Thursday, February 12, 2032

^4:7Be subject therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. ⁸Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners. Purify your hearts, you double-minded. ⁹Lament, mourn, and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. ¹⁰Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he will exalt you. ¹¹Don’t speak against one another, brothers. He who speaks against a brother and judges his brother, speaks against the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge.

¹²Only one is the lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy. But who are you to judge another? ¹³Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow let’s go into this city and spend a year there, trade, and make a profit.” ¹⁴Yet you don’t know what your life will be like tomorrow. For what is your life? For you are a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. ¹⁵For you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will both live, and do this or that.”

¹⁶But now you glory in your boasting. All such boasting is evil. ¹⁷To him therefore who knows to do good and doesn’t do it, to him it is sin. ^5:1Come now, you rich, weep and howl for your miseries that are coming on you. ²Your riches are corrupted and your garments are moth-eaten. ³Your gold and your silver are corroded, and their corrosion will be for a testimony against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have laid up your treasure in the last days. ⁴Behold, the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you have kept back by fraud, cry out; and the cries of those who reaped have entered into the ears of the Lord of Armies.

⁵You have lived in luxury on the earth, and taken your pleasure. You have nourished your hearts as in a day of slaughter. ⁶You have condemned and you have murdered the righteous one. He doesn’t resist you. ⁷Be patient therefore, brothers, until the coming of the Lord. Behold, the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient over it, until it receives the early and late rain. ⁸You also be patient. Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand. ⁹Don’t grumble, brothers, against one another, so that you won’t be judged. Behold, the judge stands at the door.

^11:27They came again to Jerusalem, and as he was walking in the temple, the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders came to him, ²⁸and they began saying to him, “By what authority do you do these things? Or who gave you this authority to do these things?” ²⁹Jesus said to them, “I will ask you one question. Answer me, and I will tell you by what authority I do these things. ³⁰The baptism of John—was it from heaven, or from men? Answer me.” ³¹They reasoned with themselves, saying, “If we should say, ‘From heaven;’ he will say, ‘Why then did you not believe him?’

³²If we should say, ‘From men’”—they feared the people, for all held John to really be a prophet. ³³They answered Jesus, “We don’t know.” Jesus said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.”

^1:8Behold, God has delivered the land before you; go in and inherit the land, which I sware to your fathers, Abraam, and Isaac, and Jacob, to give it to them and to their seed after them. ⁹And I spoke to you at that time, saying, I shall not be able by myself to bear you. ¹⁰The Lord your God has multiplied you, and, behold, ye are to-day as the stars of heaven for multitude. ¹¹The Lord God of your fathers add to you a thousand-fold more than you are, and bless you as he has spoken to you.

¹⁵So I took of you wise and understanding and prudent men, and I set them to rule over you as rulers of thousands, and rulers of hundreds, and rulers of fifties, and rulers of tens, and officers to your judges. ¹⁶And I charged your judges at that time, saying, Hear causes between your brethren, and judge rightly between a man and his brother, and the stranger that is with him. ¹⁷Thou shalt not have respect to persons in judgment, thou shalt judge small and great equally; thou shalt not shrink from before the person of a man, for the judgment is God's; and whatsoever matter shall be too hard for you, ye shall bring it to me, and I will hear it.

^10:14Behold, the heaven and the heaven of heavens belong to the Lord thy God, the earth and all things that are in it. ¹⁵Only the Lord chose your fathers to love them, and he chose out their seed after them, even you, beyond all nations, as at this day. ¹⁶Therefore ye shall circumcise the hardness of your heart, and ye shall not harden your neck. ¹⁷For the Lord your God, he is God of gods, and Lord of lords, the great, and strong, and terrible God, who does not accept persons, nor will he by any means accept a bribe: ¹⁸executing judgment for the stranger and orphan and widow, and he loves the stranger to give him food and raiment.

¹⁹And ye shall love the stranger; for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt. ²⁰Thou shalt fear the Lord thy God, and serve him, and shalt cleave to him, and shalt swear by his name. ²¹He is thy boast, and he is thy God, who has wrought in the midst of thee these great and glorious things, which thine eyes have seen.

