He said to them, “Then are you also without understanding? Do you not realize that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile him, since it enters not into the heart but into the stomach and is discharged into the sewer?” Thus, he pronounced all foods clean.
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the Church and gave himself up for her in order to sanctify her by cleansing her with water and the word.
Have mercy on me, O God, in accord with your kindness; in your abundant compassion wipe away my offenses. Wash me completely from my guilt, and cleanse me from my sin.
Since we have these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from anything that can defile flesh or spirit, and thereby make our holiness perfect in the fear of God.
However, if we live in the light as he himself is in the light, then we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son purifies us from all sin.
How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from acts that lead to death so that we may worship the living God.
This water prefigured Baptism, which now saves you. It does so not by the washing away of dirt from the body but by the pledge of a good conscience given to God through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Do everything without grumbling or arguing, so that you may show yourselves blameless and beyond reproach, children of God without spot in the midst of an evil and depraved generation, among which you shine like lights in the world as you hold fast tenaciously to the word of life.
He is the reflection of God’s glory and the perfect expression of his very being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. Achieving purification from sins, he took his seat at the right hand of the Majesty on high.
Therefore, let us leave behind the basic teaching about Christ and advance toward maturity. We must not be forever laying the foundation: repentance for actions that lead to death, faith in God, instruction about baptisms and the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment.