For: “If anyone wishes to love life and to experience good days, he must restrain his tongue from evil and his lips from deceitful speech. He must turn away from evil and do good, seek peace and pursue it.”
Indeed, the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any two-edged sword, it pierces to the point where it divides soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and the intentions of the heart.
For so has the Lord commanded us to do, saying, ‘I have made you a light for the Gentiles so that you may bring salvation to the farthest corners of the earth.’
For all have sinned and thereby are deprived of the glory of God, and all are justified by the gift of his grace that is given freely through the redemption in Christ Jesus.
Do not be concerned about your life and what you will have to eat, or about your body and what you will wear. For life is more than food, and the body is more than clothing.
May the God of peace—who brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant— make you perfect in every respect so that you may do his will. And may he enable us to achieve what is pleasing to him through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.
Commit your way to the Lord; place your trust in him, and he will act. He will make your righteousness shine like the dawn, and the justice of your cause, like the noonday.
Thereupon the Lord restored the prosperity of Job after he had prayed for his friends, and he enriched him with twice as much as he had possessed before.
Rather, revere Christ as Lord in your hearts. Always be prepared to offer an explanation to anyone who asks you to justify the hope that is in you. However, do so with gentleness and respect.
I understand that man’s greatest happiness is to be glad and do well throughout his life. And when we eat and drink and find satisfaction in all our labors, this is a gift of God.
But God is rich in his mercy, and because he had such great love for us, he brought us to life with Christ when we were already dead through sin—it is by grace that you have been saved.
Do not be conformed to the world, but be transformed by the renewal of your minds, so that you will be able to discern the will of God and to know what is good and acceptable and perfect.