Bible Reading Plan – Day 3

₁₈The sons of Noah who went out of the boat were Shem, Ham, and Japheth. (Ham was the father of Canaan.)

₁These are the descendants of Noah's sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. These three had sons after the flood.

₂The sons of Japheth — Gomer, Magog, Madai, Javan, Tubal, Meshech, and Tiras — were the ancestors of the peoples who bear their names. ₃The descendants of Gomer were the people of Ashkenaz, Riphath, and Togarmah. ₄The descendants of Javan were the people of Elishah, Spain, Cyprus, and Rhodes; ₅they were the ancestors of the people who live along the coast and on the islands. These are the descendants of Japheth, living in their different tribes and countries, each group speaking its own language.

₆The sons of Ham — Cush, Egypt, Libya and Canaan — were the ancestors of the peoples who bear their names. ₇The descendants of Cush were the people of Seba, Havilah, Sabtah, Raamah, and Sabteca. The descendants of Raamah were the people of Sheba and Dedan. ₈Cush had a son named Nimrod, who became the world's first great conqueror. ₉By the LORD's help he was a great hunter, and that is why people say, “May the LORD make you as great a hunter as Nimrod!” ₁₀At first his kingdom included Babylon, Erech, and Accad, all three of them in Babylonia. ₁₁From that land he went to Assyria and built the cities of Nineveh, Rehoboth Ir, Calah, ₁₂and Resen, which is between Nineveh and the great city of Calah.

₁₃The descendants of Egypt were the people of Lydia, Anam, Lehab, Naphtuh, ₁₄Pathrus, Casluh, and of Crete, from whom the Philistines are descended.

₁₅Canaan's sons — Sidon, the eldest, and Heth — were the ancestors of the peoples who bear their names. ₁₆Canaan was also the ancestor of the Jebusites, the Amorites, the Girgashites, ₁₇the Hivites, the Arkites, the Sinites, ₁₈the Arvadites, the Zemarites, and the Hamathites. The different tribes of the Canaanites spread out, ₁₉until the Canaanite borders reached from Sidon southwards to Gerar near Gaza, and eastwards to Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, and Zeboiim near Lasha. ₂₀These are the descendants of Ham, living in their different tribes and countries, each group speaking its own language.

₂₁Shem, the elder brother of Japheth, was the ancestor of all the Hebrews. ₂₂Shem's sons — Elam, Asshur, Arpachshad, Lud, and Aram — were the ancestors of the peoples who bear their names. ₂₃The descendants of Aram were the people of Uz, Hul, Gether, and Meshek. ₂₄Arpachshad was the father of Shelah, who was the father of Eber. ₂₅Eber had two sons: one was named Peleg, because during his time the people of the world were divided; and the other was named Joktan. ₂₆The descendants of Joktan were the people of Almodad, Sheleph, Hazarmaveth, Jerah, ₂₇Hadoram, Uzal, Diklah, ₂₈Obal, Abimael, Sheba, ₂₉Ophir, Havilah, and Jobab. All of them were descended from Joktan. ₃₀The land in which they lived extended from Mesha to Sephar in the eastern hill country. ₃₁These are the descendants of Shem, living in their different tribes and countries, each group speaking its own language.

₃₂All these peoples are the descendants of Noah, nation by nation, according to their different lines of descent. After the flood all the nations of the earth were descended from the sons of Noah.

₁At first, the people of the whole world had only one language and used the same words. ₂As they wandered about in the East, they came to a plain in Babylonia and settled there. ₃They said to one another, “Come on! Let's make bricks and bake them hard.” So they had bricks to build with and tar to hold them together. ₄They said, “Now let's build a city with a tower that reaches the sky, so that we can make a name for ourselves and not be scattered all over the earth.”

₅Then the LORD came down to see the city and the tower which those men had built, ₆and he said, “Now then, these are all one people and they speak one language; this is just the beginning of what they are going to do. Soon they will be able to do anything they want! ₇Let us go down and mix up their language so that they will not understand one another.” ₈So the LORD scattered them all over the earth, and they stopped building the city. ₉The city was called Babylon, because there the LORD mixed up the language of all the people, and from there he scattered them all over the earth.

₁₀These are the descendants of Shem. Two years after the flood, when Shem was 100 years old, he had a son, Arpachshad. ₁₁After that, he lived another 500 years and had other children.

₁₂When Arpachshad was 35 years old, he had a son, Shelah; ₁₃after that, he lived another 403 years and had other children.

₁₄When Shelah was thirty years old, he had a son, Eber; ₁₅after that, he lived another 403 years and had other children.

₁₆When Eber was 34 years old, he had a son, Peleg; ₁₇after that, he lived another 430 years and had other children.

₁₈When Peleg was thirty years old, he had a son, Reu; ₁₉after that, he lived another 209 years and had other children.

₂₀When Reu was 32 years old, he had a son, Serug; ₂₁after that, he lived another 207 years and had other children.

