Day 218 reading

Wisdom·Psalm 119:49–57

⁴⁹Remember Your word to Your servant, upon which You have given me hope. ⁵⁰This is my comfort in affliction, that Your promise has given me life. ⁵¹The arrogant utterly deride me, but I do not turn from Your law. ⁵²I remember Your judgments of old, O LORD, and in them I find comfort. ⁵³Rage has taken hold of me because of the wicked who reject Your law. ⁵⁴Your statutes are songs to me in the house of my pilgrimage. ⁵⁵In the night, O LORD, I remember Your name, that I may keep Your law. ⁵⁶This is my practice, for I obey Your precepts. ⁵⁷The LORD is my portion; I have promised to keep Your words.

New Testament·Acts 27:25–44

²⁵So take courage, men, for I believe God that it will happen just as He told me. ²⁶However, we must run aground on some island.” ²⁷On the fourteenth night we were still being driven across the Adriatic Sea. About midnight the sailors sensed they were approaching land. ²⁸They took soundings and found that the water was twenty fathoms deep. Going a little farther, they took another set of soundings that read fifteen fathoms. ²⁹Fearing that we would run aground on the rocks, they dropped four anchors from the stern and prayed for daybreak. ³⁰Meanwhile, the sailors attempted to escape from the ship. Pretending to lower anchors from the bow, they let the lifeboat down into the sea. ³¹But Paul said to the centurion and the soldiers, “Unless these men remain with the ship, you cannot be saved.” ³²So the soldiers cut the ropes to the lifeboat and set it adrift. ³³Right up to daybreak, Paul kept urging them all to eat: “Today is your fourteenth day in constant suspense, without taking any food. ³⁴So for your own preservation, I urge you to eat something, because not a single hair of your head will be lost.” ³⁵After he had said this, Paul took bread and gave thanks to God in front of them all. Then he broke it and began to eat. ³⁶They were all encouraged and took some food themselves. ³⁷In all, there were 276 of us on board. ³⁸After the men had eaten their fill, they lightened the ship by throwing the grain into the sea. ³⁹When daylight came, they did not recognize the land, but they sighted a bay with a sandy beach, where they decided to run the ship aground if they could. ⁴⁰Cutting away the anchors, they left them in the sea as they loosened the ropes that held the rudders. Then they hoisted the foresail to the wind and made for the beach. ⁴¹But the vessel struck a sandbar and ran aground. The bow stuck fast and would not move, and the stern was being broken up by the pounding of the waves. ⁴²The soldiers planned to kill the prisoners so none of them could swim to freedom. ⁴³But the centurion, wanting to spare Paul’s life, thwarted their plan. He commanded those who could swim to jump overboard first and get to land. ⁴⁴The rest were to follow on planks and various parts of the ship. In this way everyone was brought safely to land.

Old Testament·2 Chronicles 27–28

¹Jotham was twenty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem sixteen years. His mother’s name was Jerushah daughter of Zadok. ²And he did what was right in the eyes of the LORD, just as his father Uzziah had done. In addition, he did not enter the temple of the LORD. But the people still behaved corruptly. ³Jotham rebuilt the Upper Gate of the house of the LORD, and he worked extensively on the wall at the hill of Ophel. ⁴He also built cities in the hill country of Judah and fortresses and towers in the forests. ⁵Jotham waged war against the king of the Ammonites and defeated them, and that year they gave him a hundred talents of silver, ten thousand cors of wheat, and ten thousand cors of barley. They paid him the same in the second and third years. ⁶So Jotham grew powerful because he ordered his ways before the LORD his God. ⁷As for the rest of the acts of Jotham, along with all his wars and his ways, they are indeed written in the Book of the Kings of Israel and Judah. ⁸He was twenty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem sixteen years. ⁹And Jotham rested with his fathers and was buried in the City of David. And his son Ahaz reigned in his place.

