One Year Bible.

Joshua’s Charge to Leaders

¹A long time after the LORD had given Israel rest from all the enemies around them, when Joshua was old and well along in years, ²he summoned all Israel, including its elders, leaders, judges, and officers. “I am old and well along in years,” he said, ³“and you have seen everything that the LORD your God has done to all these nations for your sake, because it was the LORD your God who fought for you.

⁴See, I have allotted as an inheritance to your tribes these remaining nations, including all the nations I have already cut off, from the Jordan westward to the Great Sea. ⁵The LORD your God will push them out of your way and drive them out before you, so that you can take possession of their land, as the LORD your God promised you.

⁶Be very strong, then, so that you can keep and obey all that is written in the Book of the Law of Moses, not turning aside from it to the right or to the left. ⁷So you are not to associate with these nations that remain among you. You must not call on the names of their gods or swear by them, and you must not serve them or bow down to them. ⁸Instead, you shall hold fast to the LORD your God, as you have done to this day.

⁹The LORD has driven out great and powerful nations before you, and to this day no one can stand against you. ¹⁰One of you can put a thousand to flight, because the LORD your God fights for you, just as He promised. ¹¹Therefore watch yourselves carefully, that you love the LORD your God. ¹²For if you turn away and cling to the rest of these nations that remain among you, and if you intermarry and associate with them, ¹³know for sure that the LORD your God will no longer drive out these nations before you. Instead, they will become for you a snare and a trap, a scourge in your sides and thorns in your eyes, until you perish from this good land that the LORD your God has given you.

¹⁴Now behold, today I am going the way of all the earth, and you know with all your heart and soul that not one of the good promises the LORD your God made to you has failed. Everything was fulfilled for you; not one promise has failed. ¹⁵But just as every good thing the LORD your God promised you has come to pass, likewise the LORD will bring upon you the calamity He has threatened, until He has destroyed you from this good land He has given you. ¹⁶If you transgress the covenant of the LORD your God, which He commanded you, and go and serve other gods and bow down to them, then the anger of the LORD will burn against you, and you will quickly perish from this good land He has given you.”

Joshua Reviews Israel’s History

¹Then Joshua assembled all the tribes of Israel at Shechem. He summoned the elders, leaders, judges, and officers of Israel, and they presented themselves before God.

²And Joshua said to all the people, “This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: ‘Long ago your fathers, including Terah the father of Abraham and Nahor, lived beyond the Euphrates and worshiped other gods. ³But I took your father Abraham from beyond the Euphrates and led him through all the land of Canaan, and I multiplied his descendants. I gave him Isaac, ⁴and to Isaac I gave Jacob and Esau. I gave Esau Mount Seir to possess, but Jacob and his sons went down to Egypt.

⁵Then I sent Moses and Aaron, and I afflicted the Egyptians by what I did there, and afterward I brought you out. ⁶When I brought your fathers out of Egypt and you reached the Red Sea, the Egyptians pursued them with chariots and horsemen as far as the Red Sea. ⁷So your fathers cried out to the LORD, and He put darkness between you and the Egyptians, over whom He brought the sea and engulfed them. Your very eyes saw what I did to the Egyptians. Then you lived in the wilderness for a long time.

⁸Later, I brought you to the land of the Amorites who lived beyond the Jordan. They fought against you, but I delivered them into your hand, that you should possess their land when I destroyed them before you. ⁹Then Balak son of Zippor, the king of Moab, set out to fight against Israel. He sent for Balaam son of Beor to curse you, ¹⁰but I would not listen to Balaam. So he blessed you again and again, and I delivered you from his hand.

¹¹After this, you crossed the Jordan and came to Jericho. The people of Jericho fought against you, as did the Amorites, Perizzites, Canaanites, Hittites, Girgashites, Hivites, and Jebusites, and I delivered them into your hand. ¹²I sent the hornet ahead of you, and it drove out the two Amorite kings before you, but not by your own sword or bow. ¹³So I gave you a land on which you did not toil and cities that you did not build, and now you live in them and eat from vineyards and olive groves that you did not plant.’

Choose Whom You Will Serve

¹⁴Now, therefore, fear the LORD and serve Him in sincerity and truth; cast aside the gods your fathers served beyond the Euphrates and in Egypt, and serve the LORD. ¹⁵But if it is unpleasing in your sight to serve the LORD, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your fathers served beyond the Euphrates, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living. As for me and my house, we will serve the LORD!”

¹⁶The people replied, “Far be it from us to forsake the LORD to serve other gods! ¹⁷For the LORD our God brought us and our fathers out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, and performed these great signs before our eyes. He also protected us throughout our journey and among all the nations through which we traveled. ¹⁸And the LORD drove out before us all the nations, including the Amorites who lived in the land. We too will serve the LORD, because He is our God!”

¹⁹But Joshua said to the people, “You are not able to serve the LORD, for He is a holy God; He is a jealous God; He will not forgive your rebellion or your sins. ²⁰If you forsake the LORD and serve foreign gods, He will turn and bring disaster on you and consume you, even after He has been good to you.”

²¹“No!” replied the people. “We will serve the LORD!”

²²Then Joshua told them, “You are witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen to serve the LORD.”

“We are witnesses!” they said.

²³“Now, therefore,” he said, “get rid of the foreign gods among you and incline your hearts to the LORD, the God of Israel.”

²⁴So the people said to Joshua, “We will serve the LORD our God and obey His voice.”

²⁵On that day Joshua made a covenant for the people, and there at Shechem he established for them a statute and ordinance. ²⁶Joshua recorded these things in the Book of the Law of God. Then he took a large stone and set it up there under the oak that was near the sanctuary of the LORD. ²⁷And Joshua said to all the people, “You see this stone. It will be a witness against us, for it has heard all the words the LORD has spoken to us, and it will be a witness against you if you ever deny your God.”

²⁸Then Joshua sent the people away, each to his own inheritance.

Joshua’s Death and Burial

²⁹Some time later, Joshua son of Nun, the servant of the LORD, died at the age of 110. ³⁰And they buried him in the land of his inheritance, at Timnath-serah in the hill country of Ephraim, north of Mount Gaash. ³¹Israel had served the LORD throughout the days of Joshua and of the elders who outlived him and who had experienced all the works that the LORD had done for Israel.

³²And the bones of Joseph, which the Israelites had brought up out of Egypt, were buried at Shechem in the plot of land that Jacob had purchased from the sons of Hamor, Shechem’s father, for a hundred pieces of silver. So it became an inheritance for Joseph’s descendants.

³³Eleazar son of Aaron also died, and they buried him at Gibeah, which had been given to his son Phinehas in the hill country of Ephraim.

Zion’s Captives Restored

¹A song of ascents.

When the LORD restored the captives of Zion,

we were like dreamers.

²Then our mouths were filled with laughter,

our tongues with shouts of joy.

Then it was said among the nations,

“The LORD has done great things for them.”

³The LORD has done great things for us;

we are filled with joy.

⁴Restore our captives, O LORD,

like streams in the Negev.

⁵Those who sow in tears

will reap with shouts of joy.

⁶He who goes out weeping,

bearing a trail of seed,

will surely return with shouts of joy,

carrying sheaves of grain.

Jesus Heals a Man with Dropsy

¹One Sabbath, Jesus went to eat in the home of a leading Pharisee, and those in attendance were watching Him closely. ²Right there before Him was a man with dropsy. ³So Jesus asked the experts in the law and the Pharisees, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath or not?”

⁴But they remained silent.

Then Jesus took hold of the man, healed him, and sent him on his way. ⁵And He asked them, “Which of you whose son or ox falls into a pit on the Sabbath day will not immediately pull him out?”

⁶And they were unable to answer these questions.

The Parable of the Guests

⁷When Jesus noticed how the guests chose the places of honor, He told them a parable: ⁸“When you are invited to a wedding banquet, do not sit in the place of honor, in case someone more distinguished than you has been invited. ⁹Then the host who invited both of you will come and tell you, ‘Give this man your seat.’ And in humiliation, you will have to take the last place.

¹⁰But when you are invited, go and sit in the last place, so that your host will come and tell you, ‘Friend, move up to a better place.’ Then you will be honored in front of everyone at the table with you. ¹¹For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”

¹²Then Jesus said to the man who had invited Him, “When you host a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or brothers or relatives or rich neighbors. Otherwise, they may invite you in return, and you will be repaid. ¹³But when you host a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind, ¹⁴and you will be blessed. Since they cannot repay you, you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”

The Parable of the Banquet

¹⁵When one of those reclining with Him heard this, he said to Jesus, “Blessed is everyone who will eat at the feast in the kingdom of God.”

¹⁶But Jesus replied, “A certain man prepared a great banquet and invited many guests. ¹⁷When it was time for the banquet, he sent his servant to tell those who had been invited, ‘Come, for everything is now ready.’

¹⁸But one after another they all began to make excuses. The first one said, ‘I have bought a field, and I need to go see it. Please excuse me.’

¹⁹Another said, ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I am going to try them out. Please excuse me.’

²⁰Still another said, ‘I have married a wife, so I cannot come.’

²¹The servant returned and reported all this to his master. Then the owner of the house became angry and said to his servant, ‘Go out quickly into the streets and alleys of the city, and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame.’

²²‘Sir,’ the servant replied, ‘what you ordered has been done, and there is still room.’

²³So the master told his servant, ‘Go out to the highways and hedges and compel them to come in, so that my house will be full. ²⁴For I tell you, not one of those men who were invited will taste my banquet.’”

The Cost of Discipleship

²⁵Now large crowds were traveling with Jesus, and He turned and said to them, ²⁶“If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters — yes, even his own life — he cannot be My disciple. ²⁷And whoever does not carry his cross and follow Me cannot be My disciple.

²⁸Which of you, wishing to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost to see if he has the resources to complete it? ²⁹Otherwise, if he lays the foundation and is unable to finish the work, everyone who sees it will ridicule him, ³⁰saying, ‘This man could not finish what he started to build.’

³¹Or what king on his way to war with another king will not first sit down and consider whether he can engage with ten thousand men the one coming against him with twenty thousand? ³²And if he is unable, he will send a delegation while the other king is still far off, to ask for terms of peace.

³³In the same way, any one of you who does not give up everything he has cannot be My disciple.

Good Salt

³⁴Salt is good, but if the salt loses its savor, with what will it be seasoned? ³⁵It is fit neither for the soil nor for the manure pile, and it is thrown out.

He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”