Midday Devotion

To the choirmaster: with stringed instruments. A Psalm of David.
¹ Answer me when I call, O God of my righteousness! You have given me relief when I was in distress. Be gracious to me and hear my prayer!
² O men, how long shall my honor be turned into shame? How long will you love vain words and seek after lies? Selah
³ But know that the LORD has set apart the godly for himself; the LORD hears when I call to him.
⁴ Be angry, and do not sin; ponder in your own hearts on your beds, and be silent. Selah
⁵ Offer right sacrifices, and put your trust in the LORD.
⁶ There are many who say, “Who will show us some good? Lift up the light of your face upon us, O LORD!”
⁷ You have put more joy in my heart than they have when their grain and wine abound.
⁸ In peace I will both lie down and sleep; for you alone, O LORD, make me dwell in safety. (ESV)

A Psalm of David.
¹ I will sing of steadfast love and justice; to you, O LORD, I will make music.
² I will ponder the way that is blameless. Oh when will you come to me? I will walk with integrity of heart within my house;
³ I will not set before my eyes anything that is worthless. I hate the work of those who fall away; it shall not cling to me.
⁴ A perverse heart shall be far from me; I will know nothing of evil.
⁵ Whoever slanders his neighbor secretly I will destroy. Whoever has a haughty look and an arrogant heart I will not endure.
⁶ I will look with favor on the faithful in the land, that they may dwell with me; he who walks in the way that is blameless shall minister to me.
⁷ No one who practices deceit shall dwell in my house; no one who utters lies shall continue before my eyes.
⁸ Morning by morning I will destroy all the wicked in the land, cutting off all the evildoers from the city of the LORD. (ESV)

¹⁷ Only let each person lead the life that the Lord has assigned to him, and to which God has called him. This is my rule in all the churches.

²³ You were bought with a price; do not become bondservants of men.
²⁴ So, brothers, in whatever condition each was called, there let him remain with God. (ESV)

¹ On the third new moon after the people of Israel had gone out of the land of Egypt, on that day they came into the wilderness of Sinai.
² They set out from Rephidim and came into the wilderness of Sinai, and they encamped in the wilderness. There Israel encamped before the mountain,
³ while Moses went up to God. The LORD called to him out of the mountain, saying, “Thus you shall say to the house of Jacob, and tell the people of Israel:
⁴ ‘You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself.
⁵ Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine;
⁶ and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words that you shall speak to the people of Israel.”
⁷ So Moses came and called the elders of the people and set before them all these words that the LORD had commanded him.
⁸ All the people answered together and said, “All that the LORD has spoken we will do.” And Moses reported the words of the people to the LORD.
⁹ And the LORD said to Moses, “Behold, I am coming to you in a thick cloud, that the people may hear when I speak with you, and may also believe you forever.” When Moses told the words of the people to the LORD,
¹⁰ the LORD said to Moses, “Go to the people and consecrate them today and tomorrow, and let them wash their garments
¹¹ and be ready for the third day. For on the third day the LORD will come down on Mount Sinai in the sight of all the people.
¹² And you shall set limits for the people all around, saying, ‘Take care not to go up into the mountain or touch the edge of it. Whoever touches the mountain shall be put to death.
¹³ No hand shall touch him, but he shall be stoned or shot; whether beast or man, he shall not live.’ When the trumpet sounds a long blast, they shall come up to the mountain.”
¹⁴ So Moses went down from the mountain to the people and consecrated the people; and they washed their garments.
¹⁵ And he said to the people, “Be ready for the third day; do not go near a woman.”
¹⁶ On the morning of the third day there were thunders and lightnings and a thick cloud on the mountain and a very loud trumpet blast, so that all the people in the camp trembled.
¹⁷ Then Moses brought the people out of the camp to meet God, and they took their stand at the foot of the mountain.
¹⁸ Now Mount Sinai was wrapped in smoke because the LORD had descended on it in fire. The smoke of it went up like the smoke of a kiln, and the whole mountain trembled greatly.
¹⁹ And as the sound of the trumpet grew louder and louder, Moses spoke, and God answered him in thunder.
²⁰ The LORD came down on Mount Sinai, to the top of the mountain. And the LORD called Moses to the top of the mountain, and Moses went up.
²¹ And the LORD said to Moses, “Go down and warn the people, lest they break through to the LORD to look and many of them perish.
²² Also let the priests who come near to the LORD consecrate themselves, lest the LORD break out against them.”
²³ And Moses said to the LORD, “The people cannot come up to Mount Sinai, for you yourself warned us, saying, ‘Set limits around the mountain and consecrate it.’”
²⁴ And the LORD said to him, “Go down, and come up bringing Aaron with you. But do not let the priests and the people break through to come up to the LORD, lest he break out against them.”
²⁵ So Moses went down to the people and told them. (ESV)

