forgetting the past

¹³Brothers, I do not consider that I have already attained this. Instead, I do one thing: forgetting those things that are behind, and extending myself toward those things that are ahead,

¹⁸You need not call to mind the past, nor consider the things of antiquity. ¹⁹Behold, I am accomplishing new things. And presently, they will spring forth. With certainty, you will know them. I will make a way in the desert, and rivers in an impassible place.

¹³Brothers, I do not consider that I have already attained this. Instead, I do one thing: forgetting those things that are behind, and extending myself toward those things that are ahead, ¹⁴I pursue the destination, the prize of the heavenly calling of God in Christ Jesus.

¹⁷So if anyone is a new creature in Christ, what is old has passed away. Behold, all things have been made new.

³¹Let all bitterness and anger and indignation and outcry and blasphemy be taken away from you, along with all malice. ³²And be kind and merciful to one another, forgiving one another, just as God has forgiven you in Christ.

²⁵I am. I am the very One who wipes away your iniquities for my own sake. And I will not remember your sins.

⁹If we confess our sins, then he is faithful and just, so as to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all iniquity.

²⁵And so I say to you, do not be anxious about your life, as to what you will eat, nor about your body, as to what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? ²⁶Consider the birds of the air, how they neither sow, nor reap, nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of much greater value than they are? ²⁷And which of you, by thinking, is able to add one cubit to his stature? ²⁸And as for clothing, why are you anxious? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither work nor weave. ²⁹But I say to you, that not even Solomon, in all his glory, was arrayed like one of these. ³⁰So if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is here today, and cast into the oven tomorrow, how much more will he care for you, O little in faith?

¹Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, who are not walking according to the flesh.

²⁰I live; yet now, it is not I, but truly Christ, who lives in me. And though I live now in the flesh, I live in the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and who delivered himself for me.

⁹And he said to me: “My grace is sufficient for you. For virtue is perfected in weakness.” And so, willingly shall I glory in my weaknesses, so that the virtue of Christ may live within me. ¹⁰Because of this, I am pleased in my infirmity: in reproaches, in difficulties, in persecutions, in distresses, for the sake of Christ. For when I am weak, then I am powerful.

⁴Charity is patient, is kind. Charity does not envy, does not act wrongly, is not inflated. ⁵Charity is not ambitious, does not seek for itself, is not provoked to anger, devises no evil. ⁶Charity does not rejoice over iniquity, but rejoices in truth. ⁷Charity suffers all, believes all, hopes all, endures all.

⁶²Jesus said to him, “No one who puts his hand to the plow, and then looks back, is fit for the kingdom of God.”

¹Furthermore, since we also have so great a cloud of witnesses over us, let us set aside every burden and sin which may surround us, and advance, through patience, to the struggle offered to us. ²Let us gaze upon Jesus, as the Author and the completion of our faith, who, having joy laid out before him, endured the cross, disregarding the shame, and who now sits at the right hand of the throne of God.

¹And so, I beg you, brothers, by the mercy of God, that you offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God, with the subservience of your mind. ²And do not choose to be conformed to this age, but instead choose to be reformed in the newness of your mind, so that you may demonstrate what is the will of God: what is good, and what is well-pleasing, and what is perfect.