Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead,
I press on toward the goal to win the prize of God’s heavenly calling in Christ Jesus.
Be doers of the word, and not hearers only. Otherwise, you are deceiving yourselves.
For anyone who hears the word but does not carry it out is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror,
and after observing himself goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like.
But the one who looks intently into the perfect law of freedom, and continues to do so—not being a forgetful hearer, but an effective doer—he will be blessed in what he does.
No longer will each man teach his neighbor or his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ because they will all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the LORD. For I will forgive their iniquities and will remember their sins no more.”
“Do not call to mind the former things; pay no attention to the things of old.
Behold, I am about to do something new; even now it is coming. Do you not see it? Indeed, I will make a way in the wilderness and streams in the desert.
I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.
Therefore I urge you, brothers, on account of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.
Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what is the good, pleasing, and perfect will of God.
Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.
Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, outcry and slander, along with every form of malice.
Be kind and tenderhearted to one another, forgiving each other just as in Christ God forgave you.
Now when the people saw that Moses was delayed in coming down from the mountain, they gathered around Aaron and said, “Come, make us gods who will go before us. As for this Moses who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has happened to him!”
So Aaron told them, “Take off the gold earrings that are on your wives and sons and daughters, and bring them to me.”
Then all the people took off their gold earrings and brought them to Aaron.
He took the gold from their hands, and with an engraving tool he fashioned it into a molten calf. And they said, “These, O Israel, are your gods, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!”
When Aaron saw this, he built an altar before the calf and proclaimed: “Tomorrow shall be a feast to the LORD.”
. . .
“Come now, let us reason together,” says the LORD. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they will be as white as snow; though they are as red as crimson, they will become like wool.
Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off every encumbrance and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with endurance the race set out for us.
Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
Of David. Bless the LORD, O my soul; all that is within me, bless His holy name.
Bless the LORD, O my soul, and do not forget all His kind deeds—
He who forgives all your iniquities and heals all your diseases,
who redeems your life from the Pit and crowns you with loving devotion and compassion,
who satisfies you with good things, so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.
. . .
For when Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and he was not wholeheartedly devoted to the LORD his God, as his father David had been.
Solomon followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians and Milcom the abomination of the Ammonites.
So Solomon did evil in the sight of the LORD; unlike his father David, he did not follow the LORD completely.
But He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is perfected in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly in my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest on me.
That is why, for the sake of Christ, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
Be careful that you do not forget the covenant of the LORD your God that He made with you; do not make an idol for yourselves in the form of anything He has forbidden you.
Only be on your guard and diligently watch yourselves, so that you do not forget the things your eyes have seen, and so that they do not slip from your heart as long as you live. Teach them to your children and grandchildren.
When you eat and are satisfied, you are to bless the LORD your God for the good land that He has given you.
Be careful not to forget the LORD your God by failing to keep His commandments and ordinances and statutes, which I am giving you this day.
Otherwise, when you eat and are satisfied, when you build fine houses in which to dwell,
and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold increase and all that you have is multiplied,
then your heart will become proud, and you will forget the LORD your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.
If you ever forget the LORD your God and go after other gods to worship and bow down to them, I testify against you today that you will surely perish.
Like the nations that the LORD has destroyed before you, so you will perish if you do not obey the LORD your God.
“I, even I, am He who comforts you. Why should you be afraid of mortal man, of a son of man who withers like grass?
But you have forgotten the LORD, your Maker, who stretched out the heavens and laid the foundations of the earth. You live in terror all day long because of the fury of the oppressor who is bent on destruction. But where is the fury of the oppressor?
And as soon as Gideon was dead, the Israelites turned and prostituted themselves with the Baals, and they set up Baal-berith as their god.
The Israelites failed to remember the LORD their God who had delivered them from the hands of all their enemies on every side.
For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.
But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive yours.
Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.
Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead,
I press on toward the goal to win the prize of God’s heavenly calling in Christ Jesus.
For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is His loving devotion for those who fear Him.
As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us.
For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor principalities, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers,
neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.
It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no account of wrongs.
Love takes no pleasure in evil, but rejoices in the truth.
It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
As the time drew near for David to die, he charged his son Solomon,
“I am about to go the way of all the earth. So be strong and prove yourself a man.
And keep the charge of the LORD your God to walk in His ways and to keep His statutes, commandments, ordinances, and decrees, as is written in the Law of Moses, so that you may prosper in all you do and wherever you turn,
and so that the LORD may fulfill His promise to me: ‘If your descendants take heed to walk faithfully before Me with all their heart and soul, you will never fail to have a man on the throne of Israel.’
But they would not listen, and they stiffened their necks like their fathers, who did not believe the LORD their God.
They rejected His statutes and the covenant He had made with their fathers, as well as the decrees He had given them. They pursued worthless idols and themselves became worthless, going after the surrounding nations that the LORD had commanded them not to imitate.
They abandoned all the commandments of the LORD their God and made for themselves two cast idols of calves and an Asherah pole. They bowed down to all the host of heaven and served Baal.
They sacrificed their sons and daughters in the fire and practiced divination and soothsaying. They devoted themselves to doing evil in the sight of the LORD, provoking Him to anger.
All this happened because the people of Israel had sinned against the LORD their God, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt from under the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt. They had worshiped other gods
and walked in the customs of the nations that the LORD had driven out before the Israelites, as well as in the practices introduced by the kings of Israel.
The Israelites secretly did things against the LORD their God that were not right. From watchtower to fortified city, they built high places in all their cities.
They set up for themselves sacred pillars and Asherah poles on every high hill and under every green tree.
They burned incense on all the high places like the nations that the LORD had driven out before them. They did wicked things, provoking the LORD to anger.
. . .
When the LORD your God cuts off before you the nations you are entering to dispossess, and you drive them out and live in their land,
be careful not to be ensnared by their ways after they have been destroyed before you. Do not inquire about their gods, asking, “How do these nations serve their gods? I will do likewise.”
You must not worship the LORD your God in this way, because they practice for their gods every abomination which the LORD hates. They even burn their sons and daughters in the fire as sacrifices to their gods.
When you enter the land that the LORD your God is giving you, do not imitate the detestable ways of the nations there.
Let no one be found among you who sacrifices his son or daughter in the fire, practices divination or conjury, interprets omens, practices sorcery,
casts spells, consults a medium or spiritist, or inquires of the dead.
For whoever does these things is detestable to the LORD. And because of these detestable things, the LORD your God is driving out the nations before you.
You must be blameless before the LORD your God.
And when the LORD your God brings you into the land He swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, that He would give you—a land with great and splendid cities that you did not build,
with houses full of every good thing with which you did not fill them, with wells that you did not dig, and with vineyards and olive groves that you did not plant—and when you eat and are satisfied,
be careful not to forget the LORD who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.
Do not follow other gods, the gods of the peoples around you.
For the LORD your God, who is among you, is a jealous God. Otherwise the anger of the LORD your God will be kindled against you, and He will wipe you off the face of the earth.
And the LORD said to me, “Get up and go down from here at once, for your people, whom you brought out of Egypt, have corrupted themselves. How quickly they have turned aside from the way that I commanded them! They have made for themselves a molten image.”
The LORD also said to me, “I have seen this people, and they are indeed a stiff-necked people.
Remember this, and never forget how you provoked the LORD your God in the wilderness. From the day you left the land of Egypt until you reached this place, you have been rebelling against the LORD.
At Horeb you provoked the LORD, and He was angry enough to destroy you.
When the LORD first spoke through Hosea, He told him, “Go, take a prostitute as your wife and have children of adultery, because this land is flagrantly prostituting itself by departing from the LORD.”
Hear the word of the LORD, O children of Israel, for the LORD has a case against the people of the land: “There is no truth, no loving devotion, and no knowledge of God in the land!
Cursing and lying, murder and stealing, and adultery are rampant; one act of bloodshed follows another.
Therefore the land mourns, and all who dwell in it will waste away with the beasts of the field and the birds of the air; even the fish of the sea disappear.
They will eat but not be satisfied; they will be promiscuous but not multiply. For they have stopped obeying the LORD.
Promiscuity, wine, and new wine take away understanding.
My people consult their wooden idols, and their divining rods inform them. For a spirit of prostitution leads them astray and they have played the harlot against their God.
They sacrifice on the mountaintops and burn offerings on the hills, under oak, poplar, and terebinth, because their shade is pleasant. And so your daughters turn to prostitution and your daughters-in-law to adultery.
Listen, O heavens, and give ear, O earth, for the LORD has spoken: “I have raised children and brought them up, but they have rebelled against Me.
The ox knows its owner, and the donkey its master’s manger, but Israel does not know; My people do not understand.”
I, yes I, am He who blots out your transgressions for My own sake and remembers your sins no more.
Remind Me, let us argue the matter together. State your case, so that you may be vindicated.
Seek the LORD while He may be found; call on Him while He is near.
Let the wicked man forsake his own way and the unrighteous man his own thoughts; let him return to the LORD, that He may have compassion, and to our God, for He will freely pardon.
“For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways,” declares the LORD.
