January 31: Job 40:6 – Job 42:17

The Lord Challenges Job – Job 40:6–41:34

• God speaks to Job out of the whirlwind, and confronts him with what he wrongly said in his speeches when he dared to annul God's justice. (Because Job believed that suffering is God's punishment for sin, he had to condemn God in order to maintain his innocence.)
• God suggests that since Job felt justified in condemning how He runs the universe, perhaps Job should be "king for a day." He also tells him to consider Behemoth (perhaps a hippopotamus?) and the strength of this animal God has created, as well as Leviathan (perhaps a crocodile?). He implies that King Leviathan is over all those who have pride, including Job, and that Job could never subdue him.

Job's Confession and Repentance – Job 42

• Job responds that he knows God can do all things and that none of His purposes can be thwarted. He claims that he has said things that he didn't understand, and asks God to speak and he will hear Him. Job despises himself.

The Lord Rebukes Job's Friends

• God now tells Eliphaz and his two friends that He burns with anger against them because they have not spoken of Him what is right, as Job has. He instructs them to take seven bulls and seven rams to Job and to offer burnt offerings for themselves, and tells them that Job will then pray for them and He will accept Job's prayer and not punish them.
• Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar do as God says, and God accepts Job's prayer on their behalf.

The Lord Restores Job's Fortunes

• God restores Job's fortunes, giving him twice what he had before. God doubles his livestock, and Job has seven sons and three daughters. Job lives 140 years and dies "an old man, full of days."

January 30: Job 38:1 – Job 40:5

The Lord Answers Job – Job 38 & 39

• God answers Job out of the whirlwind, challenging him to teach Him (this is to point out to Job the consequences of his complaints and demands). God emphasizes His power over everything in the world—the seas, the weather, the dawn, etc. Through all this, the Lord compares Job's might and power to His.
• God continues, speaking of His power in the animal kingdom. Through His answer, He confirms that while He gives man free will, He also limits evil. God finishes by asking if a faultfinder should contend with the Almighty, and says, "He who argues with God, let him answer it." (Job 40:2)

Job Promises Silence – Job 40:3–5

• Job answers that he is "of a small" account" and will now remain silent.

January 29: Job 35:1 – Job 37:24

Elihu Condemns Job – Job 35

• By assessing the many complaints Job has made, Elihu exaggerates Job's question about what benefit has he received for being good. He goes on to imply that Job's prayers have not been answered because of his pride. 

Elihu Extols God's Greatness – Job 36

• Elihu states his belief: that God is mighty and just in his dealing with humans, and that Job is wrong in believing that the wicked are not punished by God. He also counters Job's other complaints about God. He encourages Job not to reject God's message by failing to cry out to Him for help, and asserts that God means to teach Job something through his affliction.

Elihu Proclaims God's Majesty – Job 37

• Elihu appeals to Job and his friends, as well as anyone else who may be listening, and speaks of the power and might of God, who controls the weather and everything else in the world. He finishes by giving praise to God who is elusive, meaning we cannot find Him, yet merciful.

January 28: Job 32:1 – Job 34:37

Elihu Rebukes Job's Three Friends – Job 32

• Elihu, who has been listening to Job and his three friends, finally speaks.  He is angry at all of them—Job because he has only justified himself, and the three friends because of the way they have accused Job. Elihu has remained quiet thus far because he is younger than the other men, but now he speaks, promising not to show partiality to any of them.

Elihu Rebukes Job – Job 33

• Elihu responds to Job's fear of God, stating that Job has nothing to fear because God's hand will not be heavy on him. He goes on to point out that Job is not righteous in attacking God and in seeing God as his equal, and implies that Job has become proud even though he sits in ashes.
• In response to Job's statement about having nightmares, Elihu points out that perhaps God is trying to teach Job something through his dreams—and that God's primary purpose in getting people's attention through dreams and suffering is to keep them from hell and give them a meaningful life.

Elihu Asserts God's Justice – Job 34

• Elihu defends God's impartiality according to the belief that God will justly punish the wicked (much like Bildad had claimed). He then asks two rhetorical questions: "Shall one who hates justice govern?" and "Will you condemn him who is righteous and mighty?" (v. 17). He goes on to assert that God does hear the cry of the poor and the afflicted. Although Elihu's conclusion includes sound analysis, it also is an unfair representation of Job's position.

January 27: Job 30:1 – Job 31:40

Job's Summary Defense – Job 30

• Job laments his situation, saying that young ruffians mock him. He is emotionally and physically drained of strength, compares his affliction to being choked by a powerful force, and goes on to identify God as the One who abuses His great power by harming Job for no apparent reason. 
• Job blames God for throwing him in the ashes (although it's Satan who's caused his trouble). He goes on to speak about his compassion for the poor and states that while he cries out for help, both God and men ignore him.

Job's Final Appeal – Job 31

• Job invites God to impose curses on him if he is guilty of anything. He claims that he had been more fair in his dealing with lawsuits of his own servants than God is being with him. A hint of pride becomes apparent, and Job's speech shows his confidence that he will be vindicated.
• Job's speech ends, and his friends have nothing more to say to him.

January 26: Job 26:1 – Job 29:25

Job Replies: God's Majesty Is Unsearchable – Job 26

• Job proclaims God's greatness and states that the great things He has created represent just a small part of Him.

Job Continues: I Will Maintain My Integrity – Job 27

• Job claims he will never lie or compromise his integrity; he will hold fast to his righteousness. He implies that his friends should return to the Almighty.

Job Continues: Where Is Wisdom? – Job 28

• Job questions where wisdom and understanding come from. He says wisdom is understood by God, and that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.

Job's Summary Defense – Job 29

• Job wishes for the prosperity of his past and reminisces about his days of glory.

January 25: Job 22:1 – Job 25:6

Eliphaz Speaks: Job's Wickedness Is Great – Job 22

• Eliphaz continues to claim that Job is wicked, assuming that the righteous are always blessed and the wicked always receive God's judgment. He lists some (untrue) reasons for Job's situation: that he was greedy in business dealings, that he lacked charity, and that he lacked compassion toward people.
• Eliphaz calls on Job to repent and return to God, and implies that Job has been trusting in riches rather than God.

Job Replies: Where Is God? – Job 23 & 24

• Job claims he has not departed from God's ways. He says God has terrified him (with his power and sovereignty) and expresses his depression because of his losses and failure to understand God's purposes.
• Job continues to describe the ways of the wicked and points out that God prolongs their lives. He questions that if it is not so, who will call him a liar.

Bildad Speaks: Man Cannot Be Righteous – Job 25

• Bildad asks how men can be right before God and claims man is a maggot before God's eyes.

January 24: Job 19:1 – Job 21:34

Job Replies: My Redeemer Lives – Job 19

• Job becomes tired of Bildad's rude questions and his friends' torments. He states that God has wronged him, but later states that he knows his Redeemer lives.

Zophar Speaks: The Wicked Will Suffer – Job 20

• Zophar gives a speech about the wicked, and implies that Job has received what he deserves. He finishes by arguing that heaven and earth will bear witness to his iniquity, not his innocence.

Job Replies: The Wicked Do Prosper – Job 21

• Job begins to expose the problems in his friends' arguments about him—that suffering always indicates God's punishment. He asks why the wicked prosper, and finishes by telling them there is nothing left of their answers but falsehood.

January 23: Job 15:1 – Job 18:21

Eliphaz Accuses: Job Does Not Fear God – Job 15

• Eliphaz argues that Job's arguments are destructive and without substance. He states that Job has turned his spirit against God in the words he speaks. Ultimately, he claims that Job doesn't fear God.

Job Replies: Miserable Comforters Are You – Job 16

• Job claims that all three of his friends are miserable comforters and that he could also speak as they did if he were in their place. He claims God has torn him in his wrath, hated him, and given him up to the ungodly.

Job Continues: Where Then Is My Hope? – Job 17

• Job's spirit is broken, and he questions where his hope is. He counters the false assurances of his friends with a statement that he waits for the grave as one who desires to go home to his long-lost relatives.

Bildad Speaks: God Punishes the Wicked – Job 18

• Bildad gives a speech about the wicked and how they are punished by God, implying that Job, since he is being punished, is wicked.

January 22: Job 12:1 – Job 14:22

Job Replies: The Lord Has Done This – Job 12

• Job calls himself a laughingstock, and claims that who—people or animals—doesn't know that the Lord has caused what happened to him. He goes on to talk of God's greatness and how He can do anything He pleases.

Job Continues: Still I Will Hope in God – Job 13

• Job continues that in spite of his circumstances, he will still trust in the Lord—that he will trust Him "though he slay me." (Job 13: 15). Job claims that he has prepared his case and he knows that he is right.

Job Continues: Death Comes Soon to All – Job 14

• Job agrees with Eliphaz, that man is born for trouble and stresses life's shortness and misery. He goes on to say that man's days are numbered, which emphasizes his belief that God is sovereign, and claims that trees are better off than humans because they can regrow.

January 21: Job 8:1 – Job 11:20

Bildad Speaks: Job Should Repent – Job 8

• Bildad argues that God does not pervert justice, so therefore Job and his children received what they, as sinners, deserved. He admonishes Job to seek God so He will restore Job's prosperity, and uses examples from nature to backup his idea that God punishes the wicked and rewards the just.

Job Replies: There Is No Arbiter – Job 9

• Job seems to consider the idea of entering a legal case against God (who is his judge and legal adversary), deducing that the chance's of his answering God's interrogation are slim.
• Job accuses God of unjustly destroying both the blameless and the wicked, and desires to stand before Him not as sinless, but innocent of any sin comparable to his suffering. Job desires a mediator between him and God.

Job Continues: A Plea to God – Job 10

• Though Job thinks God is unjust in oppressing him, he also realizes that no one can deliver him from God's hand. He believes he is innocent and feels like a criminal, then asks why he was even born and wishes to die.

Zophar Speaks: You Deserve Worse  – Job 11

• Zophar is even more brash than Bildad, claiming that Job deserves worse than what he has received. He tells Job to prepare his heart and lift up his hands (in praise).