^10:9I am the door. If anyone enters in by me, he will be saved, and will go in and go out and will find pasture. ¹⁰The thief only comes to steal, kill, and destroy. I came that they may have life, and may have it abundantly. ¹¹“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. ¹²He who is a hired hand, and not a shepherd, who doesn’t own the sheep, sees the wolf coming, leaves the sheep, and flees. The wolf snatches the sheep and scatters them.

¹³The hired hand flees because he is a hired hand and doesn’t care for the sheep. ¹⁴I am the good shepherd. I know my own, and I’m known by my own; ¹⁵even as the Father knows me, and I know the Father. I lay down my life for the sheep. ¹⁶I have other sheep which are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will hear my voice. They will become one flock with one shepherd.

^4:7Be subject therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. ⁸Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners. Purify your hearts, you double-minded. ⁹Lament, mourn, and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. ¹⁰Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he will exalt you. ¹¹Don’t speak against one another, brothers. He who speaks against a brother and judges his brother, speaks against the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge.

¹²Only one is the lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy. But who are you to judge another? ¹³Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow let’s go into this city and spend a year there, trade, and make a profit.” ¹⁴Yet you don’t know what your life will be like tomorrow. For what is your life? For you are a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. ¹⁵For you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will both live, and do this or that.”

¹⁶But now you glory in your boasting. All such boasting is evil. ¹⁷To him therefore who knows to do good and doesn’t do it, to him it is sin. ^5:1Come now, you rich, weep and howl for your miseries that are coming on you. ²Your riches are corrupted and your garments are moth-eaten. ³Your gold and your silver are corroded, and their corrosion will be for a testimony against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have laid up your treasure in the last days. ⁴Behold, the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you have kept back by fraud, cry out; and the cries of those who reaped have entered into the ears of the Lord of Armies.

⁵You have lived in luxury on the earth, and taken your pleasure. You have nourished your hearts as in a day of slaughter. ⁶You have condemned and you have murdered the righteous one. He doesn’t resist you. ⁷Be patient therefore, brothers, until the coming of the Lord. Behold, the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient over it, until it receives the early and late rain. ⁸You also be patient. Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand. ⁹Don’t grumble, brothers, against one another, so that you won’t be judged. Behold, the judge stands at the door.

^13:7Remember your leaders, men who spoke to you the word of God, and considering the results of their conduct, imitate their faith. ⁸Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. ⁹Don’t be carried away by various and strange teachings, for it is good that the heart be established by grace, not by foods, through which those who were so occupied were not benefited. ¹⁰We have an altar from which those who serve the holy tabernacle have no right to eat. ¹¹For the bodies of those animals, whose blood is brought into the holy place by the high priest as an offering for sin, are burned outside of the camp.

¹²Therefore Jesus also, that he might sanctify the people through his own blood, suffered outside of the gate. ¹³Let’s therefore go out to him outside of the camp, bearing his reproach. ¹⁴For we don’t have here an enduring city, but we seek that which is to come. ¹⁵Through him, then, let’s offer up a sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of lips which proclaim allegiance to his name. ¹⁶But don’t forget to be doing good and sharing, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.

^11:27They came again to Jerusalem, and as he was walking in the temple, the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders came to him, ²⁸and they began saying to him, “By what authority do you do these things? Or who gave you this authority to do these things?” ²⁹Jesus said to them, “I will ask you one question. Answer me, and I will tell you by what authority I do these things. ³⁰The baptism of John—was it from heaven, or from men? Answer me.” ³¹They reasoned with themselves, saying, “If we should say, ‘From heaven;’ he will say, ‘Why then did you not believe him?’

³²If we should say, ‘From men’”—they feared the people, for all held John to really be a prophet. ³³They answered Jesus, “We don’t know.” Jesus said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.”

^5:14“You are the light of the world. A city located on a hill can’t be hidden. ¹⁵Neither do you light a lamp and put it under a measuring basket, but on a stand; and it shines to all who are in the house. ¹⁶Even so, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven. ¹⁷“Don’t think that I came to destroy the law or the prophets. I didn’t come to destroy, but to fulfill. ¹⁸For most certainly, I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not even one smallest letter or one tiny pen stroke shall in any way pass away from the law, until all things are accomplished.

¹⁹Therefore, whoever shall break one of these least commandments and teach others to do so, shall be called least in the Kingdom of Heaven; but whoever shall do and teach them shall be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven.