Wednesday, January 8, 2031

^10:1For the law, having a shadow of the good to come, not the very image of the things, can never with the same sacrifices year by year, which they offer continually, make perfect those who draw near. ²Or else wouldn’t they have ceased to be offered, because the worshipers, having been once cleansed, would have had no more consciousness of sins? ³But in those sacrifices there is a yearly reminder of sins. ⁴For it is impossible that the blood of bulls and goats should take away sins. ⁵Therefore when he comes into the world, he says, “You didn’t desire sacrifice and offering, but you prepared a body for me.

⁶You had no pleasure in whole burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin. ⁷Then I said, ‘Behold, I have come (in the scroll of the book it is written of me) to do your will, O God.’” ⁸Previously saying, “Sacrifices and offerings and whole burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin you didn’t desire, neither had pleasure in them” (those which are offered according to the law), ⁹then he has said, “Behold, I have come to do your will.” He takes away the first, that he may establish the second, ¹⁰by which will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

¹¹Every priest indeed stands day by day serving and offering often the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins, ¹²but he, when he had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down on the right hand of God, ¹³from that time waiting until his enemies are made the footstool of his feet. ¹⁴For by one offering he has perfected forever those who are being sanctified. ¹⁵The Holy Spirit also testifies to us, for after saying, ¹⁶“This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days,” says the Lord, “I will put my laws on their heart, I will also write them on their mind;” then he says, ¹⁷“I will remember their sins and their iniquities no more.” ¹⁸Now where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin.

^8:30He commanded them that they should tell no one about him. ³¹He began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. ³²He spoke to them openly. Peter took him and began to rebuke him. ³³But he, turning around and seeing his disciples, rebuked Peter, and said, “Get behind me, Satan! For you have in mind not the things of God, but the things of men.” ³⁴He called the multitude to himself with his disciples and said to them, “Whoever wants to come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.

^2:11For both he who sanctifies and those who are sanctified are all from one, for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brothers, ¹²saying, “I will declare your name to my brothers. Among the congregation I will sing your praise.” ¹³Again, “I will put my trust in him.” Again, “Behold, here I am with the children whom God has given me.” ¹⁴Since then the children have shared in flesh and blood, he also himself in the same way partook of the same, that through death he might bring to nothing him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, ¹⁵and might deliver all of them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.

¹⁶For most certainly, he doesn’t give help to angels, but he gives help to the offspring of Abraham. ¹⁷Therefore he was obligated in all things to be made like his brothers, that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make atonement for the sins of the people. ¹⁸For in that he himself has suffered being tempted, he is able to help those who are tempted.

^2:13Now when they had departed, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream, saying, “Arise and take the young child and his mother, and flee into Egypt, and stay there until I tell you, for Herod will seek the young child to destroy him.” ¹⁴He arose and took the young child and his mother by night and departed into Egypt, ¹⁵and was there until the death of Herod, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, saying, “Out of Egypt I called my son.”

¹⁶Then Herod, when he saw that he was mocked by the wise men, was exceedingly angry, and sent out and killed all the male children who were in Bethlehem and in all the surrounding countryside, from two years old and under, according to the exact time which he had learned from the wise men. ¹⁷Then that which was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled, saying, ¹⁸“A voice was heard in Ramah, lamentation, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children; she wouldn’t be comforted, because they are no more.”

¹⁹But when Herod was dead, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt, saying, ²⁰“Arise and take the young child and his mother, and go into the land of Israel, for those who sought the young child’s life are dead.” ²¹He arose and took the young child and his mother, and came into the land of Israel. ²²But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning over Judea in the place of his father, Herod, he was afraid to go there. Being warned in a dream, he withdrew into the region of Galilee, ²³and came and lived in a city called Nazareth; that it might be fulfilled which was spoken through the prophets that he will be called a Nazarene.