28Ahaz was twenty years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem sixteen years. And unlike David his father, he did not do what was right in the eyes of the LORD. ²Instead, he walked in the ways of the kings of Israel and even made cast images of the Baals. ³Moreover, Ahaz burned incense in the Valley of Hinnom and sacrificed his sons in the fire, according to the abominations of the nations that the LORD had driven out before the Israelites. ⁴And he sacrificed and burned incense on the high places, on the hills, and under every green tree. ⁵So the LORD his God delivered Ahaz into the hand of the king of Aram, who attacked him and took many captives to Damascus. Ahaz was also delivered into the hand of the king of Israel, who struck him with great force. ⁶For in one day Pekah son of Remaliah killed 120,000 valiant men in Judah. This happened because they had forsaken the LORD, the God of their fathers. ⁷Zichri, a mighty man of Ephraim, killed Maaseiah the son of the king, Azrikam the governor of the palace, and Elkanah the second to the king. ⁸Then the Israelites took 200,000 captives from their kinsmen—women, sons, and daughters. They also carried off a great deal of plunder and brought it to Samaria. ⁹But a prophet of the LORD named Oded was there, and he went out to meet the army that returned to Samaria. “Look,” he said to them, “because of His wrath against Judah, the LORD, the God of your fathers, has delivered them into your hand. But you have slaughtered them in a rage that reaches up to heaven. ¹⁰And now you intend to reduce to slavery the men and women of Judah and Jerusalem. But are you not also guilty before the LORD your God? ¹¹Now therefore, listen to me and return the captives you took from your kinsmen, for the fierce anger of the LORD is upon you.” ¹²Then some of the leaders of the Ephraimites —Azariah son of Jehohanan, Berechiah son of Meshillemoth, Jehizkiah son of Shallum, and Amasa son of Hadlai—stood in opposition to those arriving from the war. ¹³“You must not bring the captives here,” they said, “for you are proposing to bring guilt upon us from the LORD and to add to our sins and our guilt. For our guilt is great, and fierce anger is upon Israel.” ¹⁴So the armed men left the captives and the plunder before the leaders and all the assembly. ¹⁵Then the men who were designated by name arose, took charge of the captives, and provided from the plunder clothing for the naked. They clothed them, gave them sandals and food and drink, anointed their wounds, and put all the feeble on donkeys. So they brought them to Jericho, the City of Palms, to their brothers. Then they returned to Samaria. ¹⁶At that time King Ahaz sent for help from the king of Assyria. ¹⁷The Edomites had again come and attacked Judah and carried away captives. ¹⁸The Philistines had also raided the cities of the foothills and the Negev of Judah, capturing and occupying Beth-shemesh, Aijalon, and Gederoth, as well as Soco, Timnah, and Gimzo with their villages. ¹⁹For the LORD humbled Judah because Ahaz king of Israel had thrown off restraint in Judah and had been most unfaithful to the LORD. ²⁰Then Tiglath-pileser king of Assyria came to Ahaz but afflicted him rather than strengthening him. ²¹Although Ahaz had taken a portion from the house of the LORD, from the royal palace, and from the princes and had presented it to the king of Assyria, it did not help him. ²²In the time of his distress, King Ahaz became even more unfaithful to the LORD. ²³Since Damascus had defeated him, he sacrificed to their gods and said, “Because the gods of the kings of Aram have helped them, I will sacrifice to them that they may help me.” But these gods were the downfall of Ahaz and of all Israel. ²⁴Then Ahaz gathered up the articles of the house of God, cut them into pieces, shut the doors of the house of the LORD, and set up altars of his own on every street corner in Jerusalem. ²⁵In every city of Judah he built high places to offer incense to other gods, and so he provoked the LORD, the God of his fathers. ²⁶As for the rest of the acts of Ahaz and all his ways, from beginning to end, they are indeed written in the Book of the Kings of Judah and Israel. ²⁷And Ahaz rested with his fathers and was buried in the city of Jerusalem, but he was not placed in the tombs of the kings of Israel. And his son Hezekiah reigned in his place.