Now finish the work, so that you may complete it just as eagerly as you began, according to your means.

And this is my opinion about what is helpful for you in this matter: Last year you were the first not only to give, but even to have such a desire. Now finish the work, so that you may complete it just as eagerly as you began, according to your means. For if the eagerness is there, the gift is acceptable according to what one has, not according to what he does not have.

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off every encumbrance and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with endurance the race set out for us.

I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.

Allow perseverance to finish its work, so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.

Jesus explained, “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me and to finish His work.

being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.

But Jesus replied, “Go tell that fox, ‘Look, I will keep driving out demons and healing people today and tomorrow, and on the third day I will reach My goal.’

And now, O LORD my God, You have made Your servant king in my father David’s place. But I am only a little child, not knowing how to go out or come in.

And not only did they do as we expected, but they gave themselves first to the Lord and then to us, because it was the will of God. So we urged Titus to help complete your act of grace, just as he had started it.

But I consider my life of no value to me, if only I may finish my course and complete the ministry I have received from the Lord Jesus—the ministry of testifying to the good news of God’s grace.

The taskmasters kept pressing them, saying, “Fulfill your quota each day, just as you did when straw was provided.”

But I have testimony more substantial than that of John. For the works that the Father has given Me to accomplish—the very works I am doing—testify about Me that the Father has sent Me.

Which of you, wishing to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost to see if he has the resources to complete it? Otherwise, if he lays the foundation and is unable to finish the work, everyone who sees it will ridicule him, saying, ‘This man could not finish what he started to build.’

Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.

The reason I left you in Crete was that you would set in order what was unfinished and appoint elders in every town, as I directed you.

“The hands of Zerubbabel have laid the foundation of this house, and his hands will complete it. Then you will know that the LORD of Hosts has sent me to you.

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

Are you so foolish? After starting in the Spirit, are you now finishing in the flesh?

I am the gate. If anyone enters through Me, he will be saved. He will come in and go out and find pasture.

After the death of Ahab, Moab rebelled against Israel. Now Ahaziah had fallen through the lattice of his upper room in Samaria and injured himself. So he sent messengers and instructed them: “Go inquire of Baal-zebub, the god of Ekron, whether I will recover from this injury.” But the angel of the LORD said to Elijah the Tishbite, “Go up to meet the messengers of the king of Samaria and ask them, ‘Is it because there is no God in Israel that you are on your way to inquire of Baal-zebub, the god of Ekron?’ Therefore this is what the LORD says: ‘You will not get up from the bed on which you are lying. You will surely die.’” So Elijah departed. When the messengers returned to the king, he asked them, “Why have you returned?” . . .

He writes this way in all his letters, speaking in them about such matters. Some parts of his letters are hard to understand, which ignorant and unstable people distort, as they do the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction.

After the death of Saul, David returned from the slaughter of the Amalekites and stayed in Ziklag two days. On the third day a man with torn clothes and dust on his head arrived from Saul’s camp. When he came to David, he fell to the ground to pay him homage. “Where have you come from?” David asked. “I have escaped from the Israelite camp,” he replied. “What was the outcome?” David asked. “Please tell me.” “The troops fled from the battle,” he replied. “Many of them fell and died. And Saul and his son Jonathan are also dead.” Then David asked the young man who had brought him the report, “How do you know that Saul and his son Jonathan are dead?” . . .

Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy, To the church of the Thessalonians in God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ: Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. We are obligated to thank God for you all the time, brothers, as is fitting, because your faith is growing more and more, and your love for one another is increasing. That is why we boast among God’s churches about your perseverance and faith in the face of all the persecution and affliction you are enduring. All this is clear evidence of God’s righteous judgment. And so you will be counted worthy of the kingdom of God, for which you are suffering. . . .

Now in the church at Antioch there were prophets and teachers: Barnabas, Simeon called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen (who had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch), and Saul. While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, “Set apart for Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.” And after they had fasted and prayed, they laid their hands on them and sent them off. So Barnabas and Saul, sent forth by the Holy Spirit, went down to Seleucia and sailed from there to Cyprus. When they arrived at Salamis, they proclaimed the word of God in the Jewish synagogues. And John was with them as their helper. . . .

Then some men came down from Judea and were teaching the brothers, “Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved.” And after engaging these men in sharp debate, Paul and Barnabas were appointed, along with some other believers, to go up to Jerusalem to see the apostles and elders about this question. Sent on their way by the church, they passed through Phoenicia and Samaria, recounting the conversion of the Gentiles and bringing great joy to all the brothers. On their arrival in Jerusalem, they were welcomed by the church and apostles and elders, to whom they reported all that God had done through them. But some believers from the party of the Pharisees stood up and declared, “The Gentiles must be circumcised and required to obey the law of Moses.” . . .

Now the Bereans were more noble-minded than the Thessalonians, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if these teachings were true.

Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother, To the saints and faithful brothers in Christ at Colossae: Grace and peace to you from God our Father. We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, because we have heard about your faith in Christ Jesus and your love for all the saints— the faith and love proceeding from the hope stored up for you in heaven, of which you have already heard in the word of truth, the gospel . . .

Just as man is appointed to die once, and after that to face judgment,

James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, To the twelve tribes of the Dispersion: Greetings. Consider it pure joy, my brothers, when you encounter trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Allow perseverance to finish its work, so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. 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. . . .

For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that everyone who believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.

The Law and the Prophets were proclaimed until John. Since that time, the gospel of the kingdom of God is being preached, and everyone is forcing his way into it.

Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, so also death was passed on to all men, because all sinned.

In the days when the judges ruled, there was a famine in the land. And a certain man from Bethlehem in Judah, with his wife and two sons, went to reside in the land of Moab. The man’s name was Elimelech, his wife’s name was Naomi, and the names of his two sons were Mahlon and Chilion. They were Ephrathites from Bethlehem in Judah, and they entered the land of Moab and settled there. Then Naomi’s husband Elimelech died, and she was left with her two sons, who took Moabite women as their wives, one named Orpah and the other named Ruth. And after they had lived in Moab about ten years, both Mahlon and Chilion also died, and Naomi was left without her two sons and without her husband. . . .