keeping a clear conscience, so that those who slander you may be put to shame by your good behavior in Christ.

In fact, you even put up with anyone who enslaves you or exploits you or takes advantage of you or exalts himself or strikes you in the face.

Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man has great power to prevail.

For the choirmaster. Of David. In the LORD I take refuge. How then can you say to me: “Flee like a bird to your mountain! For behold, the wicked bend their bows. They set their arrow on the string to shoot from the shadows at the upright in heart. If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?” The LORD is in His holy temple; the LORD is on His heavenly throne. His eyes are watching closely; they examine the sons of men. The LORD tests the righteous and the wicked; His soul hates the lover of violence. . . .

But to the cowardly and unbelieving and abominable and murderers and sexually immoral and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars, their place will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur. This is the second death.”

Brothers, if someone is caught in a trespass, you who are spiritual should restore him with a spirit of gentleness. But watch yourself, or you also may be tempted.

Then Jesus spoke to the crowds and to His disciples: “The scribes and Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat. So practice and observe everything they tell you. But do not do what they do, for they do not practice what they preach.

Who has believed our message? And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed? He grew up before Him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of dry ground. He had no stately form or majesty to attract us, no beauty that we should desire Him. He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief. Like one from whom men hide their faces, He was despised, and we esteemed Him not. Surely He took on our infirmities and carried our sorrows; yet we considered Him stricken by God, struck down and afflicted. But He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed. . . .

Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You pay tithes of mint, dill, and cumin. But you have disregarded the weightier matters of the law: justice, mercy, and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former. You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel.

Among you are slanderous men bent on bloodshed; within you are those who eat on the mountain shrines and commit acts of indecency.

You have not strengthened the weak, healed the sick, bound up the injured, brought back the strays, or searched for the lost. Instead, you have ruled them with violence and cruelty.

So Jesus declared, “The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them, and those in authority over them call themselves benefactors.

Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the kingdom of heaven in men’s faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let in those who wish to enter.

Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You traverse land and sea to win a single convert, and when he becomes one, you make him twice as much a son of hell as you are.

Because of this, I am sending you prophets and wise men and teachers. Some of them you will kill and crucify, and others you will flog in your synagogues and persecute in town after town.

I have written to the church about this, but Diotrephes, who loves to be first, will not accept our instruction. So if I come, I will call attention to his malicious slander against us. And unsatisfied with that, he refuses to welcome the brothers and forbids those who want to do so, even putting them out of the church.

Jesus answered, “You would have no authority over Me if it were not given to you from above. Therefore the one who handed Me over to you is guilty of greater sin.”

be heard by You from heaven, Your dwelling place. And may You forgive and repay each man according to all his ways, since You know his heart—for You alone know the hearts of men—

The Lord is not slow in keeping His promise as some understand slowness, but is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish but everyone to come to repentance.

but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; for in the day that you eat of it, you will surely die.”

When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices so they could go and anoint the body of Jesus. Very early on the first day of the week, just after sunrise, they went to the tomb. They were asking one another, “Who will roll away the stone from the entrance of the tomb?” But when they looked up, they saw that the stone had been rolled away, even though it was extremely large. When they entered the tomb, they saw a young man dressed in a white robe sitting on the right side, and they were alarmed. . . .

“Watch out!” Jesus told them. “Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees.”

They love the places of honor at banquets, the chief seats in the synagogues, the greetings in the marketplaces, and the title of ‘Rabbi’ by which they are addressed.

Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me.

For such men are false apostles, deceitful workers, masquerading as apostles of Christ.

All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for instruction, for conviction, for correction, and for training in righteousness,

They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.

The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.

I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them in as well, and they will listen to My voice. Then there will be one flock and one shepherd.

Then they understood that He was not telling them to beware of the leaven used in bread, but of the teaching of the Pharisees and Sadducees.

Then Jesus spoke to the crowds and to His disciples: “The scribes and Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat.

Who, existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Now then, why do you test God by placing on the necks of the disciples a yoke that neither we nor our fathers have been able to bear?

Then the word of the LORD came to me, saying, “Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel. Prophesy and tell them that this is what the Lord GOD says: ‘Woe to the shepherds of Israel, who only feed themselves! Should not the shepherds feed their flock? You eat the fat, wear the wool, and butcher the fattened sheep, but you do not feed the flock. You have not strengthened the weak, healed the sick, bound up the injured, brought back the strays, or searched for the lost. Instead, you have ruled them with violence and cruelty. They were scattered for lack of a shepherd, and when they were scattered they became food for all the wild beasts. . . .

Those who want to make a good impression outwardly are trying to compel you to be circumcised. They only do this to avoid persecution for the cross of Christ. For the circumcised do not even keep the law themselves, yet they want you to be circumcised that they may boast in your flesh.

But you shall not be like them. Instead, the greatest among you should be like the youngest, and the one who leads like the one who serves.

So practice and observe everything they tell you. But do not do what they do, for they do not practice what they preach.

But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, who are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come forth for Me One to be ruler over Israel—One whose origins are of old, from the days of eternity.

This is the revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him to show His servants what must soon come to pass. He made it known by sending His angel to His servant John,