January 20: Job 5:1 – Job 7:21

Eliphaz Speaks: The Innocent Prayer – Job 5

• Eliphaz continues, warning Job against appealing to "holy ones" or angels. His argument continues to be that Job's trouble didn't come from nowhere—he caused it. He tells Job to seek God, and to not despise what God is trying to teach him through trials. (Though God does sometimes discipline people for their sin through pain and suffering, Eliphaz was wrong to suggest this in Job's case.) Eliphaz then points out that God can heal the wounds he inflicted for discipline.

Job Replies: My Complaint Is Just – Job 6

• Job answers, but to all three friends instead of to just Eliphaz. He describes his suffering as caused by poison-tipped arrows sent by the Almighty. (Arrows are usually used to describe God's judgment or wrath, so Job seems to assume that the Lord was punishing him unjustly). His reply goes on to he would exult in pain rather than deny the words of God.
• Job calls his friends "my brothers," which indicates at one time he had a close relationship with them. But now he is disappointed in how they are treating him. Job had hoped to receive help from his friends, but they offer nothing, and he pleads with them to have understanding instead of an argumentative spirit.

Job Continues: My Life Has No Hope – Job 7

• Job argues that his situation is much worse than that of a slave. He uses the word "servant," which has some irony: Before he was God's servant, but now he feels like a mistreated servant or slave. Job believes his days are completely without hope. He speaks of  the weaver's shuttle and not having a thread of hope; he could not see God's design for his life through his suffering (but sometimes we can't see the design until the weaver—or God—is finished).
• Job appeals to God to show him what he has done wrong.

January 19: Job 1:1 – Job 4:21

Job's Character and Wealth – Job 1

• A man by the name of Job lives in the land of Uz (possibly near Edom?). He is blameless and upright, has always feared God and turned away from evil.
• Job has seven sons and three daughters, as well as much livestock (seven was the biblical number of completeness).
• Job's sons participate in a feast with their siblings on their appointed day. Afterward, Job sanctifies his children by interceding with burnt offerings, in case any of them have sinned and cursed God in their heart. 

Satan Allowed to Test Job

• The sons of God (angels) present themselves before God, and Job comes among them. God asks Satan where he has come from, and he answers that he has been walking about the earth. God points out his servant Job, and Satan says that Job fears God only because God has blessed him, and points out that if God took what he had, Job would curse God to his face.
• God tells Satan that he may do what he will with all that Job has, "only against him do not stretch out your hand." (This proves that God limits Satan's power.)
• Satan leaves God's presence.

Satan Takes Job's Property and Children

• On a day that Job's children are feasting in the oldest brother's house, a messenger comes to Job to tell him that the Sabeans (nomadic raiders from Sheba) have taken all the oxen and donkeys and have killed all the servants with them (except the one who escaped to tell Job). 
• Before that servant finishes speaking, another messenger comes and informs Job that fire fell from heaven and burned up all the sheep and the servants with them (except for the one who escaped to tell Job).
• Before that servant finishes speaking, another messenger comes and informs Job that the Chaldeans (a west Semitic raiding tribe) have taken all the camels and killed all the servants with them (except the one who escaped to tell Job).
• Before that servant finishes speaking, another messenger comes and informs Job that a great wind struck the house of his oldest son, collapsing the house on all his children, who all died.
• Job rises, tears his robe, shaves his head, and falls on the ground worshiping God. He claims, "Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked I shall return. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord."
• Despite what has happened, Job does not sin or charge God with wrong.

Satan Attacks Job's Health – Job 2

• Again, Satan comes before God when the sons of God present themselves to Him. God asks Satan where he has been, and he responds that he has been walking the earth. God again points out his servant Job and how he has held to his integrity despite what has happened to him.
• Satan replies that a man will give all he has to keep his life, and that if God would "touch his bone and flesh," Job would curse Him to His face. God tells Satan he may do with Job as he wishes, but he must not take his life.
• Satan leaves the Lord's presence and strikes Job with "loathsome sores" from the top of his head to the sole of his foot.
• Job sits in ashes and uses a piece of broken pottery to scratch himself. His wife tells him to curse God and die. He replies that she speaks like a foolish woman and that they receive good from God, so why shouldn't they receive evil. He does not sin with his words.

Job's Three Friends

• When Job's three friends hear about what has happened to him, they come to show sympathy and comfort him. When they see him from a distance, they do not recognize him, and they tear their robes and sprinkle dust on their heads, crying loudly. They sit with him in silence for seven days and nights because of his great suffering.

Job Laments His Birth – Job 3

• Job curses the day of his birth. (He wishes that the popular magicians who cast spells could cast a spell on the day of his birth so he was never born. Job's belief in God indicates that he was speaking dramatically, and not that he was truly endorsing pagan magic.)

Eliphaz Speaks: The Innocent Prayer – Job 4

• Eliphaz speaks, and though his words are more courteous than will be the other two friends', he points out that God would never punish the righteous. He concludes that since Job is suffering, he must be a sinner.
• Eliphaz adds illustrations of God's retribution on animals (possibly implying that Job's "groanings" or "roaring" made him comparable to an old lion, symbolizing the wicked). He then states that he heard a voice that told him that no one is righteous compared to God, implying that Job is not righteous.

January 18: Genesis 47:28 – Genesis 50:26

Jacob Summons Joseph — Genesis 47

• After seventeen years in Egypt, Jacob calls Joseph to him and asks him to promise not to bury him in Egypt but to take him to where his fathers are buried in Canaan. Joseph swears to him that he will do that.

Jacob Blesses Ephraim and Manasseh – Genesis 48

• Joseph is told that Jacob is ill. He takes his sons Manasseh and Ephraim to him.
• Jacob claims Joseph's two sons as his own (as much as Reuben and Simeon are his own—by blessing Joseph's two sons on the same level as his own sons, Jacob gives Joseph the double share). Since Jacob's vision is failing, Joseph brings the sons near and Jacob embraces and kisses them. He points out that the never expected to see Joseph again, but God has let him see Joseph and his sons.
• Jacob places his right hand on Ephraim's head and his left on Manasseh's hand to bless them, and Joseph tells Jacob that Manasseh is older and tries to move his right hand to Manasseh's head. Jacob responds that both brothers will be great, but Ephraim, though younger, will be greater than Manasseh.
• Jacob tells Joseph he is about to die, that God will be with Joseph, and that God will bring him back to the land of his fathers. Jacob gives him a mountain slope that he took from the Amorites (this promise would be fulfilled when the Israelites returned to Canaan to possess the land God had given them).

Jacob Blesses His Sons – Genesis 49

• Jacob calls his sons together. He tells Reuben he will not have preeminence because he defiled his father's bed (by sleeping with Bilhah). He also reminds Simeon and Levi of their excessive vengeance for their sister Dinah's rape; because of their actions (including an outrage against the ritual of circumcision), their descendants would be scattered. Jacob praises Judah for his selfless actions to save his brother Benjamin, even after his mistreating of Tamar. Zebulun is given precedence over his brother Issachar, who will endure slavery after a time of plenty. Jacob says that "Dan will judge," Gad will endure hardship but ultimate victory is promised, and Asher and Naphtali promised are happiness, hope, and joy. Joseph is spoken highly of and the promises to him are great. He uses the word "Nazirites" (later, both Joseph and the Nazirites were separated from the others in order to serve God's holy purposes). Benjamin is ominously described as a wolf. While Jacob's prophecies about the destiny of some of the tribes are obscure, he declares blessings on Judah and Joseph.

Jacob's Death and Burial

• The twelve tribes of Israel are established. Jacob then tells his sons to bury him with his fathers in the cave of Ephron the Hittite at Machpelah in Canaan. When he finishes, he breathes his last breath.
• Joseph commands Pharaoh's physicians to embalm Jacob (embalming was common for high-ranking Egyptians). The Egyptians weep for Jacob for seventy days.
• When the time of mourning is finished, Joseph goes to Pharaoh to ask to bury Jacob in Canaan. Pharaoh agrees, and all of Egypt's elders and all of Jacob's household leave for Canaan with Jacob's body. At the threshing floor of Atad, beyond Jordan, they mourn for seven days.
• Jacob is buried in the cave in the field of Machpelah, which Abraham bought from Ephron the Hittite.
• Joseph's family and the Egyptian elders return to Egypt.

God's Good Purposes – Genesis 50

• After Jacob's death, Joseph's brothers fear that Joseph will hate them and repay their evil to him (for their selling him to the Midianites). They send a message to Joseph asking forgiveness and telling him that they are his servants.
• Joseph tells them not to fear because while they meant evil against him, God meant it for good. He promises to care for them and their children.

The death of Joseph

• At the age of 110 years, Joseph tells his brothers that he is about to die but that God will visit them and bring them up to the land he swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He has them swear to take his body from Egypt, and when he dies, he body is embalmed and put in a coffin in Egypt.

January 17: Genesis 45:16 – Genesis 47:27

Joseph Provides for His Brothers and Family – Genesis 45:16

• Pharaoh is pleased when he learns Joseph's brothers have come to Egypt, and he tells Joseph to have the whole family come and live on the best lands in Egypt. He even sends wagons and everything the family will need to move. Joseph gives each of his brothers a change of clothing, except for Benjamin. He gives Benjamin three hundred shekels of silver and five changes of clothing.
• Joseph's brothers tell Jacob that Joseph is still alive, but Jacob doesn't believe them. When the brothers tell Jacob what Joseph has said, and show him all the wagons, Jacob's spirit revives. Jacob now believes, and he determines to go to see Joseph before he dies.

Joseph Brings the Family to Egypt – Genesis 46

• Jacob takes all he has and journeys to Beersheba, where he offers sacrifices to God.
• God speaks to Jacob in a nighttime vision and tells him not to be afraid to go to Egypt because He will make him a great nation there (God had previously forbidden Isaac to go to Egypt, and Abram had an unpleasant experience there). God promises to be with Jacob in Egypt.
• Jacob takes his family (not including his sons' wives, sixty-six people in all) and all that he owns to Egypt. Including Jacob, Joseph, and Joseph's two sons, they are seventy people in all.