¹ Let brotherly love continue.
² Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.
³ Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body.
⁴ Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous.
⁵ Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.”
⁶ So we can confidently say, “The Lord is my helper; I will not fear; what can man do to me?”
⁷ Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God. Consider the outcome of their way of life, and imitate their faith.
⁸ Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.
⁹ Do not be led away by diverse and strange teachings, for it is good for the heart to be strengthened by grace, not by foods, which have not benefited those devoted to them.
¹⁰ We have an altar from which those who serve the tent have no right to eat.
¹¹ For the bodies of those animals whose blood is brought into the holy places by the high priest as a sacrifice for sin are burned outside the camp.
¹² So Jesus also suffered outside the gate in order to sanctify the people through his own blood.
¹³ Therefore let us go to him outside the camp and bear the reproach he endured.
¹⁴ For here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come.
¹⁵ Through him then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that acknowledge his name.
¹⁶ Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God.
¹⁷ Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who will have to give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you.
¹⁸ Pray for us, for we are sure that we have a clear conscience, desiring to act honorably in all things.
¹⁹ I urge you the more earnestly to do this in order that I may be restored to you the sooner.
²⁰ Now may the God of peace who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant,
²¹ equip you with everything good that you may do his will, working in us that which is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen. (ESV)

¹ “At the end of every seven years you shall grant a release.
² And this is the manner of the release: every creditor shall release what he has lent to his neighbor. He shall not exact it of his neighbor, his brother, because the LORD’s release has been proclaimed.
³ Of a foreigner you may exact it, but whatever of yours is with your brother your hand shall release.
⁴ But there will be no poor among you; for the LORD will bless you in the land that the LORD your God is giving you for an inheritance to possess—
⁵ if only you will strictly obey the voice of the LORD your God, being careful to do all this commandment that I command you today.
⁶ For the LORD your God will bless you, as he promised you, and you shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow, and you shall rule over many nations, but they shall not rule over you.
⁷ “If among you, one of your brothers should become poor, in any of your towns within your land that the LORD your God is giving you, you shall not harden your heart or shut your hand against your poor brother,
⁸ but you shall open your hand to him and lend him sufficient for his need, whatever it may be.
⁹ Take care lest there be an unworthy thought in your heart and you say, ‘The seventh year, the year of release is near,’ and your eye look grudgingly on your poor brother, and you give him nothing, and he cry to the LORD against you, and you be guilty of sin.
¹⁰ You shall give to him freely, and your heart shall not be grudging when you give to him, because for this the LORD your God will bless you in all your work and in all that you undertake.
¹¹ For there will never cease to be poor in the land. Therefore I command you, ‘You shall open wide your hand to your brother, to the needy and to the poor, in your land.’
¹² “If your brother, a Hebrew man or a Hebrew woman, is sold to you, he shall serve you six years, and in the seventh year you shall let him go free from you.
¹³ And when you let him go free from you, you shall not let him go empty-handed.
¹⁴ You shall furnish him liberally out of your flock, out of your threshing floor, and out of your winepress. As the LORD your God has blessed you, you shall give to him.
¹⁵ You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the LORD your God redeemed you; therefore I command you this today.
¹⁶ But if he says to you, ‘I will not go out from you,’ because he loves you and your household, since he is well-off with you,
¹⁷ then you shall take an awl, and put it through his ear into the door, and he shall be your slave forever. And to your female slave you shall do the same.
¹⁸ It shall not seem hard to you when you let him go free from you, for at half the cost of a hired worker he has served you six years. So the LORD your God will bless you in all that you do.
¹⁹ “All the firstborn males that are born of your herd and flock you shall dedicate to the LORD your God. You shall do no work with the firstborn of your herd, nor shear the firstborn of your flock.
²⁰ You shall eat it, you and your household, before the LORD your God year by year at the place that the LORD will choose.
²¹ But if it has any blemish, if it is lame or blind or has any serious blemish whatever, you shall not sacrifice it to the LORD your God.
²² You shall eat it within your towns. The unclean and the clean alike may eat it, as though it were a gazelle or a deer.
²³ Only you shall not eat its blood; you shall pour it out on the ground like water.

