The One Year Bible TLB (166 page)
Read The One Year Bible TLB Online
Authors: Tyndale
If you love sleep, you will end in poverty. Stay awake, work hard, and there will be plenty to eat!
14
“Utterly worthless!” says the buyer as he haggles over the price. But afterwards he brags about his bargain!
15
Good sense is far more valuable than gold or precious jewels.
August 2Some time later after this good work of King Hezekiah, King Sennacherib of Assyria invaded Judah and laid siege to the fortified cities, planning to place them under tribute.
2
When it was clear that Sennacherib was intending to attack Jerusalem,
3
Hezekiah summoned his princes and officers for a council of war, and it was decided to plug the springs outside the city.
4
They organized a huge work crew to block them and to cut off the brook running through the fields.
“Why should the king of Assyria come and find water?” they asked.
5
Then Hezekiah further strengthened his defenses by repairing the wall wherever it was broken down, and by adding to the fortifications, and constructing a second wall outside it. He also reinforced Fort Millo in the City of David and manufactured large numbers of weapons and shields.
6
He recruited an army and appointed officers, and summoned them to the plains before the city, and encouraged them with this address:
7
“Be strong, be brave, and do not be afraid of the king of Assyria or his mighty army, for there is someone with us who is far greater than he is!
8
He has a great army, but they are all mere men, while we have the Lord our God to fight our battles for us!” This greatly encouraged them.
9
Then King Sennacherib of Assyria, while still besieging the city of Lachish, sent ambassadors with this message to King Hezekiah and the citizens of Jerusalem:
10
“King Sennacherib of Assyria asks, ‘Do you think you can survive my siege of Jerusalem?
11
King Hezekiah is trying to persuade you to commit suicide by staying there—to die by famine and thirst—while he promises that “the Lord our God will deliver us from the king of Assyria”!
12
Don’t you realize that Hezekiah is the very person who destroyed all the idols, and commanded Judah and Jerusalem to use only the one altar at the Temple, and to burn incense upon it alone?
13
Don’t you realize that I and the other kings of Assyria before me have never yet failed to conquer a nation we attacked? The gods of those nations weren’t able to do a thing to save their lands!
14
Name just one time when anyone, anywhere, was able to resist us successfully. What makes you think your God can do any better?
15
Don’t let Hezekiah fool you! Don’t believe him. I say it again—no god of any nation has ever yet been able to rescue his people from me or my ancestors; how much less your God!’”
16
Thus the ambassador mocked the Lord God and God’s servant Hezekiah, heaping up insults.
17
King Sennacherib also sent letters scorning the Lord God of Israel.
“The gods of all the other nations failed to save their people from my hand, and the God of Hezekiah will fail too,” he wrote.
18
The messengers who brought the letters shouted threats in the Jewish language to the people gathered on the walls of the city, trying to frighten and dishearten them.
19
These messengers talked about the God of Jerusalem just as though he were one of the heathen gods—a handmade idol!
20
Then King Hezekiah and Isaiah the prophet (son of Amoz) cried out in prayer to God in heaven,
21
and the Lord sent an angel who destroyed the Assyrian army with all its officers and generals! So Sennacherib returned home in deep shame to his own land. And when he arrived at the temple of his god, some of his own sons killed him there.
22
That is how the Lord saved Hezekiah and the people of Jerusalem. And now there was peace at last throughout his realm.
23
From then on King Hezekiah became immensely respected among the surrounding nations, and many gifts for the Lord arrived at Jerusalem, with valuable presents for King Hezekiah too.
24
But about that time Hezekiah became deathly sick, and he prayed to the Lord, and the Lord replied with a miracle.
25
However, Hezekiah didn’t respond with true thanksgiving and praise for he had become proud, and so the anger of God was upon him and upon Judah and Jerusalem.
26
But finally Hezekiah and the residents of Jerusalem humbled themselves, so the wrath of the Lord did not fall upon them during Hezekiah’s lifetime.
27
So Hezekiah became very wealthy and was highly honored. He had to construct special treasury buildings for his silver, gold, precious stones, and spices, and for his shields and gold bowls.
28-29
He also built many storehouses for his grain, new wine, and olive oil, with many stalls for his animals and folds for the great flocks of sheep and goats he purchased; and he acquired many towns, for God had given him great wealth.
30
He dammed up Gihon’s Upper Spring and brought the water down through an aqueduct to the west side of the City of David sector in Jerusalem. He prospered in everything he did.
31
However, when ambassadors arrived from Babylon to find out about the miracle of his being healed, God left him to himself in order to test him and to see what he was really like.
32
The rest of the story of Hezekiah and all of the good things he did are written in
The Book of Isaiah
(the prophet, the son of Amoz), and in
The Annals of the Kings of Judah and Israel
.