₂₂When Serug was thirty years old, he had a son, Nahor; ₂₃after that, he lived another 200 years and had other children.

₂₄When Nahor was 29 years old, he had a son, Terah; ₂₅after that, he lived another 119 years and had other children.

₂₆After Terah was seventy years old, he became the father of Abram, Nahor, and Haran.

₂₇These are the descendants of Terah, who was the father of Abram, Nahor, and Haran. Haran was the father of Lot, ₂₈and Haran died in his native city, Ur in Babylonia, while his father was still living. ₂₉Abram married Sarai, and Nahor married Milcah, the daughter of Haran, who was also the father of Iscah. ₃₀Sarai was not able to have children.

₃₁Terah took his son Abram, his grandson Lot, who was the son of Haran, and his daughter-in-law Sarai, Abram's wife, and with them he left the city of Ur in Babylonia to go to the land of Canaan. They went as far as Haran and settled there. ₃₂Terah died there at the age of 205.

₁The LORD said to Abram, “Leave your country, your relatives, and your father's home, and go to a land that I am going to show you. ₂I will give you many descendants, and they will become a great nation. I will bless you and make your name famous, so that you will be a blessing.

₄When Abram was 75 years old, he started out from Haran, as the LORD had told him to do; and Lot went with him. ₅Abram took his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, and all the wealth and all the slaves they had acquired in Haran, and they started out for the land of Canaan.

When they arrived in Canaan, ₆Abram travelled through the land until he came to the sacred tree of Moreh, the holy place at Shechem. (At that time the Canaanites were still living in the land.) ₇The LORD appeared to Abram and said to him, “This is the country that I am going to give to your descendants.” Then Abram built an altar there to the LORD, who had appeared to him. ₈After that, he moved on south to the hill country east of the city of Bethel and set up his camp between Bethel on the west and Ai on the east. There also he built an altar and worshipped the LORD. ₉Then he moved on from place to place, going towards the southern part of Canaan.

₁₀But there was a famine in Canaan, and it was so bad that Abram went farther south to Egypt, to live there for a while. ₁₁When he was about to cross the border into Egypt, he said to his wife Sarai, “You are a beautiful woman. ₁₂When the Egyptians see you, they will assume that you are my wife, and so they will kill me and let you live. ₁₃Tell them that you are my sister; then because of you they will let me live and treat me well.” ₁₄When he crossed the border into Egypt, the Egyptians did see that his wife was beautiful. ₁₅Some of the court officials saw her and told the king how beautiful she was; so she was taken to his palace. ₁₆Because of her the king treated Abram well and gave him flocks of sheep and goats, cattle, donkeys, slaves, and camels.

₁₇But because the king had taken Sarai, the LORD sent terrible diseases on him and on the people of his palace. ₁₈Then the king sent for Abram and asked him, “What have you done to me? Why didn't you tell me that she was your wife? ₁₉Why did you say that she was your sister, and let me take her as my wife? Here is your wife; take her and get out!” ₂₀The king gave orders to his men, so they took Abram and put him out of the country, together with his wife and everything he owned.

₁Abram went north out of Egypt to the southern part of Canaan with his wife and everything he owned, and Lot went with him. ₂Abram was a very rich man, with sheep, goats, and cattle, as well as silver and gold. ₃Then he left there and moved from place to place, going towards Bethel. He reached the place between Bethel and Ai where he had camped before ₄and had built an altar. There he worshipped the LORD.

₅Lot also had sheep, goats, and cattle, as well as his own family and servants. ₆And so there was not enough pasture land for the two of them to stay together, because they had too many animals. ₇So quarrels broke out between the men who took care of Abram's animals and those who took care of Lot's animals. (At that time the Canaanites and the Perizzites were still living in the land.)

₈Then Abram said to Lot, “We are relatives, and your men and my men shouldn't be quarrelling. ₉So let's separate. Choose any part of the land you want. You go one way, and I'll go the other.”

₁₀Lot looked round and saw that the whole Jordan Valley, all the way to Zoar, had plenty of water, like the Garden of the LORD or like the land of Egypt. (This was before the LORD had destroyed the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah.) ₁₁So Lot chose the whole Jordan Valley for himself and moved away towards the east. That is how the two men parted. ₁₂Abram stayed in the land of Canaan, and Lot settled among the cities in the valley and camped near Sodom, ₁₃whose people were wicked and sinned against the LORD.

₁₄After Lot had left, the LORD said to Abram, “From where you are, look carefully in all directions. ₁₅I am going to give you and your descendants all the land that you see, and it will be yours for ever. ₁₆I am going to give you so many descendants that no one will be able to count them all; it would be as easy to count all the specks of dust on earth! ₁₇Now, go and look over the whole land, because I am going to give it all to you.” ₁₈So Abram moved his camp and settled near the sacred trees of Mamre at Hebron, and there he built an altar to the LORD.