Jacob and Joseph Reunited

• Jacob sends Judah ahead of him to Joseph, and Joseph prepares his chariot and meets his father in Goshen. After they have wept together, Jacob says that he can now die since he has seen Joseph's face and knows he is alive.
• Joseph tells his father that he will tell Pharaoh that his family has arrived, and that when Pharaoh asks their occupation, they are to say that they are shepherds (which the Egyptians consider an abomination) and that they would live in Goshen. (God uses the ethnic and racial prejudice of the Egyptians as a way of preserving the ethnic and spiritual identity of the Hebrews.) 

Jacob's Family Settles in Goshen – Genesis 47

• Joseph goes to Pharaoh and tells him that Jacob, his family, and their flocks and herds have come from Canaan and are now in Goshen. He presents five of his brothers to Pharaoh.
• Pharaoh asks the brothers' occupation, and they tell him they are shepherds. They point out that they have come because there is no pasture land in Canaan due to the famine and request to dwell in the land of Goshen.
• Pharaoh tells Joseph to settle his family in the best lands of Egypt—in Goshen—and also that Joseph may put some of the able-bodied men in charge of Pharaoh's livestock.
• Joseph brings Jacob before Pharaoh, and Jacob blesses Pharaoh. Pharaoh asks Jacob's age, and he tells him he is 130 years. He also claims that "Few and evil have been the days of my life, and they have not attained to the days of the years of the life of my fathers in the days of their sojourning." Jacob blesses Pharaoh again before leaving him.
• Joseph settles his family in the best land of Egypt, in the land of Ramses, and he provides for the entire household.

Joseph and the Famine 

• The famine is so severe that the lands of Egypt and Canaan languish. Joseph gathers up all the money found in Egypt and Canaan in exchange for the grain he has stored, and brings the money into the house of Pharaoh. 
• When the people have spent all their money on grain, they trade their livestock for grain instead for that year. The next year they again ask for grain, and this time they have nothing but themselves and their lands to give. Joseph buys all the land in Egypt for Pharaoh and makes all the people servants. The only land he doesn't buy is that of the priests, since they lived on a fixed allowance given by Pharaoh. 
• In return for the lands and the people's servanthood, Joseph gives them seed so they can sow the land. He tells them that one-fifth of what is harvested must be given to Pharaoh while the rest is theirs to use for food and seed. Joseph makes a statute that Pharaoh should always have a fifth, and the lands of the priests were all that didn't belong to Pharaoh.
• In Egypt, Jacob's family prospers and grows substantially.

January 16: Genesis 42:1 to Genesis 45:15

Joseph's Brothers Go to Egypt – Genesis 42

• During the famine, Jacob learns that Egypt has grain and sends ten of Joseph's brothers there to buy grain. He does not send Benjamin, Joseph's full brother, for fear of what would happen to him.
• In Egypt, Joseph is governor over the land, and he is the one who sells the grain. His brothers bow before him but don't recognize him (this is twenty years after Joseph was sold into slavery). He recognizes them, and harshly questions where they have come from. They tell him they are from Canaan and have come to buy food.
• Joseph remembers his dreams, and accuses them of being spies (he accuses them of something he knows they haven't done to see if they would betray each other under pressure). They deny it, and Joseph accuses them again. They deny it a second time, claiming they are ten brothers, their father and youngest brother is in Canaan, and another brother is "no more."
• Joseph tests them by telling them that one of them must return to Canaan and bring back the youngest brother. He then puts them in custody, and on the third day repeats what must be done. This time he says he will keep one brother while the others return to bring the youngest brother.
• The brothers agree, and believe that this distress has come upon them because of what they did to their brother Joseph. Reuben points out that he told them not to sin against Joseph. All this is said in front of Joseph, as there is an interpreter present and they are unaware that he can understand their language.
• Joseph turns away and weeps. Then he takes Simeon (since Reuben had tried to save Joseph, the next oldest son is chosen) and binds him before their eyes. He gives orders to fill the brothers' bags with grain, to replace every man's money in his sack, and to give them provisions for the journey. They are then sent to Canaan.
• When one of the brothers opens his sack to give his donkey fodder, he finds the money in the sack. The brothers are afraid (they probably fear they will be charged with stealing), and accuse God for their problems, asking what He has done to them.
• In Canaan, they tell Jacob everything that has happened and how they must bring Benjamin to Egypt. When they empty their sacks, all find their money still there, which terrifies them. (While money in one's sack could be a mistake, money in each sack could not.)
• Jacob is angry and claims they have bereaved him of both Joseph and Simeon, and that they will not take Benjamin from him as well. Reuben tells Jacob that he can kill Reuben's two sons if they don't return with Benjamin.
• Jacob again refuses to send Benjamin with them.

Joseph's Brothers Return to Egypt – Genesis 43

• The famine is severe in the land, and when Jacob's family has eaten all the grain the sons had bought, Jacob again sends them to buy food. Judah tells him that they were warned not to return without Benjamin.
• Jacob asks why the brothers told the Egyptian why they had a younger brother, and they brothers reply that the man questioned them all about their father and whether they had another brother. They claim they couldn't have known that he would request they bring their youngest brother to him.
• Judah asks that Jacob allow Benjamin to go with him to Egypt so they won't all die of starvation. (Judah has changed tremendously; instead of leaving the family, he protected his brother and was concerned about his father's welfare.) He claims that if he doesn't return with Benjamin, Jacob can blame him forever.
• Jacob agrees, and has the brothers take gifts, double the money they will need, the money that was in their sacks when they returned, and Benjamin. 
• In Egypt, when Joseph sees Benjamin with the brothers, he has his servants prepare a meal for them. They fear that Joseph has brought them to his house to make them servants and steal their donkeys. They explain about the money in their sacks to the steward of Joseph's house, and he tells them not to be afraid, because their God put the money in their sacks. He then brings Simeon out to them.
• The steward brings them into the house, gives them water, washes their feet, and provides fodder for their donkeys. The brothers prepare the gifts they have brought for Joseph.
• When Joseph comes home, they present the gifts and bow down to him. Joseph questions if his father is well (they tell him he is) and he asks about Benjamin. Joseph then leaves the room to weep, and returns after he has washed his face.
• The  Hebrews and Egyptians are then served separately, as it was an abomination for Egyptians to eat with Hebrews. Portions are taken from Joseph's table for the brothers, but Benjamin is given five times as much.

Joseph Tests His Brothers – Genesis 44

• Joseph commands his house steward to fill the brothers' sacks with as much food as they could carry, put each man's money back in his sack, and put Joseph's silver cup in Benjamin's sack.
• The next morning, the brothers are sent home. When they are only a short distance away, Joseph sends his men after them to accuse them of stealing from Joseph.
• Joseph's men overtake them and do as they've been told, claiming that the one who has stolen the silver cup will die. Each brother is instructed to lower his sack to the ground so it can be searched. The search is conducted from oldest to youngest, and the cup is found in Benjamin's sack. The brothers tear their clothes, and all return to Joseph's house. (Ironically, years ago they tore Joseph's coat to pieces; now they are tearing their own clothing over the possible coming loss of another brother, Benjamin.)
• Joseph demands that Benjamin be his servant, and tells the others to return to their father in peace (he wants to see if they will leave Benjamin as a slave in Egypt just as they sold Joseph to be a slave).
• Judah explains that the loss of Benjamin would kill their father and offers himself as a slave in Benjamin's place.

Joseph Provides for His Brothers and Family – Genesis 45:1–15

• Joseph can no longer control his emotion and has everyone but his brothers removed from his presence. Joseph cries so loudly that all in the palace hear it, and he informs his brothers that he is Joseph and then asks if his father is still alive.
• The brothers do not believe him, and he calls them closer to him. He then points out that he is their brother who they sold into slavery and that they should not be upset because God sent him before them to save their lives. 
• Joseph explains that there will be five more years of famine, and he is in Egypt to provide for his family—so it was not them who sent him there, but God. He tells them to return to their father and tell Jacob that God has made Joseph lord of all Egypt and to come to Joseph so they can dwell in the land of Goshen, near Egypt. Joseph assures them that he will provide for them and again tells them to bring their father to him. 
• Joseph weeps with Benjamin and then with the other brothers. They then talk together.

January 15: Genesis 40:1–23; Genesis 35:28–29; Genesis 41:1–57

Joseph Interprets Two Prisoners' Dreams – Genesis 40

• The cupbearer and baker (two important officers in the royal court) commit an offense against Pharaoh, who has them placed in prison. The captain of the guard appoints Joseph to be with them.
• One night, the cupbearer and baker both dream, and when Joseph greets them in the morning, he sees that they are troubled. He asks why, and they tell him about the dreams. 
• Joseph asks that they explain the dreams, and he interprets them both. He tells the cupbearer that in three days he will be returned to his position, and tells the chief baker that in three days he will be hanged. Both come to pass, but the cupbearer does not remember Joseph to Pharaoh as Joseph had asked him to.

The Death of Isaac – Genesis 35:28–29

• Isaac dies as the age of 180 years, and Jacob and Esau bury him.

Joseph Interprets Pharaoh's Dreams – Genesis 41

• Two years later, Pharaoh dreams that he is standing by the Nile River, and out of it comes seven well-fed cows that feed in the reed grass. Soon after, seven thin cows come out of the Nile and eat the healthy cows. Pharaoh then awakens.
• Pharaoh dreams again when he falls asleep, and seven healthy ears of grain are growing on a stalk. After them sprout seven blighted ears. The thin ears then swallow up the healthy ears, and Pharaoh awakens.
• In the morning, Pharaoh sends for all of Egypt's magicians and wise men. He tells them his dreams, but none are able to interpret them. 
• The chief cupbearer tells Pharaoh about the Hebrew who was a servant of the captain of the guard, and how he interpreted his dream, and Pharaoh sends for Joseph.
• Pharaoh tells Joseph about his dreams, and Joseph tells him that God has revealed to Pharaoh what He's about to do—that there will be seven years of plenty followed by seven years of famine.
• Pharaoh appoints overseers over the land, and tells them to store up grain during the next seven years of plenty so there will be grain when the famine comes.

Joseph Rises to Power

• Pharaoh is pleased with Joseph and determines that there is no other who is as discerning and wise as Joseph. He puts Joseph in charge of his household, making him second-in-command only to Pharaoh. He gives Joseph his signet ring and fine clothing and puts a gold chain around his neck. The Egyptians are instructed to bow to Joseph, and Pharaoh gives him Asenath, a daughter of a priest, for a wife.
• Joseph is thirty years old when he begins his service to Pharaoh. He goes throughout Egypt, ensuring that grain is gathered and stored in all the cities. The grain is plentiful beyond measure.
• Two sons are born to Joseph and Asenath: Manassah and Ephraim.
• The seven years of plenty end, and seven years of famine begin. Joseph opens the storehouses of grain, and the famine is so severe that people from all over come to Egypt in search of grain.

January 14: Genesis 37:1–Genesis 38:30; 1 Chronicles 2:3–6, 8; Genesis 39:1–23

Joseph's Dreams – Genesis 37

• When Jacob's son Joseph is seventeen, he tends his father's flocks, working for his half-brothers, the sons of his father's wives Bilhah and Zilpah. Joseph reports to his father some of the bad things his brothers are doing.
• Jacob loves Joseph more than any of his brothers, and he has a beautiful robe made for him. Joseph's brothers hate him because of their father's favoritism, and never have a kind word to say to him.
• Joseph has a dream that he and his brothers are out in the fields tying bundles of grain, and Joseph's bundle stands up and all his brothers' bundles bow down to it. He tells his brothers about the dream, and they hate him more.
• Joseph then has a dream that the sun, moon, and eleven stars all bow down to him. He tells his brothers and also tells his father. His father scolds him, asking if he thinks his entire family will bow down to him. But while Joseph's brothers are jealous, Jacob wonders what the dreams mean.
• While Joseph brothers are with the sheep in Shechem, Jacob sends Joseph out to them. Joseph goes in search of them but doesn't find them, and a man he meets tells Joseph he heard them talk about going to Dothan. Joseph goes to Dothan and finds his brothers there.

Joseph Sold by His Brothers

• Joseph's brothers see him coming and make plans to kill him. Reuben, the oldest brother, says that they shouldn't kill him but throw him into an empty cistern and let him die there; that way it wouldn't be his blood on their hands. Reuben plans to rescue Joseph and return him to their father.
• When Joseph reaches them, the brothers rip off his robe and throw him into the empty cistern. They sit down to eat, and a caravan of Ishmaelite Midianite traders and their camels near. Judah suggests they sell Joseph to the traders, and they do so for twenty pieces of silver. Joseph is then taken to Egypt by the traders.
• Reuben returns to get Joseph, but he is gone. He rips his clothing in despair.
• The other brothers kill a young goat and dip Joseph's coat in its blood, then take the robe to Jacob and ask him if the robe belonged to Joseph.
• Jacob confirms it is Joseph's coat and assumes he must have been eaten by a wild animal. He mourns for Joseph for a long time, unable to be comforted.
• The Midianite traders arrive in Egypt, where they sell Joseph to Potiphar, the captain of Pharaoh's palace guard.

Judah and Tamar – Genesis 38

• Jacob's son Judah moves to Adullam. There he marries a Canaanite woman and they have three sons: Er, Onan, and Shelah. The years pass, and Judah arranges for Er to marry a young woman named Tamar.
• Er is a wicked man, and the Lord takes his life, so Judah tells Onan that he must marry Tamar since their cultural tradition requires that a younger brother produce an heir for the deceased older brother.
• Onan is not willing to have a son who isn't his own heir, so whenever he sleeps with Tamar, he spills his seed on the ground so she won't become pregnant.
• God considers it evil for Onan to deny his dead brother an heir, so He taks Onan's life too. Judah tells Tamar to return to her parents until Shelah is old enough to marry (he doesn't intend to marry Shelah to Tamar, though, because he fears Shelah will die too).
• Some years later, Judah's wife dies. After his time of mourning, Judah and a friend, Hirah, travel up to Timnah to supervise the shearing of sheep. Someone tells Tamar, who knows that Shelah is now old enough to marry.
• Tamar changes out of her widow's clothes, covers herself with a veil, and goes to a town on the road to Timnah, where she sits to wait. Judah sees her as he is traveling and thinks she is a prostitute, and propositions her.
• She asks how much he will pay her, and he offers her a young goat. She asks how she can know he will send the goat, and then suggests he leave his identification seal and its cord and his walking stick. Judah agrees.
• Judah sleeps with Tamar, and she becomes pregnant. She returns home and redresses in her widow's clothing.
• Judah has Hirah take a young goat and go looking for the woman so he can get his property back. When Hirah asks about her, then men of the town tell him there is no shrine prostitute. He returns to Judah, who tells him to let the woman have his property then, because he would be a laughingstock if they went back to look for her again.
• About three months later, Judah is told that his daughter-in-law, Tamar, has acted like a prostitute and become pregnant. Judah insists that she be burned. As men are dragging her away to be burned, she sends word to Judah about the seal and cord and walking stick and says that the man who owns them is the one who got her pregnant.
• Judah recognizes them as his own, and determines that she is more righteous than he, because he didn't arrange for her to marry Shelah as he should have.
• When the time comes for Tamar to give birth, it is discovered that she carries twins. During labor, one of the babies reaches his arm out, and the midwife ties a scarlet string on the wrist. That baby pulls his arm back in, and his brother is born first. The firstborn is named Perez and the second Zerah.

Descendants of Judah – 1 Chronicles 2:3–6, 8

• An account is given of the five sons of Judah, the sons of Perez and Zerah, and the son of Ethan (a son of Zerah), Azariah.

Joseph and Potiphar's Wife – Genesis 39

• The Lord is with Joseph while he's in Egypt, so Joseph succeeds in everything he does while in the house of Potiphar. Potiphar notices this and realizes that God is with Joseph, so he puts Joseph in charge of his entire household and everything he owns.
• Potiphar prospers, so he gives Joseph complete administrative responsibility over everything he has.
• Joseph is a handsome young man, and Potiphar's wife tries to get him to sleep with her. Joseph refuses, but she keeps pressuring him. One day, when no one else is around, Joseph goes into the house, and Potiphar's wife grabs him by the cloak and tries to get him to sleep with her. He refuses and gets away from her, but she still has his cloak.
• Potiphar's wife calls on her servants, shows them Joseph's cloak, and tells them that Joseph tried to rape her. She then tells Potiphar the same thing when he returns home.

Joseph Put in Prison 

• Potiphar is furious and has Joseph put in prison, where the king's prisoners are held.
• God is with Joseph, and makes him a favorite with the prison warden. Soon the warden puts Joseph in charge of all the other prisoners and everything that happens in the prison.
• The Lord is with Joseph and causes everything that he does to prosper.

January 13: Genesis 36:1–19; 1 Chronicles 1:35–37; Genesis 36:20–30; 1 Chronicles1:38–42; Genesis 36:31–43; 1 Chronicles 1:43–1 Chronicles 2:2

Esau's Descendants – Genesis 36 & 1 Chronicles 1:35–37

• An account is given of the descendants of Esau, also known as Edom.
• With not enough land to support both Esau and Jacob, Esau took his wives, children, and everything he had acquired in the land of Canaan and moved to the hill country of Seir.
• Esau has sons by three wives: Eliphaz by wife Adah; Reuel by wife Basemath; and Jerush, Jalam, and Korah by wife Oholibamah.

Original Peoples of Edom – Genesis 36:20–30 & 1 Chronicles 1:38–42

• An account is given of the tribes that descended from Seir the Horite.

Rulers of Edom – Genesis 36:31–43 & 1 Chronicles 1:43–54

• An account is given of the rulers in Edom before any king ruled over the Israelites.

Descendants of Israel – 1 Chronicles 2:1–2

• The sons of Israel were Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Zebulun, Dan, Joseph, Benjamin, Naphtali, Gad, and Asher.

January 12: Genesis 32:1 – Genesis 35:27

Jacob Fears Esau – Genesis 32

• As Jacob starts on his way again, angels of God appear to him.
• Jacob sends messengers ahead to his brother Esau, hoping that Esau will be friendly to him. The messengers return with word that Esau is coming to meet Jacob—with an army of four hundred men.
• Jacob splits his household and flocks in two, hoping Esau will only be able to attack one. He then prays, since God told him to return to his land. He asks that the Lord rescue him from Esau. Then he selects gifts for his brother from his flocks and other livestock. He has his servants take the animals and go ahead to meet Esau.

Jacob Wrestles with God

• During the night, Jacob sends his wives, his two servant wives, and his eleven sons across the Jabbok River. Then he sends over all his possessions. He is now alone in the camp.
• A man comes and wrestles with Jacob until dawn. When the man sees that he would not win the match, he touches Jacob's hip and wrenches it from its socket. Then the man asks Jacob to let him go. Jacob says he won't let go until the man blesses him.
• The man asks his name, and Jacob tells him. The man then tells him his name is no longer Jacob, but is now Israel, because he has fought with God and men and has won.
• Jacob asks his name, and the man asks him why he wants to  know his name and then blesses him. 
• Jacob names the place where this happened Peniel, meaning "face of God" (Jacob says he has seen God face to face but his life has been spared). 
• Jacob leaves Peniel when the sun rises, limping due to his injury. (Even today the people of Israel don't eat the tendon near the hip socket because of what happened to Jacob.)

Jacob Meets Esau – Genesis 33

• Jacob looks up and sees Esau coming with his four hundred men. He divides the children among his wives: the servants wives and their children first, then Leah and her children, and then Rachel and her children.
• Jacob goes ahead of them and bows before Esau. Esau runs to him, embraces him, and kisses him. They both weep. 
• Esau asks who the women and children are, and Jacob tells him they are his wives and children. He has the women and children come forward and bow before Esau. Esau then asks about the flocks and animals sent before them, and Jacob tells him they were a gift for him.
• Esau tells Jacob that he has plenty, and that Jacob should keep what he has. Jacob insists he take the gift, and Esau eventually agrees and tells Jacob to follow him home.
• Jacob tells Esau to go ahead, as he doesn't want to harm any of his children or animals by driving them too long. Esau agrees, but leaves some of his men to guard them.
• Esau returns to Seir, and Jacob travels to Succoth, where he builds himself a house and shelters for his livestock. Later, Jacob travels to Shechem and sets up camp outside town. He buys land there and builds and altar to the Lord.

