Meditate

Deuteronomy 22

22. Marriage Violations

¹ If you see your fellow Israelite’s ox or sheep straying, do not ignore it but be sure to take it back to its owner. ² If they do not live near you or if you do not know who owns it, take it home with you and keep it until they come looking for it. Then give it back. ³ Do the same if you find their donkey or cloak or anything else they have lost. Do not ignore it.

    ⁴ If you see your fellow Israelite’s donkey or ox fallen on the road, do not ignore it. Help the owner get it to its feet.

    ⁵ A woman must not wear men’s clothing, nor a man wear women’s clothing, for the LORD your God detests anyone who does this.

    ⁶ If you come across a bird’s nest beside the road, either in a tree or on the ground, and the mother is sitting on the young or on the eggs, do not take the mother with the young. ⁷ You may take the young, but be sure to let the mother go, so that it may go well with you and you may have a long life.

    ⁸ When you build a new house, make a parapet around your roof so that you may not bring the guilt of bloodshed on your house if someone falls from the roof.

    ⁹ Do not plant two kinds of seed in your vineyard; if you do, not only the crops you plant but also the fruit of the vineyard will be defiled. Or be forfeited to the sanctuary

    ¹⁰ Do not plow with an ox and a donkey yoked together.

    ¹¹ Do not wear clothes of wool and linen woven together.

    ¹² Make tassels on the four corners of the cloak you wear.

Marriage Violations

    ¹³ If a man takes a wife and, after sleeping with her, dislikes her ¹⁴ and slanders her and gives her a bad name, saying, “I married this woman, but when I approached her, I did not find proof of her virginity,” ¹⁵ then the young woman’s father and mother shall bring to the town elders at the gate proof that she was a virgin. ¹⁶ Her father will say to the elders, “I gave my daughter in marriage to this man, but he dislikes her. ¹⁷ Now he has slandered her and said, ‘I did not find your daughter to be a virgin.’ But here is the proof of my daughter’s virginity.” Then her parents shall display the cloth before the elders of the town, ¹⁸ and the elders shall take the man and punish him. ¹⁹ They shall fine him a hundred shekels That is, about 2 1/2 pounds or about 1.2 kilograms of silver and give them to the young woman’s father, because this man has given an Israelite virgin a bad name. She shall continue to be his wife; he must not divorce her as long as he lives.

    ²⁰ If, however, the charge is true and no proof of the young woman’s virginity can be found, ²¹ she shall be brought to the door of her father’s house and there the men of her town shall stone her to death. She has done an outrageous thing in Israel by being promiscuous while still in her father’s house. You must purge the evil from among you.

    ²² If a man is found sleeping with another man’s wife, both the man who slept with her and the woman must die. You must purge the evil from Israel.

    ²³ If a man happens to meet in a town a virgin pledged to be married and he sleeps with her, ²⁴ you shall take both of them to the gate of that town and stone them to death—the young woman because she was in a town and did not scream for help, and the man because he violated another man’s wife. You must purge the evil from among you.

    ²⁵ But if out in the country a man happens to meet a young woman pledged to be married and rapes her, only the man who has done this shall die. ²⁶ Do nothing to the woman; she has committed no sin deserving death. This case is like that of someone who attacks and murders a neighbor, ²⁷ for the man found the young woman out in the country, and though the betrothed woman screamed, there was no one to rescue her.

    ²⁸ If a man happens to meet a virgin who is not pledged to be married and rapes her and they are discovered, ²⁹ he shall pay her father fifty shekels That is, about 1 1/4 pounds or about 575 grams of silver. He must marry the young woman, for he has violated her. He can never divorce her as long as he lives.

    ³⁰ A man is not to marry his father’s wife; he must not dishonor his father’s bed. In Hebrew texts this verse (22:30) is numbered 23:1.

Luke 12:4-7

12. Warnings and Encouragement

⁴ “I tell you, my friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body and after that can do no more. ⁵ But I will show you whom you should fear: Fear him who, after your body has been killed, has authority to throw you into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him. ⁶ Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one of them is forgotten by God. ⁷ Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.

   

Psalm 53

53. Psalm 53

¹ The fool says in his heart,
   “There is no God.”
They are corrupt, and their ways are vile;
   there is no one who does good.

    ² God looks down from heaven
   on all mankind
to see if there are any who understand,
   any who seek God.
³ Everyone has turned away, all have become corrupt;
   there is no one who does good,
   not even one.

    ⁴ Do all these evildoers know nothing?

   They devour my people as though eating bread;
   they never call on God.
⁵ But there they are, overwhelmed with dread,
   where there was nothing to dread.
God scattered the bones of those who attacked you;
   you put them to shame, for God despised them.

    ⁶ Oh, that salvation for Israel would come out of Zion!
   When God restores his people,
   let Jacob rejoice and Israel be glad!