The Daily Audio Bible Reading for Friday May 26, 2023 (NIV)

David and Mephibosheth

9 David said, “Is there anyone still left from the house of Saul, to whom I may show kindness for the sake of Jonathan?”

² There was a servant of Saul’s house named Ziba, so they summoned him to come to David.

The king said to him, “Are you Ziba?” He said, “I am.”

³ The king said, “Isn’t there still a man left who belongs to the house of Saul, to whom I may show the kindness of God?”

Ziba said to the king, “There is still a son of Jonathan. He has crippled feet.”

⁴ The king said to him, “Where is he?”

Ziba said to the king, “He is in the house of Makir son of Ammiel in Lo Debar.”

⁵ So King David sent and brought him from the house of Makir son of Ammiel from Lo Debar.

⁶ When Mephibosheth, the son of Saul’s son Jonathan, came to David, he bowed facedown to the ground.

David said, “Mephibosheth?” He said, “I am.”

⁷ David said to him, “Do not be afraid. I will certainly show kindness to you because of Jonathan, your father. I will return to you all the land of your grandfather Saul, and you will always eat bread at my table.”

⁸ He bowed down and said, “What is your servant that you have paid attention to a dead dog like me?”

⁹ The king called Ziba, Saul’s servant, and said to him, “Everything that belonged to Saul and to his entire house I am giving to your master’s son. ¹⁰ You are to work the soil for him, you and your sons and your servants. You are to bring in the crops, so your master’s son will have food to eat. Mephibosheth, your master’s son, will always eat bread at my table.”

(Ziba had fifteen sons and twenty servants.)

¹¹ Ziba said to the king, “Everything that my lord the king commands his servant, your servant will do.”

So Mephibosheth began eating at the king’s table^[a] like one of the king’s sons.

¹² Mephibosheth had a young son named Mica. Everyone living in Ziba’s house became servants of Mephibosheth. ¹³ So Mephibosheth took up residence in Jerusalem because he was always to eat at the table of the king. He was crippled in both his feet.

The War With Ammon

10 After this, the king of the Ammonites died, and his son Hanun became king in his place.

² David said, “I will show kindness to Hanun son of Nahash, just as his father showed kindness to me.” So David sent his officials to express condolences to Hanun concerning his father. David’s officials arrived in the land of the Ammonites.

³ But the officials of the Ammonites said to Hanun their master, “Do you really think David was honoring your father when he sent messengers to express his sympathy to you? No, David sent his officials to you in order to gather information about the city and to spy on it, in order to overthrow it.”

⁴ So Hanun seized the officials of David, shaved off half of each one’s beard, cut off their clothing up to their buttocks, and sent them away.

⁵ David was told about this, and he sent messengers to meet them because the men were deeply humiliated. The king said, “Stay in Jericho until your beards have grown. Then return.”

⁶ The Ammonites saw that they had become a digusting stench to David, so they sent and hired twenty thousand foot soldiers from Aram Beth Rehob and Aram Zobah, one thousand men from the king of Ma’akah, and twelve thousand men from Tob.^[b]

⁷ When David heard about it, he deployed Joab and the entire army, the strong warriors.

⁸ The Ammonites went out and lined up in battle formation in front of the entrance to the city gate. Aram Zobah and Aram Rehob, as well as the men of Tob and Ma’akah, were lined up by themselves in the open country.

⁹ Joab saw that the battle lines were drawn up against him both in front of him and behind him, so he chose some of the best troops of Israel and lined them up to confront the Arameans. ¹⁰ The rest of the men he placed under the command of his brother Abishai and lined them up to face the Ammonites. ¹¹ He said, “If Aram is too strong for me, then you are to rescue me. If the Ammonites are too strong for you, I will come to rescue you. ¹² Be strong. We must show ourselves to be strong for our people and for the cities of our God. The Lord will do what is good in his eyes.”

¹³ Joab and all the people with him advanced to join battle against the Arameans, and the Arameans fled from him. ¹⁴ When the Ammonites saw that Aram had fled, they also fled from Abishai and entered the city. Then Joab returned from fighting against the Ammonites and came back to Jerusalem.

¹⁵ When the Arameans saw that they had been defeated by Israel, they regrouped. ¹⁶ Hadadezer sent for Arameans from beyond the Euphrates. They came to Helam with Shobak, who was the commander of the army of Hadadezer, at their head.

¹⁷ When David was informed, he gathered all Israel, crossed the Jordan, and came to Helam. The Arameans lined up to confront David and fought against him. ¹⁸ The Arameans fled from Israel. David killed seven hundred Aramean charioteers and forty thousand foot soldiers.^[c] Shobak, the commander of their army, was wounded, and he died there. ¹⁹ All the kings who were the subjects of Hadadezer saw that they had been defeated by Israel, so they made peace with Israel and became subject to them. Then the Arameans were afraid to try to rescue the Ammonites anymore.

David and Bathsheba

11 Springtime arrived, the time when kings go out to war. David sent Joab out with his officers and with all Israel. They ravaged the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah. But David stayed in Jerusalem.

² One evening David had gotten up from his couch and was walking around on the roof of the palace. From the roof he saw a woman bathing. The woman was very good looking. ³ David sent to inquire about the woman, and he was told, “Isn’t this Bathsheba daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?”

⁴ David sent messengers to bring her. She came to him, and he lay down with her. (She had been purifying herself from her ceremonial uncleanness.)^[d] She then returned to her house.

⁵ The woman became pregnant, so she sent a message and told David, “I am pregnant.”

⁶ David sent a message to Joab, “Send Uriah the Hittite to me.” So Joab sent Uriah to David, ⁷ and Uriah came to him.

David asked how Joab and the troops were doing, and how the war effort was going. ⁸ Then David said to Uriah, “Go down to your house and wash your feet.”

When Uriah went out from the palace, the king sent a gift to him. ⁹ But Uriah slept at the entrance to the palace with all the servants of his master. He did not go down to his own house.

¹⁰ David was informed, “Uriah has not gone down to his house.” So David said to Uriah, “Haven’t you come a long distance? Why didn’t you go down to your house?”

¹¹ Uriah said to David, “The ark and Israel and Judah are living in shelters, and my master Joab and the servants of my master are camped on the bare ground in the open countryside. Should I go to my house to eat and to drink and to lie down with my wife? By your life, as surely as you live, I will not do such a thing.”

¹² Then David said to Uriah, “Stay here today also. Tomorrow I will send you back.” So Uriah remained in Jerusalem that day and the next. ¹³ David summoned him, and Uriah ate as his guest, and David got him drunk. But in the evening he went and slept on his mat where the servants of his master were. He did not go to his own house.

¹⁴ In the morning David wrote a letter to Joab, and he sent it in the hands of Uriah. ¹⁵ In the letter he wrote, “Station Uriah opposite the fiercest fighting. Then withdraw from behind him so that he will be struck down and die.”

¹⁶ So when Joab was besieging the city, he assigned Uriah to a place where he knew that the enemy’s strongest warriors were. ¹⁷ The men of the city came out and fought against Joab, and some of the troops of David fell. Uriah the Hittite also died.

¹⁸ Joab sent a message to inform David about all the events of the war. ¹⁹ He instructed the messenger, “As you are finishing reporting all the events of the war to the king, ²⁰ if the king becomes angry and says to you, ‘Why did you go so close to the city to fight? Didn’t you know that they would be shooting from on top of the wall? ²¹ Who killed Abimelek son of Jerubbesheth?^[e] Didn’t a woman throw an upper millstone from the wall on him, so that he died at Thebez? Why did you go so close to the wall?’ Then you are to say, ‘Your servant Uriah the Hittite also died.’”

²² The messenger set out. He came and told David everything that Joab had sent him to say. ²³ The messenger said to David, “Their men gained an advantage over us and drove us back into the open country. But then we gained the upper hand and drove them back all the way to the entrance of the city gate. ²⁴ The archers shot at your troops from the wall. Some of the servants of the king died. And your servant Uriah the Hittite also died.”

²⁵ David told the messenger, “Say this to Joab: ‘Do not take this too hard, because the sword devours people at random. Strengthen your attack against the city, and overthrow it.’ Encourage Joab.”

²⁶ The wife of Uriah the Hittite heard that her husband was dead, so she mourned for her husband. ²⁷ When her mourning was completed, David sent for her and brought her to his house, and she became his wife. She gave birth to a son for him. But what David had done was evil in the eyes of the Lord.

No Greater Love—in Good Fruit

15 “I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener.^{[a] 2} Every branch in me that does not bear fruit, he is going to cut off. And he prunes every branch that does bear fruit, so that it will bear more fruit.

³ “You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. ⁴ Remain in me, and I am going to remain in you. A branch cannot bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Likewise, you cannot bear fruit unless you remain in me.

⁵ “I am the Vine; you are the branches. The one who remains in me and I in him is the one who bears much fruit, because without me you can do nothing. ⁶ If anyone does not remain in me, he is thrown away like a branch and withers. Such branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. ⁷ If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. ⁸ My Father is glorified by this: that you continue to bear much fruit and prove to be^[b] my disciples.

⁹ “As the Father has loved me, so also I have loved you. Remain in my love. ¹⁰ If you hold on to my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have held on to my Father’s commands and remain in his love. ¹¹ I have told you these things so that my joy would continue to be in you and that your joy would be complete.

¹² “This is my command: Love one another as I have loved you. ¹³ No one has greater love than this: that someone lays down his life for his friends. ¹⁴ You are my friends if you continue to do the things I instruct you. ¹⁵ I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know what his master is doing. But I have called you friends, because everything that I heard from my Father, I have made known to you. ¹⁶ You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will endure, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name. ¹⁷ These things I am instructing you, so that you love one another.

¹⁸ “If the world hates you, you know that it hated me first. ¹⁹ If you were of the world, the world would love its own. However, because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of it, for that very reason the world hates you. ²⁰ Remember the saying I told you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will persecute you too. If they held on to my word, they will hold on to yours as well. ²¹ But they will do all these things to you on account of my name, because they do not know the one who sent me. ²² If I had not come and spoken to them, they would have no sin. But now they have no excuse for their sin. ²³ The one who hates me also hates my Father. ²⁴ If I had not done the works among them that no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin. But now they have seen and hated both me and my Father. ²⁵ This was to fulfill the word which is written in their Law: ‘They hated me for no reason.’^[c]

²⁶ “When the Counselor comes, whom I will send to you from the Father—the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father—he will testify about me. ²⁷ And you also are going to testify, because you have been with me from the beginning.”

Zayin: Comfort in Suffering

Ḥet: I Will Not Forget

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