⁶ He shall also make restitution for what he has done amiss in the holy thing and shall add a fifth to it and give it to the priest. And the priest shall make atonement for him with the ram of the guilt offering, and he shall be forgiven.
¹⁷ “If anyone sins, doing any of the things that by the LORD’s commandments ought not to be done, though he did not know it, then realizes his guilt, he shall bear his iniquity.
¹⁸ He shall bring to the priest a ram without blemish out of the flock, or its equivalent, for a guilt offering, and the priest shall make atonement for him for the mistake that he made unintentionally, and he shall be forgiven.
¹⁹ It is a guilt offering; he has indeed incurred guilt before the LORD.”

¹ The LORD spoke to Moses, saying,
² “If anyone sins and commits a breach of faith against the LORD by deceiving his neighbor in a matter of deposit or security, or through robbery, or if he has oppressed his neighbor
³ or has found something lost and lied about it, swearing falsely—in any of all the things that people do and sin thereby—
⁴ if he has sinned and has realized his guilt and will restore what he took by robbery or what he got by oppression or the deposit that was committed to him or the lost thing that he found
⁵ or anything about which he has sworn falsely, he shall restore it in full and shall add a fifth to it, and give it to him to whom it belongs on the day he realizes his guilt.
⁶ And he shall bring to the priest as his compensation to the LORD a ram without blemish out of the flock, or its equivalent, for a guilt offering.
⁷ And the priest shall make atonement for him before the LORD, and he shall be forgiven for any of the things that one may do and thereby become guilty.”
⁸ The LORD spoke to Moses, saying,
⁹ “Command Aaron and his sons, saying, This is the law of the burnt offering. The burnt offering shall be on the hearth on the altar all night until the morning, and the fire of the altar shall be kept burning on it.
¹⁰ And the priest shall put on his linen garment and put his linen undergarment on his body, and he shall take up the ashes to which the fire has reduced the burnt offering on the altar and put them beside the altar.
¹¹ Then he shall take off his garments and put on other garments and carry the ashes outside the camp to a clean place.
¹² The fire on the altar shall be kept burning on it; it shall not go out. The priest shall burn wood on it every morning, and he shall arrange the burnt offering on it and shall burn on it the fat of the peace offerings.
¹³ Fire shall be kept burning on the altar continually; it shall not go out.
¹⁴ “And this is the law of the grain offering. The sons of Aaron shall offer it before the LORD in front of the altar.
¹⁵ And one shall take from it a handful of the fine flour of the grain offering and its oil and all the frankincense that is on the grain offering and burn this as its memorial portion on the altar, a pleasing aroma to the LORD.
¹⁶ And the rest of it Aaron and his sons shall eat. It shall be eaten unleavened in a holy place. In the court of the tent of meeting they shall eat it.
¹⁷ It shall not be baked with leaven. I have given it as their portion of my food offerings. It is a thing most holy, like the sin offering and the guilt offering.
¹⁸ Every male among the children of Aaron may eat of it, as decreed forever throughout your generations, from the LORD’s food offerings. Whatever touches them shall become holy.”
¹⁹ The LORD spoke to Moses, saying,
²⁰ “This is the offering that Aaron and his sons shall offer to the LORD on the day when he is anointed: a tenth of an ephah of fine flour as a regular grain offering, half of it in the morning and half in the evening.
²¹ It shall be made with oil on a griddle. You shall bring it well mixed, in baked pieces like a grain offering, and offer it for a pleasing aroma to the LORD.
²² The priest from among Aaron’s sons, who is anointed to succeed him, shall offer it to the LORD as decreed forever. The whole of it shall be burned.
²³ Every grain offering of a priest shall be wholly burned. It shall not be eaten.”
²⁴ The LORD spoke to Moses, saying,
²⁵ “Speak to Aaron and his sons, saying, This is the law of the sin offering. In the place where the burnt offering is killed shall the sin offering be killed before the LORD; it is most holy.
²⁶ The priest who offers it for sin shall eat it. In a holy place it shall be eaten, in the court of the tent of meeting.
²⁷ Whatever touches its flesh shall be holy, and when any of its blood is splashed on a garment, you shall wash that on which it was splashed in a holy place.
²⁸ And the earthenware vessel in which it is boiled shall be broken. But if it is boiled in a bronze vessel, that shall be scoured and rinsed in water.
²⁹ Every male among the priests may eat of it; it is most holy.
³⁰ But no sin offering shall be eaten from which any blood is brought into the tent of meeting to make atonement in the Holy Place; it shall be burned up with fire.