The Defiling of Dinah – Genesis 34

• Dinah, the daughter of Jacob and Leah, goes to visit some young women who live in the area. The local prince, Shechem son of Hamor the Hivite, seizes her and rapes her. Then he falls in love with her and tries to win her affection with tender words. Shechem tells his father that he wants to marry Dinah.
• Jacob learns what has happened to Dinah, and since his sons are all out in the fields, he says nothing until they return. Hamor comes to discuss the matter with Jacob, and while they are speaking, Jacob's sons return. They are furious about what has happened.
• Hamor claims that Shechem loves Dinah and wants to marry her, and proposes that Jacob's sons and daughters marry with his sons and daughters. Shechem then asks Jacob if he can marry Dinah.
• Jacob's sons respond deceitfully since Shechem has defiled their sister. They tell Hamor and Shechem that they could not allow the marriage because the men are not circumcised, and agree that if all their men will be circumcised, they will agree to marriage.
• Hamor and Shechem agree, believing that marriage will allow them to becomes owners of Jacob's families livestock and possessions. All the men in the town agree to their circumcision, believing it will give them a way to get to Jacob's possessions, and it is carried out.
• Three days later, Jacob's sons Simeon and Levi (Dinah's full brothers) take their swords and enter the town without opposition (the men are all healing). They kill every male there, including Hamor and Shechem, then take Dinah from Shechem's house and return to their camp.
• The rest of Jacob's sons arrive in town, and finding all the men dead, they plunder the town and take all the possessions and livestock they can find. They also take the women and children of the town as captives.
• When they return to Jacob, he tells Simeon and Levi that they have ruined him, and that the Canaanites and Perizzites will destroy them.
• The brothers ask why they should let their sister be treated like a prostitute.

God Blesses and Renames Jacob – Genesis 35

• God tells Jacob to move to Bethel, settle there, and build an altar to the Lord. Jacob tells everyone in the household to get rid of their idols, purify themselves, and put on clean clothing. Jacob buries their pagan idols and earrings under a tree in Shechem. As they leave, fear spreads over the people, and they allow Jacob's family to leave.
• Jacob and his family eventually reach Bethel, in Canaan. There he builds an altar. Soon after, Rebekah's old nurse, Deborah, dies and she is buried.
• God appears to Jacob and blesses him, telling him he will now be called Israel. God tells him to be fruitful and multiply, and that he will become a great nation and God will give him the lands that once belonged to Abraham and Isaac.
• Jacob sets up a stone to mark where God spoke to him. He pours wine over it as an offering and anoints the pillar with olive oil. He names the place Bethel, which means "house of God."

The Death of Rachel

• Jacobs clan leaves to move to Ephrath (Bethelehem). Rachel goes into labor while they are traveling, and after a hard delivery, the midwife tells her she has another son. With her last words, Rachel names him Ben-Oni (which means "son of my sorrow"). Jacob renames him Benjamin, meaning "son of my right hand." 
• Rachel dies and is buried on the way to Ephrath. Jacob sets up a stone monument over her grave.
• Reuben, Jacob and Leah's son, has intercourse with Bilhah, his father's servant wife, and Jacob hears about it. (He does this to assert himself as principal heir, but this act later causes him to lose the blessing he desired.)
• Jacob returns to his father, Isaac, in Mamre, where Abraham and Isaac had both lived as foreigners.

January 11: Genesis 30:25 – Genesis 31:55

Jacob's Prosperity – Genesis 30:25–43

• After Rachel gives birth to Joseph, Jacob asks Laban to release him so he can go home to his own country. Laban tries to bargain with Jacob, asking how much he owes Jacob (he has become very wealthy because of Jacob and doesn't want him to leave).
• Jacob again asks to be released, but Laban again asks him how much he owes him.
• Jacob tells him he doesn't want money, but asks if he can have all the spotted or speckled sheep and goats from the flocks, as well as the black sheep, as his wages.
• Laban agrees, and places the removed sheep and goats into his sons' care. His sons take the sheep and goats three days' journey away while Jacob stays to care for Laban's flocks.
• Jacob takes branches from poplar, almond, and plane trees, and peels off the bark, making white streaks on them. He places the peeled branches in the water troughs where the flocks come to drink and mate. When they mate in front of the branches, they later give birth to streaked, spotted, or speckled lambs, which then become Jacob's.
• When the stronger females (but not the weaker ones) are ready to mate, Jacob places the peeled branches in front of them. This way the stronger lambs belong to Jacob and the weaker ones to Laban, and Jacob becomes very wealthy.

Jacob Flees from Laban – Genesis 31

• Jacob learns Laban's sons are grumbling about him robbing their father, and Laban begins to treat Jacob differently.
• God tells Jacob to return to his homeland and that He will be with him.
• Jacob calls Leah and Rachel to the fields and tells them that their father has cheated him and that God has told him to leave. They agree, knowing that they will not inherit their father's wealth anyway and that their father has wasted the money Jacob paid him for them.
• Jacob puts his wife and children on camels and drives his livestock ahead of them. He packs all the belongings he had acquired and sets out for Canaan, where his father Isaac lived.
• Before leaving, Rachel steals some of her father's household idols.
• With Laban away, they leave without him knowing about it.

Laban Pursues Jacob

• Three days later, Laban is told that Jacob has fled. Laban gathers a group of relatives and follows after him. They catch up with Jacob seven days later, in the hill country of Gilead. But the previous night, God had appeared to Laban in a dream and told him to leave Jacob alone.
• Laban questions Jacob why he has deceived him and why they left without telling him. He says he could destroy Jacob, but that God had told him to leave Jacob alone. Finally, he asks why Jacob has stolen his gods.
• Jacob responds that he rushed away because he was afraid Laban would take his daughters by force, but then tells him he hasn't taken his gods (he didn't know Rachel had taken them).
• Laban searches Jacob's and Leah's tents and doesn't find them. He then goes to Rachel's tent, Rachel, who is sitting on her camel saddle that holds the idols, does not get up and tells her father she is having her monthly period. Laban continues his search and doesn't find the idols.
• Jacob becomes angry with Laban. He asks what he has taken from Laban and points out that he has slaved for him for twenty years. Jacob tells him that if God had not been on his side, Laban would have sent him away empty-handed. Jacob points out that God has seen Laban's abuse and Jacob's hard work, and that's why he rebuked Laban in the dream.

January 10: Genesis 28:6 – Genesis 30:24

Esau Marries an Ishmaelite – Genesis 28

• Esau, angry at his father Isaac and his brother Jacob over not receiving his blessing, learns that Isaac sent Jacob away so he would not marry a Canaanite woman.
• To try to make his father happy, Esau visits his uncle Ishmael's family and marries one of his daughters, in addition to the wives he already has.

Jacob's Dream

• Jacob leaves Beersheba and journeys toward Haran. One night, he dreams of a ladder reaching up to heaven with angels traveling up and down it.
• God is standing at the top of the ladder, and he tells Jacob that the land he is standing on belonged to his ancestors, and that God will give it to him and his descendants. God also tells him that He will be with Jacob and will bless his descendants.
• Jacob gets up the next morning, sets the rock he used as a pillow for an upright memorial pillar, and pours olive oil over it, calling the place Bethel.
• Jacob vows that if God will protect him on his journey, He will be his God.

Jacob Arrives in Paddan-Aram – Genesis 29

• Jacob arrives in Paddan-Aram and sees flocks of sheep and goats in an open field near a well. Jacob asks the shepherds where they are from, and when they say they are from Haran, he asks if they know Laban, his mother Rebekah's brother.
• They tell him they do know Laban, and that his daughter Rachel is coming with her flock of sheep (she was a shepherd).
• Jacob encourages them to remove the stone from the well to water the sheep and goats, but the shepherds tell him it is tradition to wait until all animals have reached the well before the well is opened. Since the sheep belong to Jacob's uncle, Jacob opens the well and watered the flock. He then kisses Rachel, weeps aloud, and tells her he is her cousin. She runs home to her father to tell him.
• Laban runs out to meet him and brings him back to the house.

Jacob Marries Leah and Rachel – Genesis 29

• After Jacob has stayed with Laban for about a month, Laban tells him he shouldn't be working for him for free just because he's family, and he asks Jacob how much his wages should be.
• Jacob is in love with Rachel, the younger of Laban's daughters, so he tells Laban he will work for him for seven years if he'll allow him to marry Rachel.
• Jacob works hard for seven years, and Laban agrees that he and Rachel can marry, But after it is dark, Laban takes Leah (who is not beautiful like Rachel) in to Jacob instead. In the morning, Jacob realizes what Laban has done and asks why Laban has tricked him.
• Laban explains that it is not their custom to marry off a younger daughter before an older daughter. He then offers Rachel to Jacob if Jacob will work for him for another seven years.
• A week after his marriage to Leah, Jacob is given Rachel as a wife as well, and he stays and works for Laban for seven more years.

Jacob's Children 

• God sees that Jacob does not love Leah like he loves Rachel, so He enables Leah to have many children while Rachel is barren. Within a few years, Leah bears Jacob four sons: Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah.
• Rachel becomes jealous and tells Jacob to take her maid, Bilhah, as another wife so Rachel can have children through her. Bilhah bears a son, whom Rachel names Dan. Bilhah has another son with Jacob, whom Rachel names Naphtali.
• Leah realizes she isn't getting pregnant anymore, and she has her maid, Zilpah, become another wife for Jacob so Leah can have more children through her. Zilpah then has two sons: Gad and Asher,
• Rachel allows Leah to sleep with Jacob one night, and over a few years she bears Jacob two sons and a daughter: Issachar, Zebulon, and Dinah.
• God remembers Rachel's plight, and she becomes pregnant. She bears Jacob a son, whom she names Joseph. 