33
When Hezekiah died, he was buried in the royal hillside cemetery among the other kings, and all Judah and Jerusalem honored him at his death. Then his son Manasseh became the new king.
33:
1
Manasseh was only twelve years old when he became king, and he reigned fifty-five years in Jerusalem.
2
But it was an evil reign, for he encouraged his people to worship the idols of the heathen nations destroyed by the Lord when the people of Israel entered the land.
3
He rebuilt the heathen altars his father Hezekiah had destroyed—the altars of Baal, and of the shameful images, and of the sun, moon, and stars.
4-5
He even constructed heathen altars in both courts of the Temple of the Lord for worshiping the sun, moon, and stars—in the very place where the Lord had said that he would be honored forever.
6
And Manasseh sacrificed his own children as burnt offerings in the valley of Hinnom. He consulted spirit-mediums, too, and fortune-tellers and sorcerers, and encouraged every sort of evil, making the Lord very angry.
7
Think of it! He placed an idol in the very Temple of God, where God had told David and his son Solomon, “I will be honored here in this Temple and in Jerusalem—the city I have chosen to be honored forever above all the other cities of Israel.
8
And if you will only obey my commands—all the laws and instructions given to you by Moses—I won’t ever again exile Israel from this land which I gave your ancestors.”
9
But Manasseh encouraged the people of Judah and Jerusalem to do even more evil than the nations the Lord destroyed when Israel entered the land.
10
Warnings from the Lord were ignored by both Manasseh and his people.
11
So God sent the Assyrian armies, and they seized him with hooks and bound him with bronze chains and carted him away to Babylon.
12
Then at last he came to his senses and cried out humbly to God for help.
13
And the Lord listened and answered his plea by returning him to Jerusalem and to his kingdom! At that point Manasseh finally realized that the Lord was really God!
But now at last I am through with my work here, and I am ready to come after all these long years of waiting.
24
For I am planning to take a trip to Spain, and when I do, I will stop off there in Rome; and after we have had a good time together for a little while, you can send me on my way again.
25
But before I come, I must go down to Jerusalem to take a gift to the Jewish Christians there.
26
For you see, the Christians in Macedonia and Achaia have taken up an offering for those in Jerusalem who are going through such hard times.
27
They were very glad to do this, for they feel that they owe a real debt to the Jerusalem Christians. Why? Because the news about Christ came to these Gentiles from the church in Jerusalem. And since they received this wonderful spiritual gift of the Gospel from there, they feel that the least they can do in return is to give some material aid.
*
28
As soon as I have delivered this money and completed this good deed of theirs, I will come to see you on my way to Spain.
29
And I am sure that when I come the Lord will give me a great blessing for you.
30
Will you be my prayer partners? For the Lord Jesus Christ’s sake and because of your love for me—given to you by the Holy Spirit—pray much with me for my work.
31
Pray that I will be protected in Jerusalem from those who are not Christians. Pray also that the Christians there will be willing to accept the money I am bringing them.
32
Then I will be able to come to you with a happy heart by the will of God, and we can refresh each other.
33
And now may our God, who gives peace, be with you all. Amen.
16:
1-2
Phoebe, a dear Christian woman from the town of Cenchreae, will be coming to see you soon. She has worked hard in the church there. Receive her as your sister in the Lord, giving her a warm Christian welcome. Help her in every way you can, for she has helped many in their needs, including me.
3
Tell Priscilla and Aquila hello. They have been my fellow workers in the affairs of Christ Jesus.
4
In fact, they risked their lives for me, and I am not the only one who is thankful to them; so are all the Gentile churches.
5
Please give my greetings to all those who meet to worship in their home. Greet my good friend Epaenetus. He was the very first person to become a Christian in Asia.
6
Remember me to Mary, too, who has worked so hard to help us.
7
Then there are Andronicus and Junias, my relatives who were in prison with me. They are respected by the apostles and became Christians before I did. Please give them my greetings.
8
Say hello to Ampliatus, whom I love as one of God’s own children,
9
and Urbanus, our fellow worker, and beloved Stachys.
My eyes are ever looking to the Lord for help, for he alone can rescue me.
16
Come, Lord, and show me your mercy, for I am helpless, overwhelmed, in deep distress;
17
my problems go from bad to worse. Oh, save me from them all!
18
See my sorrows; feel my pain; forgive my sins.
19
See how many enemies I have and how viciously they hate me!
20
Save me from them! Deliver my life from their power! Oh, let it never be said that I trusted you in vain!
21
Assign me Godliness and Integrity as my bodyguards, for I expect you to protect me
22
and to ransom Israel from all her troubles.
It is risky to make loans to strangers!
