Matthew 3:1-12 Acts 3 Psalms 5 Genesis 12-14

Matthew 3:1-12
Mat 3:1 While Jesus was living in the Galilean hills, John, called "the Baptizer," was preaching in the desert country of Judea.
Mat 3:2 His message was simple and austere, like his desert surroundings: "Change your life. God's kingdom is here."
Mat 3:3 John and his message were authorized by Isaiah's prophecy: Thunder in the desert! Prepare for God's arrival! Make the road smooth and straight!
Mat 3:4 John dressed in a camel-hair habit tied at the waist by a leather strap. He lived on a diet of locusts and wild field honey.
Mat 3:5 People poured out of Jerusalem, Judea, and the Jordanian countryside to hear and see him in action.
Mat 3:6 There at the Jordan River those who came to confess their sins were baptized into a changed life.
Mat 3:7 When John realized that a lot of Pharisees and Sadducees were showing up for a baptismal experience because it was becoming the popular thing to do, he exploded: "Brood of snakes! What do you think you're doing slithering down here to the river? Do you think a little water on your snakeskins is going to make any difference?
Mat 3:8 It's your life that must change, not your skin!
Mat 3:9 And don't think you can pull rank by claiming Abraham as father. Being a descendant of Abraham is neither here nor there. Descendants of Abraham are a dime a dozen.
Mat 3:10 What counts is your life. Is it green and blossoming? Because if it's deadwood, it goes on the fire.
Mat 3:11 "I'm baptizing you here in the river, turning your old life in for a kingdom life. The real action comes next: The main character in this drama--compared to him I'm a mere stagehand--will ignite the kingdom life within you, a fire within you, the Holy Spirit within you, changing you from the inside out.
Mat 3:12 He's going to clean house--make a clean sweep of your lives. He'll place everything true in its proper place before God; everything false he'll put out with the trash to be burned."

Acts 3
Act 3:1 One day at three o'clock in the afternoon, Peter and John were on their way into the Temple for prayer meeting.
Act 3:2 At the same time there was a man crippled from birth being carried up. Every day he was set down at the Temple gate, the one named Beautiful, to beg from those going into the Temple.
Act 3:3 When he saw Peter and John about to enter the Temple, he asked for a handout.
Act 3:4 Peter, with John at his side, looked him straight in the eye and said, "Look here."
Act 3:5 He looked up, expecting to get something from them.
Act 3:6 Peter said, "I don't have a nickel to my name, but what I do have, I give you: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk!"
Act 3:7 He grabbed him by the right hand and pulled him up. In an instant his feet and ankles became firm.
Act 3:8 He jumped to his feet and walked. The man went into the Temple with them, walking back and forth, dancing and praising God.
Act 3:9 Everybody there saw him walking around and praising God.
Act 3:10 They recognized him as the one who sat begging at the Temple's Gate Beautiful and rubbed their eyes, astonished, scarcely believing what they were seeing.
Act 3:11 The man threw his arms around Peter and John, ecstatic. All the people ran up to where they were at Solomon's Porch to see it for themselves.
Act 3:12 When Peter saw he had a congregation, he addressed the people: "Oh, Israelites, why does this take you by such complete surprise, and why stare at us as if our power or piety made him walk?
Act 3:13 The God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, the God of our ancestors, has glorified his Son Jesus. The very One that Pilate called innocent, you repudiated.
Act 3:14 You repudiated the Holy One, the Just One, and asked for a murderer in his place.
Act 3:15 You no sooner killed the Author of Life than God raised him from the dead--and we're the witnesses.
Act 3:16 Faith in Jesus' name put this man, whose condition you know so well, on his feet--yes, faith and nothing but faith put this man healed and whole right before your eyes.
Act 3:17 "And now, friends, I know you had no idea what you were doing when you killed Jesus, and neither did your leaders.
Act 3:18 But God, who through the preaching of all the prophets had said all along that his Messiah would be killed, knew exactly what you were doing and used it to fulfill his plans.
Act 3:19 "Now it's time to change your ways! Turn to face God so he can wipe away your sins, pour out showers of blessing to refresh you,
Act 3:20 and send you the Messiah he prepared for you, namely, Jesus.
Act 3:21 For the time being he must remain out of sight in heaven until everything is restored to order again just the way God, through the preaching of his holy prophets of old, said it would be.
Act 3:22 Moses, for instance, said, 'Your God will raise up for you a prophet just like me from your family. Listen to every word he speaks to you.
Act 3:23 Every last living soul who refuses to listen to that prophet will be wiped out from the people.'
Act 3:24 "All the prophets from Samuel on down said the same thing, said most emphatically that these days would come.
Act 3:25 These prophets, along with the covenant God made with your ancestors, are your family tree. God's covenant-word to Abraham provides the text: 'By your offspring all the families of the earth will be blessed.'