January 9: Genesis 25:27 – Genesis 28:5

Esau Sells His Birthright – Genesis 25:27–34

• Jacob and Esau grow up. Esau becomes a skilled hunter, while Jacob prefers staying at home. Jacob loves Esau, while Rebekah loves Jacob.
• Esau arrives home from hunting, very hungry, while Jacob is cooking stew. He asks Jacob for some stew, and Jacob agrees if Esau will give him his birthright.
• Esau agrees, and trades his birthright for bread and lentil stew, showing contempt for his rights as firstborn. He then leaves the tent.

God's Promise to Isaac – Genesis 26

• A famine strikes the land where Isaac is living, so he moves to Gerar, where Abimelech, the king of the Philistines, lives.
• The Lord appears to Isaac and tells him not to go to Egypt, but to stay as a foreigner in Gerar, and He will bless him and give him the lands for him and his descendants.
• Isaac stays in Gerar, and when people ask him about his wife, Rebekah, he tells them that she is his sister, because he is afraid they will kill him if he admits that she is his wife.
• One day Abimelech sees Jacob caressing Rebekah, and calls Jacob to him, asking him why he has lied, since she is obviously his wife and not his sister.
• Jacob admits that he was afraid, and Abimelech questions how he could have lied and put Abimelech or another man at risk for great sin if they'd taken his wife and slept with her. Abimelech issues a public proclamation that any man who touches Rebekah will be put to death.

Isaac and Abimelech

• Isaac plants his crops and then harvests a hundred times more than he planted because the Lord blessed him. He becomes a very rich man, and acquires many flocks of sheep and goats, herds of cattle, and servants.
• The Philistines become jealous of him and fill his wells, which had been dug by the servants of Abraham, with dirt. Finally, Abimelech orders Isaac to leave because he has become to powerful for them.
• Isaac moves to the Gerar Valley. He has his servants reopen his wells, and the servants also open a well in the Gerar Valley. Shepherds from Gerar claim the well belongs to them, and Isaac has his men dig another well, but the shepherds again dispute the well. Isaac's servants dig another well, and this time the shepherds don't dispute the well.
• Isaac moves to Beersheba, and God appears to him that night. He tells Jacob he will be with him and bless him because of his promise to Abraham. Isaac builds and altar there and worships the Lord. His servants dig another well.

A Treaty with Abimelech

• One day Abimelech, his adviser Ahuzzath, and his army commander Phicol visit Isaac.
• Isaac asks why they have come there since they have removed him from his land in Gerar and obviously hate him.
• They respond that they can see the Lord is with him and they want to make a covenant with him. They ask that Jacob will not cause them any harm, pointing out that they sent him away in peace and God has blessed him.
• Isaac prepares a covenant feast, and the next morning they take an oath not to interfere with each other. The men then leave Jacob in peace.
• The next morning, Isaac's servants return to him with word that they have dug another well (called Beersheba) and found water.
• At the age of forty, Esau marries two Hittite wives, Judith and Basemath. Esau's wives make life difficult for Isaac and Rebekah.

Isaac Blesses Jacob – Genesis 27

• Isaac, who is old and becoming blind, calls for Esau and tells him to go and hunt some wild game and prepare his favorite dish for him. Isaac will then bless Esau.
• Rebekah overhears them. She has Jacob go and get two young goats from their herds so she can prepare Isaac's favorite dish, then has him take the food to his father so Isaac will bless him instead.
• Rebekah dresses Jacob in Esau's clothes and covers Jacob's arms and neck with the skin of the young goats (so he will feel like Esau) and has him take the food to his father.
• Isaac asks which son he is, and Jacob claims he is Esau. Though Jacob doesn't sound like Esau, when Isaac feels his arms and smells his clothes, he believes he is Esau.
• Isaac blesses Jacob, and soon after Jacob leaves his father, Esau returns from his hunt and learns his father, who was deceived, has blessed Jacob instead. Esau asks that Jacob bless him as well, but Isaac cannot because he has nothing left to give Esau. 
• Esau is upset that Jacob has stolen both his birthright and his blessing.

Jacob Sent to Laban – Genesis 27:41 to Genesis 28:5

• Esau plans to kill Jacob, but Rebekah overhears his plan. She tells Jacob to flee to her brother Laban and stay there until Esau's rage has waned and she calls him back to them.
• Rebekah tells Isaac that she doesn't want Jacob to marry a local Hittite woman, and Isaac calls Jacob to him and tells him to go to Paddan-Aram, to the house of his grandfather, and marry one of his uncle Laban's daughters.
• Jacob goes to Paddan-Aram to live with Laban.

January 8: Genesis 25:1–4; 1 Chronicles 25:5–6; Genesis 25:12-18; 1 Chronicles 1:28–31; 1 Chronicles 34; Genesis 25:19–26; Genesis 25:7–11

Abraham's Descendants – Genesis 25:1–6 & 1 Chronicles 1:32–33

• Abraham takes another wife, Keturah, who bears him six sons. Even so, Abraham gives all he has to Isaac. 
• To the sons of his concubines Abraham gives gifts, and then he sends them away from Isaac, eastward to the east country. 

Ishmael's Descendants – Genesis 25:12–18 & 1 Chronicles 1:28–31

• Ishmael has twelve sons, who become twelve princes according to their tribes. They settle from Havilah to Shur.
• Ishmael later dies at the age of 137 years.

Isaac's Descendants – 1 Chronicles 1:34 & Genesis 25:19–26

• Isaac pleads with the Lord because his wife, Rebekah, is barren. God answers his prayers, and Rebekah becomes pregnant. The twins battle in her womb, and Rebekah questions God what is going on.
• God tells her that her sons will become rival nations and that one will be stronger than the other, with her older son serving the younger.
• When her sons are born, the first is red in color and covered with thick hair. She names him Esau. His twin was born grasping Esau's heel, so they named him Jacob (or Israel).

Abraham's Death – Genesis 25:7–11

• Abraham dies as the age of 175 years. Isaac and Ishmael bury him in the cave of Machpelah, near Mamre, where Abraham buried Sarah.
• God blesses Isaac, who settles near Beer-lahai-roi.

January 7: Genesis 21:8 – Genesis 23:20; Genesis 11:32; Genesis 24:1–67

God Protects Hagar and Ishmael – Genesis 21

• Abraham plans a great feast when Isaac is weaned. Sarah sees Ishmael laughing about Isaac and tells Abraham to send away Hagar and Ishmael. (Even in this culture, it would be considered reprehensible for Sarah to send away Hagar and Ishmael in this way. As well, Abraham loved his son Ishmael.)
• God tells Abraham to do as Sarah says, as He will make a nation of both Isaac and Ishmael.
• The next morning, Abraham gives Hagar bread and water, and sends her away with Ishmael. The two wander in the desert of Beersheba.
• When the water was gone, Hagar placed Ishmael under a bush and went away from him (about "a bow shot away") so she would not have to watch her child die. She and Ishmael cry, and God hears them.
• An angel appears to Hagar and tells her to go get Ishmael because God will make a great nation of him. God opens Hagar's eyes and she sees a well, where she fills her water skin and gives water to Ishmael. 
• God is with Ishmael as he grows up, and Ishmael lives in the wilderness of Paran and becomes an expert with a bow. His mother takes a wife for him from the land of Egypt (one of her own people).

A Treaty with Abimelech

• Abraham reproves Abimelech about a well of his that Abimelech's servants had seized. Abimelech denies knowing anything about it.
• The two men make a covenant, with Abraham giving Abimelech seven ewe lambs.
• Abimelech and his army commander Phicol return to the land of the Philistines, and Abraham plants a tree at Beersheba, calls on the name of the Lord there, and sojourns for many days in the land of the Philistines.

The Sacrifice of Isaac

• God appears to Abraham and tells him to take Isaac, go to the land of Moriah, and there offer Isaac as a burnt offering.
• Abraham obeys. The next morning, he saddled his donkey and took Isaac and two men with him. He cuts wood to build a fire and goes to the place where God directs him. 
• On the third day, Abraham sees the place God has directed him to and tells the two men to stay with the donkey while he takes Isaac and goes to worship the Lord. 
• Isaac points out that they have wood and fire but no lamb to offer as a sacrifice. Abraham tells him that God will provide the lamb.
• When they reach the place God told Abraham to go, Abraham builds an altar, lays the wood in order, and binds Isaac and places him on the wood. When Abraham takes the knife to slay Isaac, God tells him not to lay his hand on the boy, and tells him that He now know that Abraham fears Him since he would not even withhold his only son from Him.
• Abraham sees a ram caught by its horn in a thicket behind him, and takes the ram and offers it as a burnt offering.
• The angel of the Lord tells Abraham that because of his obedience, God will bless him and multiply his offspring.
• Abraham returned to the two men and his donkey, and they all return to Beersheba, where Abraham continues to live.

The Burial of Sarah – Genesis 23

• Sarah dies, and Abraham goes to the Hittite elders to request a place to bury her. Since Abraham is consider "an honored prince," they give him their finest tomb to bury her.
• Abraham offers to pay the owner of the tomb, but the owner refuses and gives to tomb to him for four hundred pieces of silver (not nearly its worth).