¹ “This is the law of the guilt offering. It is most holy.
² In the place where they kill the burnt offering they shall kill the guilt offering, and its blood shall be thrown against the sides of the altar.
³ And all its fat shall be offered, the fat tail, the fat that covers the entrails,
⁴ the two kidneys with the fat that is on them at the loins, and the long lobe of the liver that he shall remove with the kidneys.
⁵ The priest shall burn them on the altar as a food offering to the LORD; it is a guilt offering.
⁶ Every male among the priests may eat of it. It shall be eaten in a holy place. It is most holy.
⁷ The guilt offering is just like the sin offering; there is one law for them. The priest who makes atonement with it shall have it.
⁸ And the priest who offers any man’s burnt offering shall have for himself the skin of the burnt offering that he has offered.
⁹ And every grain offering baked in the oven and all that is prepared on a pan or a griddle shall belong to the priest who offers it.
¹⁰ And every grain offering, mixed with oil or dry, shall be shared equally among all the sons of Aaron. (ESV)

³² And they were on the road, going up to Jerusalem, and Jesus was walking ahead of them. And they were amazed, and those who followed were afraid. And taking the twelve again, he began to tell them what was to happen to him,
³³ saying, “See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn him to death and deliver him over to the Gentiles.
³⁴ And they will mock him and spit on him, and flog him and kill him. And after three days he will rise.”
³⁵ And James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came up to him and said to him, “Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.”
³⁶ And he said to them, “What do you want me to do for you?”
³⁷ And they said to him, “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.”
³⁸ Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or to be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?”
³⁹ And they said to him, “We are able.” And Jesus said to them, “The cup that I drink you will drink, and with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized,
⁴⁰ but to sit at my right hand or at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared.”
⁴¹ And when the ten heard it, they began to be indignant at James and John.
⁴² And Jesus called them to him and said to them, “You know that those who are considered rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them.
⁴³ But it shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant,
⁴⁴ and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all.
⁴⁵ For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
⁴⁶ And they came to Jericho. And as he was leaving Jericho with his disciples and a great crowd, Bartimaeus, a blind beggar, the son of Timaeus, was sitting by the roadside.
⁴⁷ And when he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out and say, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!”
⁴⁸ And many rebuked him, telling him to be silent. But he cried out all the more, “Son of David, have mercy on me!”
⁴⁹ And Jesus stopped and said, “Call him.” And they called the blind man, saying to him, “Take heart. Get up; he is calling you.”
⁵⁰ And throwing off his cloak, he sprang up and came to Jesus.
⁵¹ And Jesus said to him, “What do you want me to do for you?” And the blind man said to him, “Rabbi, let me recover my sight.”
⁵² And Jesus said to him, “Go your way; your faith has made you well.” And immediately he recovered his sight and followed him on the way. (ESV)

¹² A worthless person, a wicked man, goes about with crooked speech,
¹³ winks with his eyes, signals with his feet, points with his finger,
¹⁴ with perverted heart devises evil, continually sowing discord;
¹⁵ therefore calamity will come upon him suddenly; in a moment he will be broken beyond healing.
¹⁶ There are six things that the LORD hates, seven that are an abomination to him:
¹⁷ haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood,
¹⁸ a heart that devises wicked plans, feet that make haste to run to evil,
¹⁹ a false witness who breathes out lies, and one who sows discord among brothers. (ESV)