One Year Bible.

My Heart Is Stirred by a Noble Theme

¹For the choirmaster. To the tune of “The Lilies.” A Maskil of the sons of Korah. A love song.

My heart is stirred by a noble theme

as I recite my verses to the king;

my tongue is the pen of a skillful writer.

²You are the most handsome of men;

grace has anointed your lips;

therefore God has blessed you forever.

³Strap your sword at your side, O mighty warrior;

appear in your majesty and splendor.

⁴In your splendor ride forth in victory

on behalf of truth and humility and justice;

may your right hand show your awesome deeds.

⁵Your arrows pierce the hearts of the king’s foes;

the nations fall beneath your feet.

⁶Your throne, O God, endures forever and ever,

and justice is the scepter of Your kingdom.

⁷You have loved righteousness

and hated wickedness;

therefore God, your God, has anointed you

above your companions with the oil of joy.

⁸All your garments are fragrant

with myrrh and aloes and cassia;

from palaces of ivory the harps make you glad.

⁹The daughters of kings are among your honored women;

the queen stands at your right hand,

adorned with the gold of Ophir.

¹⁰Listen, O daughter! Consider and incline your ear:

Forget your people and your father’s house,

¹¹and the king will desire your beauty;

bow to him, for he is your lord.

¹²The Daughter of Tyre will come with a gift;

men of wealth will seek your favor.

¹³All glorious is the princess in her chamber;

her gown is embroidered with gold.

¹⁴In colorful garments she is led to the king;

her virgin companions are brought before you.

¹⁵They are led in with joy and gladness;

they enter the palace of the king.

¹⁶Your sons will succeed your fathers;

you will make them princes throughout the land.

¹⁷I will commemorate your name through all generations;

therefore the nations will praise you forever and ever.

Alive with Christ

¹And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, ²in which you used to walk when you conformed to the ways of this world and of the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit who is now at work in the sons of disobedience. ³All of us also lived among them at one time, fulfilling the cravings of our flesh and indulging its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature children of wrath.

⁴But because of His great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, ⁵made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in our trespasses. It is by grace you have been saved! ⁶And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with Him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, ⁷in order that in the coming ages He might display the surpassing riches of His grace, demonstrated by His kindness to us in Christ Jesus.

⁸For it is by grace you have been saved through faith, and this not from yourselves; it is the gift of God, ⁹not by works, so that no one can boast. ¹⁰For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance as our way of life.

One in Christ

¹¹Therefore remember that formerly you who are Gentiles in the flesh and called uncircumcised by the so-called circumcision (that done in the body by human hands) — ¹²remember that at that time you were separate from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world. ¹³But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ.

¹⁴For He Himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has torn down the dividing wall of hostility ¹⁵by abolishing in His flesh the law of commandments and decrees. He did this to create in Himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace ¹⁶and reconciling both of them to God in one body through the cross, by which He put to death their hostility.

¹⁷He came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. ¹⁸For through Him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit.

Christ Our Cornerstone

¹⁹Therefore you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of God’s household, ²⁰built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus Himself as the cornerstone. ²¹In Him the whole building is fitted together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord. ²²And in Him you too are being built together into a dwelling place for God in His Spirit.

A Warning against Pride

¹What causes conflicts and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from the passions at war within you? ²You crave what you do not have; you kill and covet, but are unable to obtain it. You quarrel and fight. You do not have, because you do not ask. ³And when you do ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may squander it on your pleasures.

⁴You adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore, whoever chooses to be a friend of the world renders himself an enemy of God. ⁵Or do you think the Scripture says without reason that the Spirit He caused to dwell in us yearns with envy? ⁶But He gives us more grace. This is why it says:

“God opposes the proud,

but gives grace to the humble.”

Drawing Near to God

⁷Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. ⁸Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. ⁹Grieve, mourn, and weep. Turn your laughter to mourning, and your joy to gloom. ¹⁰Humble yourselves before the Lord, and He will exalt you.

¹¹Brothers, do not slander one another. Anyone who speaks against his brother or judges him speaks against the law and judges it. And if you judge the law, you are not a practitioner of the law, but a judge of it. ¹²There is only one Lawgiver and Judge, the One who is able to save and destroy. But who are you to judge your neighbor?

Do Not Boast about Tomorrow

¹³Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business, and make a profit.” ¹⁴You do not even know what will happen tomorrow! What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.

¹⁵Instead, you ought to say, “If the Lord is willing, we will live and do this or that.” ¹⁶As it is, you boast in your proud intentions. All such boasting is evil. ¹⁷Anyone, then, who knows the right thing to do, yet fails to do it, is guilty of sin.

A Warning to the Rich

¹Come now, you who are rich, weep and wail over the misery to come upon you. ²Your riches have rotted and moths have eaten your clothes. ³Your gold and silver are corroded. Their corrosion will testify against you and consume your flesh like fire.

You have hoarded treasure in the last days. ⁴Look, the wages you withheld from the workmen who mowed your fields are crying out against you. The cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of Hosts.

⁵You have lived on earth in luxury and self-indulgence. You have fattened your hearts in the day of slaughter. ⁶You have condemned and murdered the righteous, who did not resist you.

Patience in Suffering

⁷Be patient, then, brothers, until the Lord’s coming. See how the farmer awaits the precious fruit of the soil — how patient he is for the fall and spring rains. ⁸You, too, be patient and strengthen your hearts, because the Lord’s coming is near. ⁹Do not complain about one another, brothers, so that you will not be judged. Look, the Judge is standing at the door!

¹⁰Brothers, as an example of patience in affliction, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. ¹¹See how blessed we consider those who have persevered. You have heard of Job’s perseverance and have seen the outcome from the Lord. The Lord is full of compassion and mercy.

¹²Above all, my brothers, do not swear, not by heaven or earth or by any other oath. Simply let your “Yes” be yes, and your “No,” no, so that you will not fall under judgment.

The Prayer of Faith

¹³Is any one of you suffering? He should pray. Is anyone cheerful? He should sing praises. ¹⁴Is any one of you sick? He should call the elders of the church to pray over him and anoint him with oil in the name of the Lord. ¹⁵And the prayer offered in faith will restore the one who is sick. The Lord will raise him up. If he has sinned, he will be forgiven.

¹⁶Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man has great power to prevail. ¹⁷Elijah was a man just like us. He prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years. ¹⁸Again he prayed, and the heavens gave rain, and the earth yielded its crops.

Restoring a Sinner

¹⁹My brothers, if one of you should wander from the truth and someone should bring him back, ²⁰consider this: Whoever turns a sinner from the error of his way will save his soul from death and cover over a multitude of sins.