Daily Readings - 13/04/2026

^4:23 As soon as they were released they went to the community and told them everything the chief priests and elders had said to them.

^4:24 When they heard it they lifted up their voice to God all together. ‘Master,’ they prayed ‘it is you who made heaven and earth and sea, and everything in them;

^4:25 you it is who said through the Holy Spirit and speaking through our ancestor David, your servant: Why this arrogance among the nations, these futile plots among the peoples?

^4:26 Kings on earth setting out to war, princes making an alliance, against the Lord and against his Anointed.[*d]

^4:27 ‘This is what has come true: in this very city Herod and Pontius Pilate made an alliance with the pagan nations and the peoples of Israel, against your holy servant Jesus whom you anointed,[*e]

^4:28 but only to bring about the very thing that you in your strength and your wisdom had predetermined should happen.

^4:29 And now, Lord, take note of their threats and help your servants to proclaim your message with all boldness,

^4:30 by stretching out your hand to heal and to work miracles and marvels through the name of your holy servant Jesus.’

^4:31 As they prayed, the house where they were assembled rocked; they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to proclaim the word of God boldly.

^2:1 Why this uproar among the nations? Why this impotent muttering of pagans –

^2:2 kings on earth rising in revolt, princes plotting against Yahweh and his Anointed,

^2:3 ‘Now let us break their fetters! Now let us throw off their yoke!’

^2:4 The One whose throne is in heaven sits laughing, Yahweh derides them.

^2:5 Then angrily he addresses them, in a rage he strikes them with panic,

^2:6 ‘This is my king, installed by me on Zion, my holy mountain’.

^2:7 Let me proclaim Yahweh’s decree; he has told me, ‘You are my son, today I have become your father.

^2:8 Ask and I will give you the nations for your heritage, the ends of the earth for your domain.

^2:9 With iron sceptre you will break them, shatter them like potter’s ware.’

^2:10 So now, you kings, learn wisdom, earthly rulers, be warned:

^2:11 serve Yahweh, fear him,

^2:12 tremble and kiss his feet, or he will be angry and you will perish, for his anger is very quick to blaze. Happy all who take shelter in him.

^3:1 There was one of the Pharisees called Nicodemus, a leading Jew,

^3:2 who came to Jesus by night and said, ‘Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who comes from God; for no one could perform the signs that you do unless God were with him’.

^3:3 Jesus answered: ‘I tell you most solemnly, unless a man is born from above, he cannot see the kingdom of God’.

^3:4 Nicodemus said, ‘How can a grown man be born? Can he go back into his mother’s womb and be born again?’

^3:5 Jesus replied: ‘I tell you most solemnly, unless a man is born through water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God:

^3:6 what is born of the flesh is flesh; what is born of the Spirit is spirit.

^3:7 Do not be surprised when I say: You must be born from above.

^3:8 The wind blows wherever it pleases; you hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. That is how it is with all who are born of the Spirit.’