¹ “Observe the month of Abib and keep the Passover to the LORD your God, for in the month of Abib the LORD your God brought you out of Egypt by night.
² And you shall offer the Passover sacrifice to the LORD your God, from the flock or the herd, at the place that the LORD will choose, to make his name dwell there.
³ You shall eat no leavened bread with it. Seven days you shall eat it with unleavened bread, the bread of affliction—for you came out of the land of Egypt in haste—that all the days of your life you may remember the day when you came out of the land of Egypt.
⁴ No leaven shall be seen with you in all your territory for seven days, nor shall any of the flesh that you sacrifice on the evening of the first day remain all night until morning.
⁵ You may not offer the Passover sacrifice within any of your towns that the LORD your God is giving you,
⁶ but at the place that the LORD your God will choose, to make his name dwell in it, there you shall offer the Passover sacrifice, in the evening at sunset, at the time you came out of Egypt.
⁷ And you shall cook it and eat it at the place that the LORD your God will choose. And in the morning you shall turn and go to your tents.
⁸ For six days you shall eat unleavened bread, and on the seventh day there shall be a solemn assembly to the LORD your God. You shall do no work on it.
⁹ “You shall count seven weeks. Begin to count the seven weeks from the time the sickle is first put to the standing grain.
¹⁰ Then you shall keep the Feast of Weeks to the LORD your God with the tribute of a freewill offering from your hand, which you shall give as the LORD your God blesses you.
¹¹ And you shall rejoice before the LORD your God, you and your son and your daughter, your male servant and your female servant, the Levite who is within your towns, the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow who are among you, at the place that the LORD your God will choose, to make his name dwell there.
¹² You shall remember that you were a slave in Egypt; and you shall be careful to observe these statutes.
¹³ “You shall keep the Feast of Booths seven days, when you have gathered in the produce from your threshing floor and your winepress.
¹⁴ You shall rejoice in your feast, you and your son and your daughter, your male servant and your female servant, the Levite, the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow who are within your towns.
¹⁵ For seven days you shall keep the feast to the LORD your God at the place that the LORD will choose, because the LORD your God will bless you in all your produce and in all the work of your hands, so that you will be altogether joyful.
¹⁶ “Three times a year all your males shall appear before the LORD your God at the place that he will choose: at the Feast of Unleavened Bread, at the Feast of Weeks, and at the Feast of Booths. They shall not appear before the LORD empty-handed.
¹⁷ Every man shall give as he is able, according to the blessing of the LORD your God that he has given you.
¹⁸ “You shall appoint judges and officers in all your towns that the LORD your God is giving you, according to your tribes, and they shall judge the people with righteous judgment.
¹⁹ You shall not pervert justice. You shall not show partiality, and you shall not accept a bribe, for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and subverts the cause of the righteous.
²⁰ Justice, and only justice, you shall follow, that you may live and inherit the land that the LORD your God is giving you. (ESV)

³¹ At that very hour some Pharisees came and said to him, “Get away from here, for Herod wants to kill you.”
³² And he said to them, “Go and tell that fox, ‘Behold, I cast out demons and perform cures today and tomorrow, and the third day I finish my course.
³³ Nevertheless, I must go on my way today and tomorrow and the day following, for it cannot be that a prophet should perish away from Jerusalem.’
³⁴ O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!
³⁵ Behold, your house is forsaken. And I tell you, you will not see me until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!’”

¹ One Sabbath, when he went to dine at the house of a ruler of the Pharisees, they were watching him carefully.
² And behold, there was a man before him who had dropsy.
³ And Jesus responded to the lawyers and Pharisees, saying, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath, or not?”
⁴ But they remained silent. Then he took him and healed him and sent him away.
⁵ And he said to them, “Which of you, having a son or an ox that has fallen into a well on a Sabbath day, will not immediately pull him out?”
⁶ And they could not reply to these things.
⁷ Now he told a parable to those who were invited, when he noticed how they chose the places of honor, saying to them,
⁸ “When you are invited by someone to a wedding feast, do not sit down in a place of honor, lest someone more distinguished than you be invited by him,
⁹ and he who invited you both will come and say to you, ‘Give your place to this person,’ and then you will begin with shame to take the lowest place.
¹⁰ But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, so that when your host comes he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at table with you.
¹¹ For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”
¹² He said also to the man who had invited him, “When you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return and you be repaid.
¹³ But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind,
¹⁴ and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the just.” (ESV)

To the choirmaster. A Maskil of the Sons of Korah.
¹ O God, we have heard with our ears, our fathers have told us, what deeds you performed in their days, in the days of old:
² you with your own hand drove out the nations, but them you planted; you afflicted the peoples, but them you set free;
³ for not by their own sword did they win the land, nor did their own arm save them, but your right hand and your arm, and the light of your face, for you delighted in them.
⁴ You are my King, O God; ordain salvation for Jacob!
⁵ Through you we push down our foes; through your name we tread down those who rise up against us.
⁶ For not in my bow do I trust, nor can my sword save me.
⁷ But you have saved us from our foes and have put to shame those who hate us.
⁸ In God we have boasted continually, and we will give thanks to your name forever. Selah
⁹ But you have rejected us and disgraced us and have not gone out with our armies.
¹⁰ You have made us turn back from the foe, and those who hate us have gotten spoil.
¹¹ You have made us like sheep for slaughter and have scattered us among the nations.
¹² You have sold your people for a trifle, demanding no high price for them. (ESV)