Daily Readings - 02/04/2026

^61:1 The spirit of the Lord Yahweh has been given to me, for Yahweh has anointed me. He has sent me to bring good news to the poor, to bind up hearts that are broken; to proclaim liberty to captives, freedom to those in prison;

^61:2 to proclaim a year of favour from Yahweh, a day of vengeance for our God, to comfort all those who mourn

^61:3 and to give them for ashes a garland; for mourning robe the oil of gladness, for despondency, praise. They are to be called ‘terebinths of integrity’, planted by Yahweh to glorify him.

^88:1 Yahweh my God, I call for help all day, I weep to you all night;

^88:2 may my prayer reach you hear my cries for help;

^88:3 for my soul is all troubled, my life is on the brink of Sheol;

^88:4 I am numbered among those who go down to the Pit, a man bereft of strength:

^88:5 a man alone, down among the dead, among the slaughtered in their graves, among those you have forgotten, those deprived of your protecting hand.

^88:6 You have plunged me to the bottom of the Pit, to its darkest, deepest place,

^88:7 weighted down by your anger, drowned beneath your waves. (pause)

^88:8 You have turned my friends against me and made me repulsive to them; in prison and unable to escape, my eyes are worn out with suffering.

^88:9 Yahweh, I invoke you all day, I stretch out my hands to you:

^88:10 are your marvels meant for the dead, can ghosts rise up to praise you?

^88:11 Who talks of your love in the grave, of your faithfulness in the place of perdition?

^88:12 Do they hear about your marvels in the dark, about your righteousness in the land of oblivion? (pause)

^88:13 But I am here, calling for your help, praying to you every morning:

^88:14 why do you reject me? Why do you hide your face from me?

^88:15 Wretched, slowly dying since my youth, I bore your terrors – now I am exhausted;

^88:16 your anger overwhelmed me, you destroyed me with your terrors

^88:17 which, like a flood, were round me, all day long, all together closing in on me.

^88:18 You have turned my friends and neighbours against me, now darkness is my one companion left.

^4:16 He came to Nazara, where he had been brought up, and went into the synagogue on the sabbath day as he usually did. He stood up to read[*e]

^4:17 and they handed him the scroll of the prophet Isaiah. Unrolling the scroll he found the place where it is written:

^4:18 The spirit of the Lord has been given to me, for he has anointed me. He has sent me to bring the good news to the poor, to proclaim liberty to captives and to the blind new sight, to set the downtrodden free,

^4:19 to proclaim the Lord’s year of favour[*f].

^4:20 He then rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the assistant and sat down. And all eyes in the synagogue were fixed on him.

^4:21 Then he began to speak to them, ‘This text is being fulfilled today even as you listen’.

^12:1 Yahweh said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt,

^12:2 ‘This month is the first of all the others for you, the first month of your year.

^12:3 Speak to the whole community of Israel and say, “On the tenth day of this month each man must take an animal from the flock, one for each family: one animal for each household.

^12:4 If the household is too small to eat the animal, a man must join with his neighbour, the nearest to his house, as the number of persons requires. You must take into account what each can eat in deciding the number for the animal.

^12:5 It must be an animal without blemish, a male one year old; you may take it from either sheep or goats.

^12:6 You must keep it till the fourteenth day of the month when the whole assembly of the community of Israel shall slaughter it between the two evenings.[*a]

^12:7 Some of the blood must then be taken and put on the two doorposts and the lintel of the houses where it is eaten.

^12:8 That night, the flesh is to be eaten, roasted over the fire; it must be eaten with unleavened bread and bitter herbs.

^12:11 You shall eat it like this: with a girdle round your waist, sandals on your feet, a staff in your hand. You shall eat it hastily: it is a passover[*b] in honour of Yahweh.

^12:12 That night, I will go through the land of Egypt and strike down all the first-born in the land of Egypt, man and beast alike, and I shall deal out punishment to all the gods of Egypt, I am Yahweh!

^12:13 The blood shall serve to mark the houses that you live in. When I see the blood I will pass over you and you shall escape the destroying plague when I strike the land of Egypt.

^12:14 This day is to be a day of remembrance for you, and you must celebrate it as a feast in Yahweh’s honour. For all generations you are to declare it a day of festival, for ever.

^115:1 Not by us, Yahweh, not by us, by you alone is glory deserved, by your love and your faithfulness!

^115:2 Do the pagans ask, ‘Where is their God?’

^115:3 Ours is the God whose will is sovereign in the heavens and on earth,

^115:4 whereas their idols, in silver and gold, products of human skill,

^115:5 have mouths, but never speak, eyes, but never see,

^115:6 ears, but never hear, noses, but never smell,

^115:7 hands, but never touch, feet, but never walk, and not a sound from their throats.

^115:8 their makers will end up like them, and so will anyone who relies on them.

^115:9 House of Israel, rely on Yahweh, on him, our help and shield!

^115:10 House of Aaron, rely on Yahweh, on him, our help and shield!

^115:11 You who fear Yahweh, rely on Yahweh, on him, our help and shield!

^115:12 Yahweh remembers us, he will bless, he will bless the House of Israel, he will bless the House of Aaron,

^115:13 he will bless those who fear Yahweh, without distinction of rank.[*a]

^115:14 May Yahweh add to your numbers, yours and your children’s too!

^115:15 May you be blessed by Yahweh, maker of heaven and earth!

^115:16 Heaven belongs to Yahweh, earth he bestows on man.

^115:17 The dead cannot praise Yahweh, they have gone down to silence;

^115:18 but we, the living, bless Yahweh henceforth and evermore.

^11:23 For this is what I received from the Lord, and in turn passed on to you: that on the same night that he was betrayed, the Lord Jesus took some bread,

^11:24 and thanked God for it and broke it, and he said, ‘This is my body, which is for you; do this as a memorial of me’.

^11:25 In the same way he took the cup after supper, and said, ‘This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Whenever you drink it, do this as a memorial of me.’

^11:26 Until the Lord comes, therefore, every time you eat this bread and drink this cup, you are proclaiming his death,

^13:1 It was before the festival of the Passover, and Jesus knew that the hour had come for him to pass from this world to the Father. He had always loved those who were his in the world, but now he showed how perfect his love was.

^13:2 They were at supper, and the devil had already put it into the mind of Judas Iscariot son of Simon, to betray him.

^13:3 Jesus knew that the Father had put everything into his hands, and that he had come from God and was returning to God,

^13:4 and he got up from table, removed his outer garment and, taking a towel, wrapped it round his waist;

^13:5 he then poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet[*a] and to wipe them with the towel he was wearing.

^13:6 He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, ‘Lord, are you going to wash my feet?’

^13:7 Jesus answered, ‘At the moment you do not know what I am doing, but later you will understand’.

^13:8 ‘Never!’ said Peter ‘You shall never wash my feet.’ Jesus replied, ‘If I do not wash you, you can have nothing in common with me’.

^13:9 ‘Then, Lord,’ said Simon Peter ‘not only my feet, but my hands and my head as well!’

^13:10 Jesus said, ‘No one who has taken a bath needs washing, he is clean all over. You too are clean, though not all of you are.’

^13:11 He knew who was going to betray him, that was why he said, ‘though not all of you are’.

^13:12 When he had washed their feet and put on his clothes again he went back to the table. ‘Do you understand’ he said ‘what I have done to you?

^13:13 You call me Master and Lord, and rightly; so I am.

^13:14 If I, then, the Lord and Master, have washed your feet, you should wash each other’s feet.

^13:15 I have given you an example so that you may copy what I have done to you.