Day 22 reading

Wisdom·Psalm 18:16–24

¹⁶He reached down from on high and took hold of me; He drew me out of deep waters. ¹⁷He rescued me from my powerful enemy, from foes too mighty for me. ¹⁸They confronted me in my day of calamity, but the LORD was my support. ¹⁹He brought me out into the open; He rescued me because He delighted in me. ²⁰The LORD has rewarded me according to my righteousness; He has repaid me according to the cleanness of my hands. ²¹For I have kept the ways of the LORD and have not wickedly departed from my God. ²²For all His ordinances are before me; I have not disregarded His statutes. ²³And I have been blameless before Him and kept myself from iniquity. ²⁴So the LORD has repaid me according to my righteousness, according to the cleanness of my hands in His sight.

New Testament·Matthew 14:1–26

¹At that time Herod the tetrarch heard the reports about Jesus ²and said to his servants, “This is John the Baptist; he has risen from the dead! That is why miraculous powers are at work in him.” ³Now Herod had arrested John and bound him and put him in prison on account of Herodias, his brother Philip’s wife, ⁴because John had been telling him, “It is not lawful for you to have her.” ⁵Although Herod wanted to kill John, he was afraid of the people, because they regarded John as a prophet. ⁶On Herod’s birthday, however, the daughter of Herodias danced before them and pleased Herod ⁷so much that he promised with an oath to give to her whatever she asked. ⁸Prompted by her mother, she said, “Give me here on a platter the head of John the Baptist.” ⁹The king was grieved, but because of his oaths and his guests, he ordered that her wish be granted ¹⁰and sent to have John beheaded in the prison. ¹¹John’s head was brought in on a platter and presented to the girl, who carried it to her mother. ¹²Then John’s disciples came and took his body and buried it. And they went and informed Jesus. ¹³When Jesus heard about John, He withdrew by boat privately to a solitary place. But the crowds found out about it and followed Him on foot from the towns. ¹⁴When He stepped ashore and saw a large crowd, He had compassion on them and healed their sick. ¹⁵When evening came, the disciples came to Him and said, “This is a desolate place, and the hour is already late. Dismiss the crowds so they can go to the villages and buy themselves some food.” ¹⁶“They do not need to go away,” Jesus replied. “You give them something to eat.” ¹⁷“We have here only five loaves of bread and two fish,” they answered. ¹⁸“Bring them here to Me,” Jesus said. ¹⁹And He directed the crowds to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven, He spoke a blessing. Then He broke the loaves and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the people. ²⁰They all ate and were satisfied, and the disciples picked up twelve basketfuls of broken pieces that were left over. ²¹About five thousand men were fed, in addition to women and children. ²²Immediately Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead of Him to the other side, while He dismissed the crowds. ²³After He had sent them away, He went up on the mountain by Himself to pray. When evening came, He was there alone, ²⁴but the boat was already far from land, buffeted by the waves because the wind was against it. ²⁵During the fourth watch of the night, Jesus went out to them, walking on the sea. ²⁶When the disciples saw Him walking on the sea, they were terrified. “It’s a ghost!” they said, and cried out in fear.