Act 3:26 But you are first in line: God, having raised up his Son, sent him to bless you as you turn, one by one, from your evil ways."

Psalms 5
Psa 5:1 A David psalm. Listen, GOD! Please, pay attention! Can you make sense of these ramblings,
Psa 5:2 my groans and cries? King-God, I need your help.
Psa 5:3 Every morning you'll hear me at it again. Every morning I lay out the pieces of my life on your altar and watch for fire to descend.
Psa 5:4 You don't socialize with Wicked, or invite Evil over as your houseguest.
Psa 5:5 Hot-Air-Boaster collapses in front of you; you shake your head over Mischief-Maker.
Psa 5:6 GOD destroys Lie-Speaker; Blood-Thirsty and Truth-Bender disgust you.
Psa 5:7 And here I am, your invited guest-- it's incredible! I enter your house; here I am, prostrate in your inner sanctum,
Psa 5:8 Waiting for directions to get me safely through enemy lines.
Psa 5:9 Every word they speak is a land mine; their lungs breathe out poison gas. Their throats are gaping graves, their tongues slick as mudslides.
Psa 5:10 Pile on the guilt, God! Let their so-called wisdom wreck them. Kick them out! They've had their chance.
Psa 5:11 But you'll welcome us with open arms when we run for cover to you. Let the party last all night! Stand guard over our celebration.
Psa 5:12 You are famous, GOD, for welcoming God-seekers, for decking us out in delight.

Genesis 12-14
Gen 12:1 GOD told Abram: "Leave your country, your family, and your father's home for a land that I will show you.
Gen 12:2 I'll make you a great nation and bless you. I'll make you famous; you'll be a blessing.
Gen 12:3 I'll bless those who bless you; those who curse you I'll curse. All the families of the Earth will be blessed through you."
Gen 12:4 So Abram left just as GOD said, and Lot left with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he left Haran.
Gen 12:5 Abram took his wife Sarai and his nephew Lot with him, along with all the possessions and people they had gotten in Haran, and set out for the land of Canaan and arrived safe and sound.
Gen 12:6 Abram passed through the country as far as Shechem and the Oak of Moreh. At that time the Canaanites occupied the land.
Gen 12:7 GOD appeared to Abram and said, "I will give this land to your children." Abram built an altar at the place GOD had appeared to him.
Gen 12:8 He moved on from there to the hill country east of Bethel and pitched his tent between Bethel to the west and Ai to the east. He built an altar there and prayed to GOD.
Gen 12:9 Abram kept moving, steadily making his way south, to the Negev.
Gen 12:10 Then a famine came to the land. Abram went down to Egypt to live; it was a hard famine.
Gen 12:11 As he drew near to Egypt, he said to his wife, Sarai, "Look. We both know that you're a beautiful woman.
Gen 12:12 When the Egyptians see you they're going to say, 'Aha! That's his wife!' and kill me. But they'll let you live.
Gen 12:13 Do me a favor: tell them you're my sister. Because of you, they'll welcome me and let me live."
Gen 12:14 When Abram arrived in Egypt, the Egyptians took one look and saw that his wife was stunningly beautiful.
Gen 12:15 Pharaoh's princes raved over her to Pharaoh. She was taken to live with Pharaoh.
Gen 12:16 Because of her, Abram got along very well: he accumulated sheep and cattle, male and female donkeys, men and women servants, and camels.
Gen 12:17 But GOD hit Pharaoh hard because of Abram's wife Sarai; everybody in the palace got seriously sick.
Gen 12:18 Pharaoh called for Abram, "What's this that you've done to me? Why didn't you tell me that she's your wife?
Gen 12:19 Why did you say, 'She's my sister' so that I'd take her as my wife? Here's your wife back--take her and get out!"
Gen 12:20 Pharaoh ordered his men to get Abram out of the country. They sent him and his wife and everything he owned on their way.
Gen 13:1 So Abram left Egypt and went back to the Negev, he and his wife and everything he owned, and Lot still with him.
Gen 13:2 By now Abram was very rich, loaded with cattle and silver and gold.
Gen 13:3 He moved on from the Negev, camping along the way, to Bethel, the place he had first set up his tent between Bethel and Ai
Gen 13:4 and built his first altar. Abram prayed there to GOD.
Gen 13:5 Lot, who was traveling with Abram, was also rich in sheep and cattle and tents.
Gen 13:6 But the land couldn't support both of them; they had too many possessions. They couldn't both live there--
Gen 13:7 quarrels broke out between Abram's shepherds and Lot's shepherds. The Canaanites and Perizzites were also living on the land at the time.
Gen 13:8 Abram said to Lot, "Let's not have fighting between us, between your shepherds and my shepherds. After all, we're family.
