Be imitators of God, therefore, as beloved children,

Beloved, do not imitate what is evil, but what is good. The one who does good is of God; the one who does evil has not seen God.

You are to imitate me, just as I imitate Christ.

“Now if you faithfully obey the voice of the LORD your God and are careful to follow all His commandments I am giving you today, the LORD your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth. And all these blessings will come upon you and overtake you, if you will obey the voice of the LORD your God: You will be blessed in the city and blessed in the country. The fruit of your womb will be blessed, as well as the produce of your land and the offspring of your livestock—the calves of your herds and the lambs of your flocks. Your basket and kneading bowl will be blessed. . . .

Have no fellowship with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them.

If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.

No one can serve two masters: Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.

As it is written: “God’s name is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you.”

“Everything is permissible,” but not everything is beneficial. “Everything is permissible,” but not everything is edifying.

So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all to the glory of God.

Do not be deceived: “Bad company corrupts good character.”

He answered, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’ and ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”

Be indebted to no one, except to one another in love. For he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law. The commandments “Do not commit adultery,” “Do not murder,” “Do not steal,” “Do not covet,” and any other commandments, are summed up in this one decree: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no wrong to its neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.

“Everything is permissible for me,” but not everything is beneficial. “Everything is permissible for me,” but I will not be mastered by anything.

Flee from youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, together with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart.

And God spoke all these words: “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before Me. You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in the heavens above, on the earth below, or in the waters beneath. You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on their children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, . . .

The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity, and debauchery; idolatry and sorcery; hatred, discord, jealousy, and rage; rivalries, divisions, factions, and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

Like a muddied spring or a polluted well is a righteous man who gives way to the wicked.

Nevertheless, God’s firm foundation stands, bearing this seal: “The Lord knows those who are His,” and, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord must turn away from iniquity.”

Because you did not serve the LORD your God with joy and gladness of heart in all your abundance, you will serve your enemies the LORD will send against you in famine, thirst, nakedness, and destitution. He will place an iron yoke on your neck until He has destroyed you.

and do not give the devil a foothold.

Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, for God has said: “Never will I leave you, never will I forsake you.”

But if anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it would be better for him to have a large millstone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.

Now the Spirit expressly states that in later times some will abandon the faith to follow deceitful spirits and the teachings of demons,

For the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. By craving it, some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many sorrows.

Now Joab son of Zeruiah perceived that the king’s heart longed for Absalom. So Joab sent to Tekoa to bring a wise woman from there. He told her, “Please pretend to be a mourner; put on clothes for mourning and do not anoint yourself with oil. Act like a woman who has mourned for the dead a long time. Then go to the king and speak these words to him.” And Joab put the words in her mouth. When the woman from Tekoa went to the king, she fell facedown in homage and said, “Help me, O king!” “What troubles you?” the king asked her. “Indeed,” she said, “I am a widow, for my husband is dead. . . .

But understand this: In the last days terrible times will come. For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, without love of good, traitorous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying its power. Turn away from such as these! . . .

All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for instruction, for conviction, for correction, and for training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be complete, fully equipped for every good work.

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. “Honor your father and mother” (which is the first commandment with a promise), “that it may go well with you and that you may have a long life on the earth.” Fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath; instead, bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

for man’s anger does not bring about the righteousness that God desires.

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this world’s darkness, and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.

Do not be deceived: God is not to be mocked. Whatever a man sows, he will reap in return.

Now if any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him.

“You must not make idols for yourselves or set up a carved image or sacred pillar; you must not place a sculpted stone in your land to bow down to it. For I am the LORD your God. You must keep My Sabbaths and have reverence for My sanctuary. I am the LORD. If you follow My statutes and carefully keep My commandments, I will give you rains in their season, and the land will yield its produce, and the trees of the field will bear their fruit. Your threshing will continue until the grape harvest, and the grape harvest will continue until sowing time; you will have your fill of food to eat and will dwell securely in your land. . . .

For this reason God gave them over to dishonorable passions. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. Likewise, the men abandoned natural relations with women and burned with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.

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.

So then, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do likewise will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever practices and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.