Isaac and Rebekah – Genesis 24

• In his old age, Abraham has his servant swear that he will not take a wife for Isaac from the daughters of the Canaanites. Abraham instead wants him to go back to Abraham's country and take a wife from his people.
• The servant questions what to do if the woman he chooses will not come with him, and Abraham tells him he will not have to do what he's been instructed but he's not to take Isaac back to the country of Abraham.
• The servant takes ten camels and many gifts and departs for Nahor, in Mesopotamia. There he stops at a well while the women of the area are drawing water. The servants asks that God would show him the right woman by having her offer to water his camels when he asks her to get him water (a gesture that went far beyond her social duties).
• A beautiful woman comes to the well and the servant asks her for a drink. When she finishes giving him a drink, she offers water for his camels. The servant asks whose daughter she is, and if he can spend the night in her father's house.
• She tells him she is the daughter of Bethuel, son of Milcah and Nahor, and that they have plenty of straw, fodder, and room for him to spend the night.
• The servant worshiped the Lord, and the woman ran home and told her mother's household what had happened.
• The woman, Rebekah, has a brother named Laban, who comes to the well to meet the servant. Laban brings him back to the house and cares for the servant and his camels. The servant refuses to eat until he can say what he needs to say. He then tells Laban the story of Abraham and the servant's journey to find a wife for Isaac.
• Laban and Bethuel tell the servant to take Rebekah to be Isaac's wife. The servant gives Rebekah and her family silver and gold and garments.
• The family asks for ten more days with Rebekah, but the servant wants to leave before then, They ask Rebekah when she wants to leave, and she says she will go with him now. She and her nurse go with the servant.
• Meanwhile, Isaac is dwelling in the Negeb. He goes out into the field toward evening to meditate, and sees the camels coming.
• Rebekah sees Isaac in the field and asks the servant who he is. When the servant tells her he is his master, she veils herself (this would have been appropriate for an unmarried woman who was about to come into the company of a man). The servant tells Isaac of everything that has happened.
• Isaac takes Rebekah as his wife. He loves her, and she gives him comfort after Sarah's death.

January 6: Genesis 18:1 – Genesis 21:7

The Lord Appears to Abraham – Genesis 18

• While Abraham sits at the door of his tent, three men arrive (God and two angels). Abraham has Sarah make flour cakes, has a young man prepare a young calf, and prepares curds and milk for the men. He stands by while they eat under a tree.
• The men ask Abraham where Sarah is, and Abraham tells them she is in the tent. They respond that they will return in about a year, and at that time he and Sarah will have a son. 
• Sarah is listening from inside the tent, and she laughs to herself because she and Abraham are so old.
• The Lord asks Abraham why Sarah laughed, and reminds Abraham that nothing is too hard for Him. Sarah is fearful and denies laughing, but God confirms that she did laugh.
• The three men leave, heading toward Sodom, and Abraham goes with them. God says that due to the great sinfulness of Sodom and Gomorrah, He will go and see the cities Himself.

Abraham Intercedes for Sodom

• Looking upon Sodom, Abraham asks God if he will sweep away the righteous of Sodom with the wicked. He asks that if there are fifty righteous within the city, would God spare them.
• God answers that if there are fifty righteous within the city, He will spare the entire city for their sake. From there, Abraham continues to question the Lord: What if there are forty-five righteous? What if there are forty? Thirty? Twenty? Ten?
• God tells Abraham that for the sake of ten righteous, He will not destroy the city.
• The Lord goes away, and Abraham returns to his tent.

God Rescues Lot – Chapter 19

• The two men (the angels with God) reach Sodom, where Lot is sitting at the gate (the gate of the city was where the town elders met, so Lot, in his wealth, had become a ruling elder).
• Lot greets them with respect and offers to let them stay at his home for the night. They reply that they will stay in the town square, but he insists and they agree to stay with him. Lot prepares a feast and baked unleavened bread, and they eat.
• Before they go to bed for the night, all the men of Sodom surround the house, and ask Lot to bring the two men out, so they might "know them." Lot steps outside and asks them to take his two virgin daughters instead of the men.
• The Sodomite men refuse, trying to break the door down, and the two men bring Lot into the house, shut the door, and strike the men outside with blindness.
• The two men ask Lot if he has any family in Sodom, and tell him to get them because they are about to destroy the city. Lot goes to his two son-in-laws, who are to marry his daughters, but they don't believe him.
• When morning comes, the two men tell Lot to take his wife and daughters and leave the city. Lot lingers, and the men take his wife and daughters by the hands and take them outside the city. The men tell them not to look back or stop anywhere in the valley, but to head to the hills.
• Lot tells them if he escapes to the hills, disaster may overtake him, and he asks if he can escape to  a small city instead. The men agree, and they escape to the city of Zoar.

God Destroys Sodom

• After Lot and his family reach Zoar at sunrise, God rains down sulfur and fire on Sodom and Gomorrah.
• Lot's wife looks back and turns to a pillar of salt.
• Abraham goes to the place where he had stood with the Lord and looks down upon Sodom and Gomorrah. God has remembered Abraham and sent Lot away to protect him.

Lot and His Daughters

• Lot is afraid to live in Zoar, so he takes his daughters and goes up into the hills to live.
• His daughters conspire to get Lot drunk and have sexual relations with him so they would have children. (Their husbands were dead in Sodom, and their mother had also died and they doubted their father would remarry again. If they died childless, no one would carry on their name.)
• The firstborn lies with their father that night after he is drunk, and the next night the younger daughter does the same. Both daughters become pregnant; the firstborn bears a son she names Moab (he becomes the father of the Moabites) and the younger bears a son she names Ben-ammi (he becomes the father of the Ammonites). This shameful act of incest results in the birth of two sons who would later greatly trouble Israel.

Abraham and Abimelech – Genesis 20

• Abraham moves to the territory between Kadesh and Shur, and sojourns in Gerar. 
• There he tells people that Sarah is his sister, and Abimelech, king of Gerar, sends for Sarah and takes her into his house. 
• God appears to Abimelech in a dream and warns him that Sarah is married. Abimelech points out that he didn't know this and that he hasn't touched Sarah. God agrees that Abimelech has shown integrity (and the He kept Abimelech from sinning against him), and tells Abimelech to return Sarah to Abraham.
• Abimelech confronts Abraham, and Abraham explains why they deceived him (they feared that since they were among people who didn't fear God, Abraham would be killed and Sarah taken). Abimelech tells Abraham he may dwell where he pleases and gives him a thousand pieces of silver.
• Abraham prays to God, and God heals Abimelech, his wife, and his female slaves so they again bear children (the Lord had closed all the wombs of the house of Abimelech because of Sarah). In this way, the people of Gerar learn about the Lord, just as the people in Egypt learned of God when a similar thing happened there.

The Birth of Isaac – Genesis 21:1–7

• Sarah conceives and bears a son whom they name Isaac. When he is eight days old, they circumcise Isaac.
• Sarah says that "God has made laughter for me. ... I have borne [Abraham] a son in his old age." (Gen. 21:6–7)

January 5: Genesis 15:1 – Genesis 17:27

God's Covenant with Abram – Genesis 15

• The word of the Lord comes to Abram in a dream, telling him not to be afraid.
• Abram reminds God that he is childless, and that the heir of his house is Eliezer of Damascus, who is no blood relation to Abram.
• God assures Abram that a biological child will be his heir and that his descendants will be like the stars (innumerable).
• Abram believes God.
• God reminds Abram that He is the One who brought him out of Ur of the Chaldeans, to the land that Abram will inherit. God tells Abram to bring him a three-year-old female goat, a three-year-old heifer, a three-year-old ram, a turtledove, and a young pigeon. Abram does as he is instructed.
• At nightfall, Abram falls asleep and "horror and great darkness" fall upon him.
• God tells Abram that his descendants will be "strangers in a land that is not theirs, and will serve them, and they will afflict them four hundred years." (Gen. 15:13) (This refers to the Israelites as slaves in Egypt.) God then tells Abram that he will judge the nation they serve, and afterward the people will come out of the land with many possessions.
• When the sun goes down, a smoking oven and burning torch appear. God tells Abram that to his descendants He has given this land, from the river of Egypt to the Euphrates.

Hagar and Ishmael – Chapter 16

• Sarai has no children, and she had an Egyptian maidservant named Hagar. With the hope that Hagar would bear children for her, Sarai has Abram take Hagar as a wife.
• Hagar conceives a child, and Sarai becomes despised in Hagar's eyes. (While this type of surrogate was culturally acceptable, the act of Sarai taking Hagar's child would be incredibly difficult for Hagar.)
• When Sarai addresses Abram about Hagar's treatment of her, Abram tells Sarai to do with Hagar as she pleases. Sarai deals harshly with her, and Hagar flees her presence.
• An angel of the Lord appears to Hagar and asks where she has come from and where she is going. When Hagar responds, the angel tells her to return to Sarai and submit herself to her, and that her descendants will be multiplied so that they are innumerable.
• The angel tells her Hagar will bear a son, that she should call him Ishmael, and that he will be a "wild man" (he will be unsettled, ever on the move). Still, while Ishmael's people will often be at war, they will endure. (And they do. Ishmael's people are the Arabs of the Middle East, and very few people from the Old Testament have survived till today. Only the Hebrews [descendants of Isaac] and the Arabs [descendants of Ishmael] remain.)
• Hagar bears Abram a son, and Abram names him Ishmael.

The Sign of the Covenant – Chapter 17

• When Abram is ninety-nine years old, God appears to him and tells him to "walk before me and be blameless" (Gen. 17:1), and God will make a covenant between them and multiply Abram greatly. He tells Abram that he will be the father of many nations, and his name is now to be Abraham.
• God also tells Abraham that He will give him and his descendants all the land of Canaan, and that He will be their God.
• As a sign of this covenant, God tells Abraham that all male children shall be circumcised on the eighth day (all servants should also be circumcised). Any who are uncircumcised will be cut off from their people because they have broken the covenant.
• God changes Sarai's name to Sarah, and tells Abraham that he and Sarah will have a son and that she will be the mother of many nations.
• Abraham laughs because he is one hundred years old and Sarah is ninety years old.
• Abraham, out of love for his son, asks that Ishmael "might live before" God, and God assures him that He has blessed Ishmael and will continue to bless Ishmael.
• God repeats that they will have a son, and tells Abraham that they are to name him Isaac (which means "laughter"). He also says that while He will bless Ishmael, His covenant will be with Isaac.
• Following God's instructions, Abraham circumcises all the men of his household that day.

