As the body without the spirit is dead,
so faith without works is dead also.
Not everyone who says … , “Lord, Lord,” shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. § Pursue … holiness, without which no one will see the Lord. § Add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love. For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For he who lacks these things is shortsighted, even to blindness, and has forgotten that he was cleansed from his old sins. Therefore, brethren, be even more diligent to make your call and election sure, for if you do these things you will never stumble.
By grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.
James 2:26; Matt. 7:21; Heb. 12:14; 2 Peter 1:5–10; Eph. 2:8–9
As the children have partaken of
flesh and blood, He Himself likewise
shared in the same, that … He might …
release those who through fear of
death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.
O Death, where is your sting? O Hades, where is your victory?” … Thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. § Therefore we do not lose heart. Even though our outward man is perishing, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day.
We know that if our earthly house, this tent, is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens … So we are always confident, knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord … We are … well pleased rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord.
Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.
Heb. 2:14–15; 1 Cor. 15:55, 57;
2 Cor. 4:16; 5:1, 6, 8; John 14:1–2
To clarify their choice, Pilate asked the mob a question that has reverberated through the centuries, “What shall I do, then, with Jesus who is called Christ?” They demanded with one voice, “Crucify him!”
Whom do you know who is rejecting Jesus today? Whoever those people are, regardless of the vehemence of their words, or the hardness of their hearts there is still hope.
Because some of the very men who had rejected Jesus on the Friday morning of His crucifixion did repent of their sins and receive His forgiveness and salvation! This astounding turnabout took place fifty days after the rioting mob screamed its rejection of Jesus. In the very place where Jesus had been condemned by the religious leaders, Peter preached a sermon to a crowd of thousands at the Feast of Pentecost. Three thousand people responded with deep contrition to Peter’s powerful proclamation of the truth. They repented of their sins and claimed Jesus Christ as their own Savior and Lord, receiving His forgiveness.
The glory which You gave Me I have given them.
I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lifted up, and the train of His robe filled the temple. Above it stood seraphim … And one cried to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory!” § These things Isaiah said when he saw His glory and spoke of Him. § On the likeness of the throne was a likeness … of a man high above it … Like the appearance of a rainbow in a cloud on a rainy day, so was the appearance of the brightness all around it. This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord.
“Please, show me Your glory.” But He said, “You cannot see My face; for no man shall see Me, and live.” § No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him. § God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
John 17:22; Isa. 6:1–3; John 12:41;
Ezek. 1:26, 28; Ex. 33:18, 20; John 1:18; 2 Cor. 4:6
My son, if sinners entice you, do not consent.
She took of its fruit and ate. She also gave to her husband with her, and he ate. § Did not Achan the son of Zerah commit a trespass in the accursed thing, and wrath fell on all the congregation of Israel? And that man did not perish alone in his iniquity.
You shall not follow a crowd to do evil.
Wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it.
None of us lives to himself. § You, brethren, have been called to liberty; only do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. § Beware lest somehow this liberty of yours become a stumbling block to those who are weak … When you thus sin against the brethren, and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ.
All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned, every one, to his own way; and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.
Prov. 1:10; Gen. 3:6; Josh. 22:20; Ex. 23:2;
Matt. 7:13; Rom. 14:7; Gal. 5:13; 1 Cor. 8:9, 12; Isa. 53:6
The emaciated bodies, the pale faces, the pain-deadened eyes, the hollow cheeks all gave silent witness to the helplessness and hopelessness of the diseased and disfigured and dying who lay, crumpled and sprawled, like discarded refuse on the terrace that led to the water’s edge. As the eyes of God scanned the mass of misery, He saw “a great number of disabled people . . . the blind, the lame, the paralyzed,” (John 5:3, NIV). Each pitiful sufferer focused all attention on the water’s surface, desperately pinning his or her hope on being the first to spot the bubbling movement and the first to react by jumping-or falling-into the pool. Each was totally preoccupied with his or her own disability-blindness or lameness or paralysis.
The multitude of the miserable were all focused on the pool, on the water, on the place, on a traditional source of help, even as God Himself stood in their midst! Where is your focus?
The Lord delights in you.
Thus says the Lord, who created you … “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by your name; you are Mine.” § Can a woman forget her nursing child, and not have compassion on the son of her womb? Surely they may forget, yet I will not forget you. See, I have inscribed you on the palms of My hands; your walls are continually before Me.
The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord, and He delights in his way. § My delight was with the sons of men. § The Lord takes pleasure in those who fear Him, in those who hope in His mercy. § “They shall be Mine,” says the Lord of hosts, “on the day that I make them My jewels. And I will spare them as a man spares his own son who serves him.”
You, who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy, and blameless, and above reproach in His sight.
Isa. 62:4; 43:1; 49:15–16; Ps. 37:23;
Prov. 8:31; Ps. 147:11; Mal. 3:17; Col. 1:21–22
The sorrow of the world produces death.
When Ahithophel saw that his advice was not followed, he saddled a donkey, and arose and went home to his house, to his city. Then he put his household in order, and hanged himself, and died. § Who can bear a broken spirit?
Is there no balm in Gilead, is there no physician there? Why then is there no recovery for the health of the daughter of my people? § The Lord has anointed Me to preach good tidings to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, … to comfort all who mourn, to console those who mourn in Zion, to give them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness. § Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.
Philip … preached Jesus to him. § He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.
2 Cor. 7:10; 2 Sam. 17:23; Prov. 18:14; Jer. 8:22;
Isa. 61:1–3; Matt. 11:28–30; Acts 8:35; Ps. 147:3
