You are the salt of the earth. But if salt loses its taste, what can be done to make it salty once again? It is no longer good for anything, and thus it is cast out and trampled underfoot.
But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that the fact that you are fasting will not be obvious to others but only to your Father who is hidden. And your Father who sees everything that is done in secret will reward you.
He has made everything suitable for its time, and he has given men a sense of past and future, but they never have the slightest comprehension of what God has wrought from beginning to end.
If you refuse to listen to me and do not sincerely resolve to give glory to my name, says the Lord of hosts, I will send a curse on you, and I will turn your blessings into a curse. Indeed, I have already done so because you have not heeded my warning.
Amen, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be lifted up and thrown into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says will happen, it will be accomplished for him.
And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and the scrolls were opened. Then another scroll was opened, the book of life, and the dead were judged according to their deeds, as were recorded in the scrolls. The sea gave up all the dead who were in it, and Death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them. The dead were judged according to their deeds.
For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall also be united with him in his resurrection. We know that our old self was crucified with him, so that our sinful body might be destroyed and we might no longer be enslaved to sin.
Amen, amen, I say to you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do, and indeed will do even greater ones than these, because I am going to the Father.
All this took place in order to fulfill what the Lord had announced through the prophet: “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and give birth to a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel,” a name that means “God is with us.”
The Lord commanded us to observe all of these statutes and to fear the Lord, our God, so that we might always prosper and be kept alive, even as we are today.
For it is by grace that you have been saved through faith. This has not come from you but from the gift of God. It does not come from works, so that no one can boast.
Therefore, brethren, I implore you by the mercies of God to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice that is holy and acceptable to God—a spiritual act of worship.