January 4: Genesis 11:1 – Genesis 14:24 & 1 Chronicles 1:24–27

The Tower of Babel – Genesis 11

• The whole earth has one language. The people journey east and find a plain in the land of Shinar (ancient Babylon, in Mesopotamia), where they settle. 
• Using baked bricks and mortar, the people set out to build a city, and a tower that reaches into the heavens. (They want to become as famous as the Nephilim were before the Great Flood, and make a name for themselves.)
• God "came down to see" (omniscience) what they were doing, and sees their potential to become as willfully sinful as people were before the Flood. He will not allow this to happen.
• God confuses their language, scattering them abroad. (This is the beginning of variation in language, culture, values, and clans—caused by human arrogance.) The scattering is God's third great judgment on the people (the first being the expulsion from Eden and the second being the Great Flood). 
• The tower is called Babel. In Hebrew, the word for confuse (in verb form) sounds similar to the name of the city.

Shem's Descendants – Genesis 11:10–26 & 1 Chronicles 1:24–27

• The genealogy of Shem, the progenitor of the Hebrew people, is given, from Shem to Terah, who was the father of Abram (later Abraham), Nahor, and Haran.

Terah's Descendants

• Terah's son Haran dies, leaving a son named Lot. Abram and Nahor take wives (Sarai and Milcah, respectively). Sarai is barren.
• Terah takes Abram, Lot, and Sarai, and they leave Ur of the Chaldeans and go to Canaan, to a place called Haran, where Terah dies.

Promises to Abram – Genesis 12

• God tells Abram to take his family to the land God will show him, and that He will make Abram a great nation.
• Abram obeys, leaving Haran with Sarai, Lot, and the people they had acquired in Haran, and traveled to Shechem, also in Canaan. There, God tells Abram that He will give this land (which belongs to the Canaanites) to Abram's descendants, and Abram builds an altar to the Lord.
• Abram then moves to the mountains east of Bethel and pitches his tent between Bethel and Ai, where he builds another altar and calls on the name of the Lord.
• Abram then journeys again, heading south.

Abram in Egypt

• There was a famine in the land, so Abram takes his family south to Egypt. 
• As the family is entering Egypt, Abram tells Sarai to tell anyone who asks, that she is his sister. He fears that because she is beautiful, if she tells people that she is his wife, the people will try to kill him. (Sarai is actually Abram's half-sister, as they shared the same father.)
• In Egypt, Sarai is taken by the Pharaoh's princes into the house of Pharaoh, where she becomes a wife of Pharaoh, and Pharaoh treats Abram well for Sarai's sake (he is given servants and livestock).
• God plagues Pharaoh and his household because of Sarai (the first example of the cursing and blessing element of God's promise, found in verses 2 and 3 of the chapter).
• Angry, Pharaoh sends Abram and Sarai away with all they own.

Abram Inherits Canaan – Genesis 13

• Abram and his family return to the place where he pitched his tent between Bethel and Ai. There, he calls upon the name of the Lord again.
• Lot also goes with them, and the land is not able to house all of them, as their possessions are so great that they can't live together. There is strife between the herdsmen of the Lot and the herdsmen of Abram, so the two men decide to separate so there will be no more problems between them. Lot chooses the land of Jordan, to the east (his choice of the more favorable land leads him into territory populated by the worst of the Canaanites—the men of Sodom), while Abram chooses the land of Canaan.
• Lot pitches his tent as far as Sodom, where the men are "exceedingly wicked and sinful against the Lord." (Gen. 13:13)
• The Lord tells Abram to look all around him, and that all the land Abram can see will be given to him and his descendants forever. (This is God's reaffirmation of His promise to Abram after Abram's lack of faith in Egypt and his separation from Lot.) He also tells Abram He will make his descendants as the dust of the earth (innumerable), and tells Abram to move about through his land (a symbolic act of taking possession).
• Abram moves his tent, dwelling by the terebinth trees of Mamre (in Hebron), where he builds another altar to the Lord.

Lot's Captivity and Rescue – Genesis 14

• War breaks out in Jordan, where Lot is living. Lot and his family, along with the goods of Sodom and Gomorrah, are captured. An escapee flees to Abram and tells him what has happened.
• Abram arms his three hundred eighteen trained servants, and together they attack the city of Sodom in the night. Abram brings back all the goods, as well as Lot and his family and all their belongings.
• The king of Sodom meets Abram in the Valley of Shaveh after Abram's return from victory. 

Abram and Melchizedek

• Melchizedek, king of Salem (later Jerusalem) meets with Abram. (Melchizedek is a priest of the Most High God and worshiped the living God.) He then blesses Abram.
• The king of Sodom tells Abram to give him his people but to keep the goods. Abram refuses, saying he will not take anything that belongs to the king (this is his rebuke of Sodom and its king, which is in contrast to Lot, who moved into the wicked city), lest the king say that he made Abram rich.

January 3: Genesis 7:1–10:32; 1 Chronicles 1:5–23

The Great Flood – Genesis 7

• Seven days after Noah and his family enter the ark, forty days of rain ensued, flooding the face of the earth and killing all people and animals.
• The waters prevailed on the earth for one hundred fifty days.

Noah's Deliverance – Genesis 8

• Over forty days, the flood waters recede, and the ark rests on the mountains of Ararat.
• Noah sends out a raven and then a dove. The dove returns because it has nowhere to land, and Noah sends it out again seven days later, and this time it returns with an olive branch in its mouth. Noah waits another seven days, then sends out the dove again. This time it doesn't return, confirming dry land.
• God tells Noah and his family to leave the ark.
• The first thing Noah does is build an altar to the Lord.
• The aroma of the burnt sacrifices pleases the God, and He decides to never destroy the earth in such a way again.

God's Promise to Noah – Genesis 9

• God blesses Noah, and, as He did with Adam and Eve, tells him to "be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth." (Gen. 9:1)
• God establishes a covenant with Noah and his sons, promising to never destroy the earth by flood again. He places a rainbow in the sky as a reminder of this covenant.

Noah and His Sons

• The sons of Noah are introduced: Ham, Shem, and Japheth.
• Noah gets drunk and becomes "uncovered" in his tent.
• Ham sees his father's nakedness and tells his brothers, and Shem and Japheth respectfully cover their father without looking at him.
• When Noah finds out what happened, he blesses Shem and Japheth, but curses Canaan, the son of Ham, making him and his offspring servants.
• Three hundred fifty years after the flood, at age nine hundred fifty years, Noah dies.

Nations Descended from Noah – Genesis 10 & 1 Chronicles 1:5–23

• Describes the offspring of Ham, Shem, and Japheth, and (in Genesis) the lands they occupy.

January 2: Genesis 4:1 – 5:34; 1 Chronicles 1:1–4; Genesis 6:1–22

Sin Enters the World – Genesis 4

• Cain and then Abel are born to Adam and Eve.
• Abel was a keeper of sheep, while Cain was a tiller of the ground (farmer). Both bring a sacrifice of praise to the Lord, but Abel brings his best while Cain does not. 
• Cain is angered when God does not respect his offering, and while talking with Abel in the fields, Cain kills his brother.
• God curses Cain, banishing him from the land. (Cain is the third thing to be cursed by God; the first was the serpent and the second was the ground.)

The Family of Cain

• Cain dwells in the land of Nod with his wife (one of his sisters).
• Six generations of Cain's offspring are described, ending with Lamech, who, in taking two wives (Adah and Zillah), tries to subvert the original pattern of God of one man and one woman.

A New Son for Adam and Eve

• Seth is born to Adam and Eve.
• Enosh is born to Seth, and "Then men began to call upon the name of the Lord." (Gen. 4:26)

The Family of Adam – Genesis 5

• Many generations of Adam's offspring through Seth are given, ending with Noah.
• Of note is Enoch, son of Jared, who is described this way: "And Enoch walked with God; and he was not, for God took him." Instead of dying, Enoch was taken into God's presence. Only Enoch and Elijah (see 2 Kings 2:11) leave earth in this way.

The Family of Adam, from Seth to Noah – 1 Chronicles 1:1–4

•  Adam, Seth, Enosh, Cainan, Mahalalel, Jared, Enoch, Methuselah, Lamech, Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

The Wickedness and Judgment of Man – Genesis 6

• People begin to multiply on the earth.
• The sons of God take wives from the daughters of men. There are a few different interpretations of this passage. The view of Jewish scholars is that the "sons of God" were fallen angels who married human women, and their offspring were "Nephilim," or giants. This breach of God's order would certainly be monumental enough to provoke His judgment in the form of the flood.
• God is sorry for making mankind, and determines to destroy all people with the exception of Noah, "who found grace in the eyes of the Lord." (Gen. 6:8)
• God instructs Noah to build and ark for himself, his wife, his three sons (Ham, Shem, and Japheth), and his sons' wives.
• Onto the ark they bring seven each of every clean animal, a male and his female; two each of every unclean animal (a male and a female); and seven each of every bird of the air.

January 1: Genesis 1:1 – 3:24

The Six Days of Creation – Genesis 1

• Day One: God creates light (day) and darkness (night).
• Day Two: God creates the firmament (heavens or sky, the area that holds both the celestial lights and the birds) and waters (oceans).
• Day Three: God creates land, plants, and trees.
• Day Four: God creates the greater light (sun), the lesser light (moon), and the stars.
• Day Five: God creates birds and sea creatures.
• Day Six: God creates animals and man.

God Rests and Sanctifies the Seventh Day (Sabbath) – Genesis 2

Life in the Garden

• God forms Adam from the dust of the ground and breathes into his nostrils the breath of life.
• The tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil are in the garden.
• God places Adam in the garden and tells him that he may eat of every tree in the garden but the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
• Adam names all the birds and animals, but none are a "helper comparable to him."
• God causes Adam to sleep, then takes Adam's rib and made woman (Eve).
• Adam and Eve are naked but not ashamed.

The Temptation and Fall of Man – Genesis 3

• The serpent (Satan) appears to Eve and tempts her to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, telling her she will not die (as God said) if she did. Eve eats of the tree and also gives its fruit to Adam. Adam and Eve realize they are naked and cover themselves with fig leaves.
• When the presence of the Lord walks through the garden in the cool of the day, Adam and Eve hide themselves. When God questions them, they admit that they have eaten of the tree.
• God curses the serpent, and then makes tunics of skin for Adam and Eve (the first animal sacrifice is necessary due to their disobedience).
• God drives Adam and Eve from the garden so they cannot eat of the tree of life, and places a cherubim with a flaming sword to guard it.