I am She – Day 2

₃₆In Joppa there was a woman named Tabitha, who was a believer. (Her name in Greek is Dorcas, meaning “a deer”.) She spent all her time doing good and helping the poor.

₄Jesus answered, “Haven't you read the scripture that says that in the beginning the Creator made people male and female? ₅And God said, ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and unite with his wife, and the two will become one.’ ₆So they are no longer two, but one. No human being must separate, then, what God has joined together.”

₄Marriage is to be honoured by all, and husbands and wives must be faithful to each other. God will judge those who are immoral and those who commit adultery.

₃₂Leah became pregnant and gave birth to a son. She said, “The LORD has seen my trouble, and now my husband will love me”; so she named him Reuben.

₃A man should fulfil his duty as a husband, and a woman should fulfil her duty as a wife, and each should satisfy the other's needs. ₄A wife is not the master of her own body, but her husband is; in the same way a husband is not the master of his own body, but his wife is. ₅Do not deny yourselves to each other, unless you first agree to do so for a while in order to spend your time in prayer; but then resume normal marital relations. In this way you will be kept from giving in to Satan's temptation because of your lack of self-control.

₁₆One day two prostitutes came and presented themselves before King Solomon. ₁₇One of them said, “Your Majesty, this woman and I live in the same house, and I gave birth to a baby boy at home while she was there. ₁₈Two days after my child was born she also gave birth to a baby boy. Only the two of us were there in the house — no one else was present. ₁₉Then one night she accidentally rolled over on her baby and smothered it. ₂₀She got up during the night, took my son from my side while I was asleep, and carried him to her bed; then she put the dead child in my bed. ₂₁The next morning, when I woke up and was going to feed my baby, I saw that it was dead. I looked at it more closely and saw that it was not my child.”

₂₂But the other woman said, “No! The living child is mine, and the dead one is yours!”

The first woman answered, “No! The dead child is yours, and the living one is mine!”

And so they argued before the king.

₂₃Then King Solomon said, “Each of you claims that the living child is hers and that the dead child belongs to the other one.” ₂₄He sent for a sword, and when it was brought, ₂₅he said, “Cut the living child in two and give each woman half of it.”

₂₆The real mother, her heart full of love for her son, said to the king, “Please, Your Majesty, don't kill the child! Give it to her!”

But the other woman said, “Don't give it to either of us; go ahead and cut it in two.”

₂₇Then Solomon said, “Don't kill the child! Give it to the first woman — she is its real mother.”

₆Then the woman went and said to her husband, “A man of God has come to me, and he looked as frightening as the angel of God. I didn't ask him where he came from, and he didn't tell me his name. ₇But he did tell me that I would become pregnant and have a son. He told me not to drink any wine or beer, or eat any forbidden food, because the boy is to be dedicated to God as a Nazirite as long as he lives.”

₈Then Manoah prayed to the LORD, “Please, LORD, let the man of God that you sent come back to us and tell us what we must do with the boy when he is born.”

₈Pay attention to what your father and mother tell you, my child. ₉Their teaching will improve your character as a handsome turban or a necklace improves your appearance.

₁The widow of a member of a group of prophets went to Elisha and said, “Sir, my husband has died! As you know, he was a God-fearing man, but now a man he owed money to has come to take away my two sons as slaves in payment for my husband's debt.”

₂“What shall I do for you?” he asked. “Tell me, what have you got at home?”

“Nothing at all, except a small jar of olive oil,” she answered.

₃“Go to your neighbours and borrow as many empty jars as you can,” Elisha told her. ₄“Then you and your sons go into the house, close the door, and start pouring oil into the jars. Set each one aside as soon as it is full.”

₅So the woman went into her house with her sons, closed the door, took the small jar of olive oil, and poured oil into the jars as her sons brought them to her. ₆When they had filled all the jars, she asked if there were any more. “That was the last one,” one of her sons answered. And the olive oil stopped flowing. ₇She went back to Elisha, the prophet, who said to her, “Sell the olive oil and pay all your debts, and there will be enough money left over for you and your sons to live on.”