Old Testament·Genesis 39–40

¹Meanwhile, Joseph had been taken down to Egypt, where an Egyptian named Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh and captain of the guard, bought him from the Ishmaelites who had taken him there. ²And the LORD was with Joseph, and he became a successful man, serving in the household of his Egyptian master. ³When his master saw that the LORD was with him and made him prosper in all he did, ⁴Joseph found favor in his sight and became his personal attendant. Potiphar put him in charge of his household and entrusted him with everything he owned. ⁵From the time that he put Joseph in charge of his household and all he owned, the LORD blessed the Egyptian’s household on account of him. The LORD’s blessing was on everything he owned, both in his house and in his field. ⁶So Potiphar left all that he owned in Joseph’s care; he did not concern himself with anything except the food he ate. Now Joseph was well-built and handsome, ⁷and after some time his master’s wife cast her eyes upon Joseph and said, “Sleep with me.” ⁸But he refused. “Look,” he said to his master’s wife, “with me here, my master does not concern himself with anything in his house, and he has entrusted everything he owns to my care. ⁹No one in this house is greater than I am. He has withheld nothing from me except you, because you are his wife. So how could I do such a great evil and sin against God?” ¹⁰Although Potiphar’s wife spoke to Joseph day after day, he refused to go to bed with her or even be near her. ¹¹One day, however, Joseph went into the house to attend to his work, and not a single household servant was inside. ¹²She grabbed Joseph by his cloak and said, “Sleep with me!” But leaving his cloak in her hand, he escaped and ran outside. ¹³When she saw that he had left his cloak in her hand and had run out of the house, ¹⁴she called her household servants. “Look,” she said, “this Hebrew has been brought to us to make sport of us. He came to me so he could sleep with me, but I screamed as loud as I could. ¹⁵When he heard me scream for help, he left his cloak beside me and ran out of the house.” ¹⁶So Potiphar’s wife kept Joseph’s cloak beside her until his master came home. ¹⁷Then she told him the same story: “The Hebrew slave you brought us came to me to make sport of me, ¹⁸but when I screamed for help, he left his cloak beside me and ran out of the house.” ¹⁹When his master heard the story his wife told him, saying, “This is what your slave did to me,” he burned with anger. ²⁰So Joseph’s master took him and had him thrown into the prison where the king’s prisoners were confined. While Joseph was there in the prison, ²¹the LORD was with him and extended kindness to him, granting him favor in the eyes of the prison warden. ²²And the warden put all the prisoners under Joseph’s care, so that he was responsible for all that was done in the prison. ²³The warden did not concern himself with anything under Joseph’s care, because the LORD was with Joseph and gave him success in whatever he did.

40Some time later, the king’s cupbearer and baker offended their master, the king of Egypt. ²Pharaoh was angry with his two officers, the chief cupbearer and the chief baker, ³and imprisoned them in the house of the captain of the guard, the same prison where Joseph was confined. ⁴The captain of the guard assigned them to Joseph, and he became their personal attendant. After they had been in custody for some time, ⁵both of these men—the Egyptian king’s cupbearer and baker, who were being held in the prison—had a dream on the same night, and each dream had its own meaning. ⁶When Joseph came to them in the morning, he saw that they were distraught. ⁷So he asked the officials of Pharaoh who were in custody with him in his master’s house, “Why are your faces so downcast today?” ⁸“We both had dreams,” they replied, “but there is no one to interpret them.” Then Joseph said to them, “Don’t interpretations belong to God? Tell me your dreams.” ⁹So the chief cupbearer told Joseph his dream: “In my dream there was a vine before me, ¹⁰and on the vine were three branches. As it budded, its blossoms opened and its clusters ripened into grapes. ¹¹Pharaoh’s cup was in my hand, and I took the grapes, squeezed them into his cup, and placed the cup in his hand.” ¹²Joseph replied, “This is the interpretation: The three branches are three days. ¹³Within three days Pharaoh will lift up your head and restore your position. You will put Pharaoh’s cup in his hand, just as you did when you were his cupbearer. ¹⁴But when it goes well for you, please remember me and show me kindness by mentioning me to Pharaoh, that he might bring me out of this prison. ¹⁵For I was kidnapped from the land of the Hebrews, and even here I have done nothing for which they should have put me in this dungeon.” ¹⁶When the chief baker saw that the interpretation was favorable, he said to Joseph, “I too had a dream: There were three baskets of white bread on my head. ¹⁷In the top basket were all sorts of baked goods for Pharaoh, but the birds were eating them out of the basket on my head.” ¹⁸Joseph replied, “This is the interpretation: The three baskets are three days. ¹⁹Within three days Pharaoh will lift off your head and hang you on a tree. Then the birds will eat the flesh of your body.” ²⁰On the third day, which was Pharaoh’s birthday, he held a feast for all his officials, and in their presence he lifted up the heads of the chief cupbearer and the chief baker. ²¹Pharaoh restored the chief cupbearer to his position, so that he once again placed the cup in Pharaoh’s hand. ²²But Pharaoh hanged the chief baker, just as Joseph had described to them in his interpretation. ²³The chief cupbearer, however, did not remember Joseph; he forgot all about him.