But you who forsake the LORD, who forget My holy mountain, who set a table for Fortune and fill bowls of mixed wine for Destiny,
I will destine you for the sword, and you will all kneel down to be slaughtered, because I called and you did not answer, I spoke and you did not listen; you did evil in My sight and chose that in which I did not delight.”
For anyone who hears the word but does not carry it out is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror,
and after observing himself goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like.
But the one who looks intently into the perfect law of freedom, and continues to do so—not being a forgetful hearer, but an effective doer—he will be blessed in what he does.
Then I said, ‘How I long to make you My sons and give you a desirable land, the most beautiful inheritance of all the nations!’ I thought you would call Me ‘Father’ and never turn away from following Me.
But as a woman may betray her husband, so you have betrayed Me, O house of Israel,” declares the LORD.
A voice is heard on the barren heights, the children of Israel weeping and begging for mercy, because they have perverted their ways and forgotten the LORD their God.
Now in the days of King Josiah, the LORD said to me, “Have you seen what faithless Israel has done? She has gone up on every high hill and under every green tree to prostitute herself there.
I thought that after she had done all these things, she would return to Me. But she did not return, and her unfaithful sister Judah saw it.
She saw that because faithless Israel had committed adultery, I gave her a certificate of divorce and sent her away. Yet that unfaithful sister Judah had no fear and prostituted herself as well.
Indifferent to her own infidelity, Israel had defiled the land and committed adultery with stones and trees.
Yet in spite of all this, her unfaithful sister Judah did not return to Me with all her heart, but only in pretense,” declares the LORD.
For when I brought your fathers out of the land of Egypt, I did not merely command them about burnt offerings and sacrifices,
but this is what I commanded them: Obey Me, and I will be your God, and you will be My people. You must walk in all the ways I have commanded you, so that it may go well with you.
Yet they did not listen or incline their ear, but they followed the stubborn inclinations of their own evil hearts. They went backward and not forward.
From the day your fathers came out of the land of Egypt until this day, I have sent you all My servants the prophets again and again.
Yet they would not listen to Me or incline their ear, but they stiffened their necks and did more evil than their fathers.
Does papyrus grow where there is no marsh? Do reeds flourish without water?
While the shoots are still uncut, they dry up quicker than grass.
Such is the destiny of all who forget God; so the hope of the godless will perish.
Truly, truly, I tell you, whoever hears My word and believes Him who sent Me has eternal life and will not come under judgment. Indeed, he has crossed over from death to life.
Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes?
Look at the birds of the air: They do not sow or reap or gather into barns—and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?
Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?
And why do you worry about clothes? Consider how the lilies of the field grow: They do not labor or spin.
Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his glory was adorned like one of these.
. . .
Who is a God like You, who pardons iniquity and passes over the transgression of the remnant of His inheritance—who does not retain His anger forever, because He delights in loving devotion?
He will again have compassion on us; He will vanquish our iniquities. You will cast out all our sins into the depths of the sea.
At Horeb they made a calf and worshiped a molten image.
They exchanged their Glory for the image of a grass-eating ox.
They forgot God their Savior, who did great things in Egypt,
wondrous works in the land of Ham, and awesome deeds by the Red Sea.
For the choirmaster. A Psalm of David. When Nathan the prophet came to him after his adultery with Bathsheba. Have mercy on me, O God, according to Your loving devotion; according to Your great compassion, blot out my transgressions.
Wash me clean of my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.
For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me.
Against You, You only, have I sinned and done what is evil in Your sight, so that You may be proved right when You speak and blameless when You judge.
Surely I was brought forth in iniquity; I was sinful when my mother conceived me.
. . .
How often they disobeyed Him in the wilderness and grieved Him in the desert!
Again and again they tested God and provoked the Holy One of Israel.
They did not remember His power—the day He redeemed them from the adversary,
when He performed His signs in Egypt and His wonders in the fields of Zoan.
For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that everyone who believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.
For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him.
This is a trustworthy saying: If anyone aspires to be an overseer, he desires a noble task.
An overseer, then, must be above reproach, the husband of but one wife, temperate, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach,
not dependent on wine, not violent but gentle, peaceable, and free of the love of money.
An overseer must manage his own household well and keep his children under control, with complete dignity.
For if someone does not know how to manage his own household, how can he care for the church of God?
. . .
This is the revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him to show His servants what must soon come to pass. He made it known by sending His angel to His servant John,
This is the revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him to show His servants what must soon come to pass. He made it known by sending His angel to His servant John,
who testifies to everything he saw. This is the word of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ.
Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear and obey what is written in it, because the time is near.
John, To the seven churches in the province of Asia: Grace and peace to you from Him who is and was and is to come, and from the seven Spirits before His throne,
and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth. To Him who loves us and has released us from our sins by His blood,
. . .
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