Gen 13:9 Look around. Isn't there plenty of land out there? Let's separate. If you go left, I'll go right; if you go right, I'll go left."
Gen 13:10 Lot looked. He saw the whole plain of the Jordan spread out, well watered (this was before GOD destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah), like GOD's garden, like Egypt, and stretching all the way to Zoar.
Gen 13:11 Lot took the whole plain of the Jordan. Lot set out to the east. That's how they came to part company, uncle and nephew.
Gen 13:12 Abram settled in Canaan; Lot settled in the cities of the plain and pitched his tent near Sodom.
Gen 13:13 The people of Sodom were evil--flagrant sinners against GOD.
Gen 13:14 After Lot separated from him, GOD said to Abram, "Open your eyes, look around. Look north, south, east, and west.
Gen 13:15 Everything you see, the whole land spread out before you, I will give to you and your children forever.
Gen 13:16 I'll make your descendants like dust--counting your descendants will be as impossible as counting the dust of the Earth.
Gen 13:17 So--on your feet, get moving! Walk through the country, its length and breadth; I'm giving it all to you."
Gen 13:18 Abram moved his tent. He went and settled by the Oaks of Mamre in Hebron. There he built an altar to GOD.
Gen 14:1 Then this: Amraphel king of Shinar, Arioch king of Ellasar, Kedorlaomer king of Elam, and Tidal king of Goiim
Gen 14:2 went off to war to fight Bera king of Sodom, Birsha king of Gomorrah, Shinab king of Admah, Shemeber king of Zeboiim, and the king of Bela, that is, Zoar.
Gen 14:3 This second group of kings, the attacked, came together at the Valley of Siddim, that is, the Salt Sea.
Gen 14:4 They had been under the thumb of Kedorlaomer for twelve years. In the thirteenth year, they revolted.
Gen 14:5 In the fourteenth year, Kedorlaomer and the kings allied with him set out and defeated the Rephaim in Ashteroth Karnaim, the Zuzim in Ham, the Emim in Shaveh Kiriathaim,
Gen 14:6 and the Horites in their hill country of Seir as far as El Paran on the far edge of the desert.
Gen 14:7 On their way back they stopped at En Mishpat, that is, Kadesh, and conquered the whole region of the Amalekites as well as that of the Amorites who lived in Hazazon Tamar.
Gen 14:8 That's when the king of Sodom marched out with the king of Gomorrah, the king of Admah, the king of Zeboiim, and the king of Bela, that is, Zoar. They drew up in battle formation against their enemies in the Valley of Siddim--
Gen 14:9 against Kedorlaomer king of Elam, Tidal king of Goiim, Amraphel king of Shinar, and Arioch king of Ellasar, four kings against five.
Gen 14:10 The Valley of Siddim was full of tar pits. When the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah fled, they fell into the tar pits, but the rest escaped into the mountains.
Gen 14:11 The four kings captured all the possessions of Sodom and Gomorrah, all their food and equipment, and went on their way.
Gen 14:12 They captured Lot, Abram's nephew who was living in Sodom at the time, taking everything he owned with them.
Gen 14:13 A fugitive came and reported to Abram the Hebrew. Abram was living at the Oaks of Mamre the Amorite, brother of Eshcol and Aner. They were allies of Abram.
Gen 14:14 When Abram heard that his nephew had been taken prisoner, he lined up his servants, all of them born in his household--there were 318 of them--and chased after the captors all the way to Dan.
Gen 14:15 Abram and his men split into small groups and attacked by night. They chased them as far as Hobah, just north of Damascus.
Gen 14:16 They recovered all the plunder along with nephew Lot and his possessions, including the women and the people.
Gen 14:17 After Abram returned from defeating Kedorlaomer and his allied kings, the king of Sodom came out to greet him in the Valley of Shaveh, the King's Valley.
Gen 14:18 Melchizedek, king of Salem, brought out bread and wine--he was priest of The High God--
Gen 14:19 and blessed him: Blessed be Abram by The High God, Creator of Heaven and Earth.
Gen 14:20 And blessed be The High God, who handed your enemies over to you. Abram gave him a tenth of all the recovered plunder.
Gen 14:21 The king of Sodom said to Abram, "Give me back the people but keep all the plunder for yourself."
Gen 14:22 But Abram told the king of Sodom, "I swear to GOD, The High God, Creator of Heaven and Earth, this solemn oath,
Gen 14:23 that I'll take nothing from you, not so much as a thread or a shoestring. I'm not going to have you go around saying, 'I made Abram rich.'
Gen 14:24 Nothing for me other than what the young men ate and the share of the men who went with me, Aner, Eshcol, and Mamre; they're to get their share of the plunder."