February 3: Psalm 33; Genesis 29:31–30:43; 2 Chronicles 7; Luke 23:26–56 - a podcast by Crossway

Psalm 33(Listen)

The Steadfast Love of theLord

33   Shout for joy in the LORD, O you righteous!
    Praise befits the upright.
2   Give thanks to the LORD with the lyre;
    make melody to him with the harp of ten strings!
3   Sing to him a new song;
    play skillfully on the strings, with loud shouts.
4   For the word of the LORD is upright,
    and all his work is done in faithfulness.
5   He loves righteousness and justice;
    the earth is full of the steadfast love of the LORD.
6   By the word of the LORD the heavens were made,
    and by the breath of his mouth all their host.
7   He gathers the waters of the sea as a heap;
    he puts the deeps in storehouses.
8   Let all the earth fear the LORD;
    let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him!
9   For he spoke, and it came to be;
    he commanded, and it stood firm.
10   The LORD brings the counsel of the nations to nothing;
    he frustrates the plans of the peoples.
11   The counsel of the LORD stands forever,
    the plans of his heart to all generations.
12   Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD,
    the people whom he has chosen as his heritage!
13   The LORD looks down from heaven;
    he sees all the children of man;
14   from where he sits enthroned he looks out
    on all the inhabitants of the earth,
15   he who fashions the hearts of them all
    and observes all their deeds.
16   The king is not saved by his great army;
    a warrior is not delivered by his great strength.
17   The war horse is a false hope for salvation,
    and by its great might it cannot rescue.
18   Behold, the eye of the LORD is on those who fear him,
    on those who hope in his steadfast love,
19   that he may deliver their soul from death
    and keep them alive in famine.
20   Our soul waits for the LORD;
    he is our help and our shield.
21   For our heart is glad in him,
    because we trust in his holy name.
22   Let your steadfast love, O LORD, be upon us,
    even as we hope in you.

(ESV)

Genesis 29:31–30:43(Listen)

Jacob’s Children

31 When the LORD saw that Leah was hated, he opened her womb, but Rachel was barren.32 And Leah conceived and bore a son, and she called his name Reuben,¹for she said, “Because the LORD has looked upon my affliction; for now my husband will love me.”33 She conceived again and bore a son, and said, “Because the LORD has heard that I am hated, he has given me this son also.” And she called his name Simeon.²34 Again she conceived and bore a son, and said, “Now this time my husband will be attached to me, because I have borne him three sons.” Therefore his name was called Levi.³35 And she conceived again and bore a son, and said, “This time I will praise the LORD.” Therefore she called his name Judah.⁴Then she ceased bearing.

30 When Rachel saw that she bore Jacob no children, she envied her sister. She said to Jacob, “Give me children, or I shall die!”2 Jacob’s anger was kindled against Rachel, and he said, “Am I in the place of God, who has withheld from you the fruit of the womb?”3 Then she said, “Here is my servant Bilhah; go in to her, so that she may give birth on my behalf,⁵that even I may have children⁶through her.”4 So she gave him her servant Bilhah as a wife, and Jacob went in to her.5 And Bilhah conceived and bore Jacob a son.6 Then Rachel said, “God has judged me, and has also heard my voice and given me a son.” Therefore she called his name Dan.⁷7 Rachel’s servant Bilhah conceived again and bore Jacob a second son.8 Then Rachel said, “With mighty wrestlings⁸I have wrestled with my sister and have prevailed.” So she called his name Naphtali.⁹

9 When Leah saw that she had ceased bearing children, she took her servant Zilpah and gave her to Jacob as a wife.10 Then Leah’s servant Zilpah bore Jacob a son.11 And Leah said, “Good fortune has come!” so she called his name Gad.¹⁰12 Leah’s servant Zilpah bore Jacob a second son.13 And Leah said, “Happy am I! For women have called me happy.” So she called his name Asher.¹¹

14 In the days of wheat harvest Reuben went and found mandrakes in the field and brought them to his mother Leah. Then Rachel said to Leah, “Please give me some of your son’s mandrakes.”15 But she said to her, “Is it a small matter that you have taken away my husband? Would you take away my son’s mandrakes also?” Rachel said, “Then he may lie with you tonight in exchange for your son’s mandrakes.”16 When Jacob came from the field in the evening, Leah went out to meet him and said, “You must come in to me, for I have hired you with my son’s mandrakes.” So he lay with her that night.17 And God listened to Leah, and she conceived and bore Jacob a fifth son.18 Leah said, “God has given me my wages because I gave my servant to my husband.” So she called his name Issachar.¹²

19 And Leah conceived again, and she bore Jacob a sixth son.20 Then Leah said, “God has endowed me with a good endowment; now my husband will honor me, because I have borne him six sons.” So she called his name Zebulun.¹³21 Afterward she bore a daughter and called her name Dinah.

