| For this is the message which you have heard from the beginning, that we are to love one another. | This is the message you have heard from the beginning: We should love one another. |
| Now if your right eye is causing you to sin, tear it out and throw it away from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. | So if your eye—even your good eye—causes you to lust, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. |
| These you may eat of everything that is in the water: anything that has fins and scales you may eat, but anything that does not have fins and scales, you shall not eat; it is unclean for you. | Of all the marine animals, you may eat whatever has both fins and scales. You may not, however, eat marine animals that do not have both fins and scales. They are ceremonially unclean for you. |
| At night my soul longs for You, Indeed, my spirit within me seeks You diligently; For when the earth experiences Your judgments, The inhabitants of the world learn righteousness. | In the night I search for you; in the morning I earnestly seek you. For only when you come to judge the earth will people learn what is right. |
| For you are all sons and daughters of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. | For you are all children of God through faith in Christ Jesus. And all who have been united with Christ in baptism have put on Christ, like putting on new clothes. |
| And He has said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.” Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. | Each time he said, “My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness.” So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me. |
| For You created my innermost parts; You wove me in my mother’s womb. I will give thanks to You, because I am awesomely and wonderfully made; Wonderful are Your works, And my soul knows it very well. | You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb. Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it. |
| Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been bought for a price: therefore glorify God in your body. | Don’t you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself, for God bought you with a high price. So you must honor God with your body. |
| So remove sorrow from your heart and keep pain away from your body, because childhood and the prime of life are fleeting. | So refuse to worry, and keep your body healthy. But remember that youth, with a whole life before you, is meaningless. |
| For by their own sword they did not possess the land, And their own arm did not save them, But Your right hand and Your arm and the light of Your presence, For You favored them. | They did not conquer the land with their swords; it was not their own strong arm that gave them victory. It was your right hand and strong arm and the blinding light from your face that helped them, for you loved them. |
| But if we hope for what we do not see, through perseverance we wait eagerly for it. | But if we look forward to something we don’t yet have, we must wait patiently and confidently. |
| If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. | So we are lying if we say we have fellowship with God but go on living in spiritual darkness; we are not practicing the truth. |
| But speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, that is, Christ. | Instead, we will speak the truth in love, growing in every way more and more like Christ, who is the head of his body, the church. |
| Therefore you have no excuse, you foolish person, everyone of you who passes judgment; for in that matter in which you judge someone else, you condemn yourself; for you who judge practice the same things. | You may think you can condemn such people, but you are just as bad, and you have no excuse! When you say they are wicked and should be punished, you are condemning yourself, for you who judge others do these very same things. |
| For today in the city of David there has been born for you a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. | The Savior—yes, the Messiah, the Lord—has been born today in Bethlehem, the city of David! |
| Here is what I have seen to be good and fitting: to eat, to drink, and enjoy oneself in all one’s labor in which he labors under the sun during the few years of his life which God has given him; for this is his reward. | Even so, I have noticed one thing, at least, that is good. It is good for people to eat, drink, and enjoy their work under the sun during the short life God has given them, and to accept their lot in life. |
| For you have been born again not of seed which is perishable, but imperishable, that is, through the living and enduring word of God. | For you have been born again, but not to a life that will quickly end. Your new life will last forever because it comes from the eternal, living word of God. |
| Knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. | For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. |
| For just as we have many parts in one body and all the body’s parts do not have the same function, so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually parts of one another. | Just as our bodies have many parts and each part has a special function, so it is with Christ’s body. We are many parts of one body, and we all belong to each other. |
| Do not worry about your life, as to what you are to eat; nor for your body, as to what you are to wear. For life is more than food, and the body is more than clothing. | That is why I tell you not to worry about everyday life—whether you have enough food to eat or enough clothes to wear. For life is more than food, and your body more than clothing. |
| The statement is trustworthy: For if we died with Him, we will also live with Him. | This is a trustworthy saying: If we die with him, we will also live with him. |
| “Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, so that there may be food in My house, and put Me to the test now in this,” says the Lord of armies, “if I do not open for you the windows of heaven and pour out for you a blessing until it overflows.” | “Bring all the tithes into the storehouse so there will be enough food in my Temple. If you do,” says the Lord of Heaven’s Armies, “I will open the windows of heaven for you. I will pour out a blessing so great you won’t have enough room to take it in! Try it! Put me to the test!” |
| And as for you, the anointing which you received from Him remains in you, and you have no need for anyone to teach you; but as His anointing teaches you about all things, and is true and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you remain in Him. | But you have received the Holy Spirit, and he lives within you, so you don’t need anyone to teach you what is true. For the Spirit teaches you everything you need to know, and what he teaches is true—it is not a lie. So just as he has taught you, remain in fellowship with Christ. |
| As for you, see that what you heard from the beginning remains in you. If what you heard from the beginning remains in you, you also will remain in the Son and in the Father. | So you must remain faithful to what you have been taught from the beginning. If you do, you will remain in fellowship with the Son and with the Father. |
| For we have become partakers of Christ if we keep the beginning of our commitment firm until the end. | For if we are faithful to the end, trusting God just as firmly as when we first believed, we will share in all that belongs to Christ. |
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