17
Some men enjoy cheating, but the cake they buy with such ill-gotten gain will turn to gravel in their mouths.
18
Don’t go ahead with your plans without the advice of others; don’t go to war until they agree.
August 3It was after this that he [Manasseh] rebuilt the outer wall of the City of David and the wall from west of the spring of Gihon in the Kidron Valley, and then to the Fish Gate, and around Citadel Hill, where it was built very high. And he stationed his army generals in all of the fortified cities of Judah.
15
He also removed the foreign gods from the hills and took his idol from the Temple, and tore down the altars he had built on the mountain, where the Temple stood, and the altars that were in Jerusalem, and dumped them outside the city.
16
Then he rebuilt the altar of the Lord and offered sacrifices upon it—peace offerings and thanksgiving offerings—and demanded that the people of Judah worship the Lord God of Israel.
17
However, the people still sacrificed upon the altars on the hills, but only to the Lord their God.
18
The rest of Manasseh’s deeds, and his prayer to God, and God’s reply through the prophets—this is all written in
The Annals of the Kings of Israel.
19
His prayer, and the way God answered, and a frank account of his sins and errors, including a list of the locations where he built idols on the hills and set up shameful and graven images (this of course was before the great change in his attitude), are recorded in
The Annals of the Prophets.
20-21
When Manasseh died, he was buried beneath his own palace, and his son Amon became the new king. Amon was twenty-two years old when he began to reign in Jerusalem, but he lasted for only two years.
22
It was an evil reign like the early years of his father Manasseh; for Amon sacrificed to all the idols just as his father had.
23
But he didn’t change as his father did; instead he sinned more and more.
24
At last his own officers assassinated him in his palace.
25
But some public-spirited citizens killed all of those who assassinated him and declared his son Josiah to be the new king.
34:
1
Josiah was only eight years old when he became king. He reigned thirty-one years in Jerusalem.
2
His was a good reign, as he carefully followed the good example of his ancestor King David.
3
For when he was sixteen years old, in the eighth year of his reign, he began to search for the God of his ancestor David; and four years later he began to clean up Judah and Jerusalem, destroying the heathen altars and the shameful idols on the hills.
4
He went out personally to watch as the altars of Baal were knocked apart, the obelisks above the altars chopped down, and the shameful idols ground into dust and scattered over the graves of those who had sacrificed to them.
5
Then he burned the bones of the heathen priests upon their own altars, feeling that this action would clear the people of Judah and Jerusalem from the guilt of their sin of idol worship.
6
Then he went to the cities of Manasseh, Ephraim, and Simeon, even to distant Naphtali, and did the same thing there.
7
He broke down the heathen altars, ground to powder the shameful idols, and chopped down the obelisks. He did this everywhere throughout the whole land of Israel before returning to Jerusalem.
8
During the eighteenth year of his reign, after he had purged the land and cleaned up the situation at the Temple, he appointed Shaphan (son of Azaliah) and Maaseiah, governor of Jerusalem, and Joah (son of Joahaz), the city treasurer, to repair the Temple.
9
They set up a collection system for gifts for the Temple. The money was collected at the Temple gates by the Levites on guard duty there. Gifts were brought by the people coming from Manasseh, Ephraim, and other parts of the remnant of Israel, as well as from the people of Jerusalem. The money was taken to Hilkiah the High Priest for accounting,
10-11
and then used by the Levites to pay the carpenters and stonemasons and to purchase building materials—stone building blocks, timber, lumber, and beams. He now rebuilt what earlier kings of Judah had torn down.
12
The workmen were energetic under the leadership of Jahath and Obadiah, Levites of the subclan of Merari. Zechariah and Meshullam, of the subclan of Kohath, were the building superintendents. The Levites who were skilled musicians played background music while the work progressed.
13
Other Levites superintended the unskilled laborers who carried in the materials to the workmen. Still others assisted as accountants, supervisors, and carriers.
14
One day when Hilkiah the High Priest was at the Temple recording the money collected at the gates, he found an old scroll that turned out to be the laws of God as given to Moses!
15-16
“Look!” Hilkiah exclaimed to Shaphan, the king’s secretary. “See what I have found in the Temple! These are the laws of God!” Hilkiah gave the scroll to Shaphan, and Shaphan took it to the king, along with his report that there was good progress being made in the reconstruction of the Temple.
17
“The money chests have been opened and counted, and the money has been put into the hand of the overseers and workmen,” he said to the king.
18
Then he mentioned the scroll and how Hilkiah had discovered it. So he read it to the king.
19
When the king heard what these laws required of God’s people, he ripped his clothing in despair
20
and summoned Hilkiah, Ahikam (son of Shaphan), Abdon (son of Micah), Shaphan the treasurer, and Asaiah, the king’s personal aide.