22 Then God remembered Rachel, and God listened to her and opened her womb.23 She conceived and bore a son and said, “God has taken away my reproach.”24 And she called his name Joseph,¹⁴saying, “May the LORD add to me another son!”

Jacob’s Prosperity

25 As soon as Rachel had borne Joseph, Jacob said to Laban, “Send me away, that I may go to my own home and country.26 Give me my wives and my children for whom I have served you, that I may go, for you know the service that I have given you.”27 But Laban said to him, “If I have found favor in your sight, I have learned by divination that¹⁵the LORD has blessed me because of you.28 Name your wages, and I will give it.”29 Jacob said to him, “You yourself know how I have served you, and how your livestock has fared with me.30 For you had little before I came, and it has increased abundantly, and the LORD has blessed you wherever I turned. But now when shall I provide for my own household also?”31 He said, “What shall I give you?” Jacob said, “You shall not give me anything. If you will do this for me, I will again pasture your flock and keep it:32 let me pass through all your flock today, removing from it every speckled and spotted sheep and every black lamb, and the spotted and speckled among the goats, and they shall be my wages.33 So my honesty will answer for me later, when you come to look into my wages with you. Every one that is not speckled and spotted among the goats and black among the lambs, if found with me, shall be counted stolen.”34 Laban said, “Good! Let it be as you have said.”35 But that day Laban removed the male goats that were striped and spotted, and all the female goats that were speckled and spotted, every one that had white on it, and every lamb that was black, and put them in the charge of his sons.36 And he set a distance of three days’ journey between himself and Jacob, and Jacob pastured the rest of Laban’s flock.

37 Then Jacob took fresh sticks of poplar and almond and plane trees, and peeled white streaks in them, exposing the white of the sticks.38 He set the sticks that he had peeled in front of the flocks in the troughs, that is, the watering places, where the flocks came to drink. And since they bred when they came to drink,39 the flocks bred in front of the sticks and so the flocks brought forth striped, speckled, and spotted.40 And Jacob separated the lambs and set the faces of the flocks toward the striped and all the black in the flock of Laban. He put his own droves apart and did not put them with Laban’s flock.41 Whenever the stronger of the flock were breeding, Jacob would lay the sticks in the troughs before the eyes of the flock, that they might breed among the sticks,42 but for the feebler of the flock he would not lay them there. So the feebler would be Laban’s, and the stronger Jacob’s.43 Thus the man increased greatly and had large flocks, female servants and male servants, and camels and donkeys.

(ESV)

2 Chronicles 7(Listen)

Fire from Heaven

7 As soon as Solomon finished his prayer, fire came down from heaven and consumed the burnt offering and the sacrifices, and the glory of the LORD filled the temple.2 And the priests could not enter the house of the LORD, because the glory of the LORD filled the LORD’s house.3 When all the people of Israel saw the fire come down and the glory of the LORD on the temple, they bowed down with their faces to the ground on the pavement and worshiped and gave thanks to the LORD, saying, “For he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever.”

The Dedication of the Temple

4 Then the king and all the people offered sacrifice before the LORD.5 King Solomon offered as a sacrifice 22,000 oxen and 120,000 sheep. So the king and all the people dedicated the house of God.6 The priests stood at their posts; the Levites also, with the instruments for music to the LORD that King David had made for giving thanks to the LORD—for his steadfast love endures forever—whenever David offered praises by their ministry;¹opposite them the priests sounded trumpets, and all Israel stood.

7 And Solomon consecrated the middle of the court that was before the house of the LORD, for there he offered the burnt offering and the fat of the peace offerings, because the bronze altar Solomon had made could not hold the burnt offering and the grain offering and the fat.