₁₆But Ruth answered, “Don't ask me to leave you! Let me go with you. Wherever you go, I will go; wherever you live, I will live. Your people will be my people, and your God will be my God. ₁₇Wherever you die, I will die, and that is where I will be buried. May the LORD's worst punishment come upon me if I let anything but death separate me from you!”

₁₀Ruth bowed down with her face touching the ground, and said to Boaz, “Why should you be so concerned about me? Why should you be so kind to a foreigner?”

₁₁Boaz answered, “I have heard about everything that you have done for your mother-in-law since your husband died. I know how you left your father and mother and your own country and how you came to live among a people you had never known before. ₁₂May the LORD reward you for what you have done. May you have a full reward from the LORD God of Israel, to whom you have come for protection!”

₈she said to them, “Go back home and stay with your mothers. May the LORD be as good to you as you have been to me and to those who have died. ₉And may the LORD make it possible for each of you to marry again and have a home.”

So Naomi kissed them goodbye. But they started crying

₃₁“Simon, Simon! Listen! Satan has received permission to test all of you, to separate the good from the bad, as a farmer separates the wheat from the chaff. ₃₂But I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith will not fail. And when you turn back to me, you must strengthen your brothers.”

₈“Or suppose a woman who has ten silver coins loses one of them — what does she do? She lights a lamp, sweeps her house, and looks carefully everywhere until she finds it. ₉When she finds it, she calls her friends and neighbours together, and says to them, ‘I am so happy I found the coin I lost. Let us celebrate!’

₁Naaman, the commander of the Syrian army, was highly respected and esteemed by the king of Syria, because through Naaman the LORD had given victory to the Syrian forces. He was a great soldier, but he suffered from a dreaded skin disease. ₂In one of their raids against Israel, the Syrians had carried off a little Israelite girl, who became a servant of Naaman's wife. ₃One day she said to her mistress, “I wish that my master could go to the prophet who lives in Samaria! He would cure him of his disease.” ₄When Naaman heard of this, he went to the king and told him what the girl had said. ₅The king said, “Go to the king of Israel and take this letter to him.”

So Naaman set out, taking 30,000 pieces of silver, 6,000 pieces of gold, and ten changes of fine clothes.

₁₄So Naaman went down to the Jordan, dipped himself in it seven times, as Elisha had instructed, and he was completely cured. His flesh became firm and healthy, like that of a child. ₁₅He returned to Elisha with all his men and said, “Now I know that there is no god but the God of Israel; so please, sir, accept a gift from me.”

₂₀“Don't call me Naomi,” she answered; “call me Marah, because Almighty God has made my life bitter. ₂₁When I left here, I had plenty, but the LORD has brought me back without a thing. Why call me Naomi when the LORD Almighty has condemned me and sent me trouble?”

₂₇What God the Father considers to be pure and genuine religion is this: to take care of orphans and widows in their suffering and to keep oneself from being corrupted by the world.

₃₃Who will accuse God's chosen people? God himself declares them not guilty! ₃₄Who, then, will condemn them? Not Christ Jesus, who died, or rather, who was raised to life and is at the right-hand side of God, pleading with him for us! ₃₅Who, then, can separate us from the love of Christ? Can trouble do it, or hardship or persecution or hunger or poverty or danger or death?

[ ₃The teachers of the Law and the Pharisees brought in a woman who had been caught committing adultery, and they made her stand before them all. ₄“Teacher,” they said to Jesus, “this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery. ₅In our Law Moses commanded that such a woman must be stoned to death. Now, what do you say?” ₆They said this to trap Jesus, so that they could accuse him. But he bent over and wrote on the ground with his finger.

₇As they stood there asking him questions, he straightened himself up and said to them, “Whichever one of you has committed no sin may throw the first stone at her.” ₈Then he bent over again and wrote on the ground. ₉When they heard this, they all left, one by one, the older ones first. Jesus was left alone, with the woman still standing there. ₁₀He straightened himself up and said to her, “Where are they? Is there no one left to condemn you?”

₁₁“No one, sir,” she answered.

“Well, then,” Jesus said, “I do not condemn you either. Go, but do not sin again.”]