21
“Go to the Temple and plead with the Lord for me!” the king told them. “Pray for all the remnant of Israel and Judah! For this scroll says that the reason the Lord’s great anger has been poured out upon us is that our ancestors have not obeyed these laws that are written here.”
22
So the men went to Huldah the prophetess, the wife of Shallum (son of Tokhath, son of Hasrah). (Shallum was the king’s tailor, living in the second ward.) When they told her of the king’s trouble,
23
she replied, “The Lord God of Israel says, Tell the man who sent you,
24
“‘Yes, the Lord will destroy this city and its people. All the curses written in the scroll will come true.
25
For my people have forsaken me and have worshiped heathen gods, and I am very angry with them for their deeds. Therefore, my unquenchable wrath is poured out upon this place.’
26
“But the Lord also says this to the king of Judah who sent you to ask me about this: Tell him, the Lord God of Israel says,
27
‘Because you are sorry and have humbled yourself before God when you heard my words against this city and its people, and have ripped your clothing in despair and wept before me—I have heard you, says the Lord,
28
and I will not send the promised evil upon this city and its people until after your death.’” So they brought back to the king this word from the Lord.
29
Then the king summoned all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem,
30
and the priests and Levites and all the people great and small, to accompany him to the Temple. There the king read the scroll to them—the covenant of God that was found in the Temple.
31
As the king stood before them, he made a pledge to the Lord to follow his commandments with all his heart and soul and to do what was written in the scroll.
32
And he required everyone in Jerusalem and Benjamin to subscribe to this pact with God, and all of them did.
33
So Josiah removed all idols from the areas occupied by the Jews and required all of them to worship Jehovah their God. And throughout the remainder of his lifetime they continued serving Jehovah, the God of their ancestors.
Then there is Apelles, a good man whom the Lord approves; greet him for me. And give my best regards to those working at the house of Aristobulus.
11
Remember me to Herodion my relative. Remember me to the Christian slaves over at Narcissus House.
12
Say hello to Tryphaena and Tryphosa, the Lord’s workers, and to dear Persis, who has worked so hard for the Lord.
13
Greet Rufus for me, whom the Lord picked out to be his very own; and also his dear mother who has been such a mother to me.
14
And please give my greetings to Asyncritus, Phlegon, Hermes, Patrobas, Hermas, and the other brothers who are with them.
15
Give my love to Philologus, Julia, Nereus and his sister, and to Olympas, and all the Christians who are with them.
16
Shake hands warmly with each other. All the churches here send you their greetings.
17
And now there is one more thing to say before I end this letter. Stay away from those who cause divisions and are upsetting people’s faith, teaching things about Christ that are contrary to what you have been taught.
18
Such teachers are not working for our Lord Jesus but only want gain for themselves. They are good speakers, and simple-minded people are often fooled by them.
19
But everyone knows that you stand loyal and true. This makes me very happy. I want you always to remain very clear about what is right and to stay innocent of any wrong.
20
The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet. The blessings from our Lord Jesus Christ be upon you.
21
Timothy my fellow worker, and Lucius and Jason and Sosipater, my relatives, send you their good wishes.
22
I, Tertius, the one who is writing this letter for Paul, send my greetings too, as a Christian brother.
23
Gaius says to say hello to you for him. I am his guest, and the church meets here in his home. Erastus, the city treasurer, sends you his greetings and so does Quartus, a Christian brother.
24
Good-bye. May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.
25-27
I commit you to God, who is able to make you strong and steady in the Lord, just as the Gospel says, and just as I have told you. This is God’s plan of salvation for you Gentiles, kept secret from the beginning of time. But now as the prophets foretold and as God commands, this message is being preached everywhere, so that people all around the world will have faith in Christ and obey him. To God, who alone is wise, be the glory forever through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
Sincerely, Paul
Dismiss all the charges against me, Lord, for I have tried to keep your laws and have trusted you without wavering.
2
Cross-examine me, O Lord, and see that this is so; test my motives and affections too.
3
For I have taken your loving-kindness and your truth as my ideals.
4
I do not have fellowship with tricky, two-faced men; they are false and hypocritical.
5
I hate the sinners’ hangouts and refuse to enter them.
6
I wash my hands to prove my innocence and come before your altar,
7
singing a song of thanksgiving and telling about your miracles.
8
Lord, I love your home, this shrine where the brilliant, dazzling splendor of your presence lives.
9-10
Don’t treat me as a common sinner or murderer who plots against the innocent and demands bribes.
11
No, I am not like that, O Lord; I try to walk a straight and narrow path of doing what is right; therefore in mercy save me.
12
I publicly praise the Lord for keeping me from slipping and falling.
Don’t tell your secrets to a gossip unless you want them broadcast to the world.