8 At that time Solomon held the feast for seven days, and all Israel with him, a very great assembly, from Lebo-hamath to the Brook of Egypt.9 And on the eighth day they held a solemn assembly, for they had kept the dedication of the altar seven days and the feast seven days.10 On the twenty-third day of the seventh month he sent the people away to their homes, joyful and glad of heart for the prosperity²that the LORD had granted to David and to Solomon and to Israel his people.

If My People Pray

11 Thus Solomon finished the house of the LORD and the king’s house. All that Solomon had planned to do in the house of the LORD and in his own house he successfully accomplished.12 Then the LORD appeared to Solomon in the night and said to him: “I have heard your prayer and have chosen this place for myself as a house of sacrifice.13 When I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or command the locust to devour the land, or send pestilence among my people,14 if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.15 Now my eyes will be open and my ears attentive to the prayer that is made in this place.16 For now I have chosen and consecrated this house that my name may be there forever. My eyes and my heart will be there for all time.17 And as for you, if you will walk before me as David your father walked, doing according to all that I have commanded you and keeping my statutes and my rules,18 then I will establish your royal throne, as I covenanted with David your father, saying, ‘You shall not lack a man to rule Israel.’

19 “But if you³turn aside and forsake my statutes and my commandments that I have set before you, and go and serve other gods and worship them,20 then I will pluck you⁴up from my land that I have given you, and this house that I have consecrated for my name, I will cast out of my sight, and I will make it a proverb and a byword among all peoples.21 And at this house, which was exalted, everyone passing by will be astonished and say, ‘Why has the LORD done thus to this land and to this house?’22 Then they will say, ‘Because they abandoned the LORD, the God of their fathers who brought them out of the land of Egypt, and laid hold on other gods and worshiped them and served them. Therefore he has brought all this disaster on them.’”

(ESV)

Luke 23:26–56(Listen)

The Crucifixion

26 And as they led him away, they seized one Simon of Cyrene, who was coming in from the country, and laid on him the cross, to carry it behind Jesus.27 And there followed him a great multitude of the people and of women who were mourning and lamenting for him.28 But turning to them Jesus said,“Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children.29 For behold, the days are coming when they will say, ‘Blessed are the barren and the wombs that never bore and the breasts that never nursed!’30 Then they will begin to say to the mountains, ‘Fall on us,’ and to the hills, ‘Cover us.’31 For if they do these things when the wood is green, what will happen when it is dry?”

32 Two others, who were criminals, were led away to be put to death with him.33 And when they came to the place that is called The Skull, there they crucified him, and the criminals, one on his right and one on his left.34 And Jesus said,“Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”¹And they cast lots to divide his garments.35 And the people stood by, watching, but the rulers scoffed at him, saying, “He saved others; let him save himself, if he is the Christ of God, his Chosen One!”36 The soldiers also mocked him, coming up and offering him sour wine37 and saying, “If you are the King of the Jews, save yourself!”38 There was also an inscription over him,²“This is the King of the Jews.”

39 One of the criminals who were hanged railed at him,³saying, “Are you not the Christ? Save yourself and us!”40 But the other rebuked him, saying, “Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation?41 And we indeed justly, for we are receiving the due reward of our deeds; but this man has done nothing wrong.”42 And he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”43 And he said to him,“Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise.”

The Death of Jesus

44 It was now about the sixth hour,⁴and there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour,⁵45 while the sun’s light failed. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two.46 Then Jesus, calling out with a loud voice, said,“Father, into your hands I commit my spirit!”And having said this he breathed his last.47 Now when the centurion saw what had taken place, he praised God, saying, “Certainly this man was innocent!”48 And all the crowds that had assembled for this spectacle, when they saw what had taken place, returned home beating their breasts.49 And all his acquaintances and the women who had followed him from Galilee stood at a distance watching these things.

Jesus Is Buried

50 Now there was a man named Joseph, from the Jewish town of Arimathea. He was a member of the council, a good and righteous man,51 who had not consented to their decision and action; and he was looking for the kingdom of God.52 This man went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus.53 Then he took it down and wrapped it in a linen shroud and laid him in a tomb cut in stone, where no one had ever yet been laid.54 It was the day of Preparation, and the Sabbath was beginning.⁶55 The women who had come with him from Galilee followed and saw the tomb and how his body was laid.56 Then they returned and prepared spices and ointments.

On the Sabbath they rested according to the commandment.

(ESV)