kissing before marriage

²⁸But I say to you, that anyone who will have looked at a woman, so as to lust after her, has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

¹⁶So then, I say: Walk in the spirit, and you will not fulfill the desires of the flesh.

⁴May marriage be honorable in every way, and may the marriage bed be immaculate. For God will judge fornicators and adulterers.

¹⁸Flee from fornication. Every sin whatsoever that a man commits is outside of the body, but whoever fornicates, sins against his own body.

⁸So those who are in the flesh are not able to please God.

¹⁹Now the works of the flesh are manifest; they are: fornication, lust, homosexuality, self-indulgence,

²⁶For if we sin willingly, after receiving knowledge of the truth, there is no sacrifice remaining for sins,

¹⁰When Jacob had seen her, and he realized that she was his maternal first cousin, and that these were the sheep of his uncle Laban, he removed the stone which closed the well. ¹¹And having watered the flock, he kissed her. And lifting up his voice, he wept. ¹²And he revealed to her that he was a brother of her father, and the son of Rebekah. And so, hurrying, she announced it to her father.

³But let not any kind of fornication, or impurity, or rapacity so much as be named among you, just as is worthy of the saints,

¹If I were to speak in the language of men, or of Angels, yet not have charity, I would be like a clanging bell or a crashing cymbal. ²And if I have prophecy, and learn every mystery, and obtain all knowledge, and possess all faith, so that I could move mountains, yet not have charity, then I am nothing. ³And if I distribute all my goods in order to feed the poor, and if I hand over my body to be burned, yet not have charity, it offers me nothing. 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.

¹But accept those who are weak in faith, without disputing about ideas. ²For one person believes that he may eat all things, but if another is weak, let him eat plants. ³He who eats should not despise him who does not eat. And he who does not eat should not judge him who eats. For God has accepted him. ⁴Who are you to judge the servant of another? He stands or falls by his own Lord. But he shall stand. For God is able to make him stand. ⁵For one person discerns one age from the next. But another discerns unto every age. Let each one increase according to his own mind. ⁶He who understands the age, understands for the Lord. And he who eats, eats for the Lord; for he gives thanks to God. And he who does not eat, does not eat for the Lord, and he gives thanks to God.

¹⁹Or do you not know that your bodies are the Temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own?

¹Now concerning the things about which you wrote to me: It is good for a man not to touch a woman. ²But, because of fornication, let each man have his own wife, and let each woman have her own husband. ³A husband should fulfill his obligation to his wife, and a wife should also act similarly toward her husband.

⁶And so, now they are not two, but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, let no man separate.”

²with old women, like mothers; with young women, in all chastity, like sisters.

¹⁷All that is iniquity is sin. But there is a sin unto death.

²²So then, flee from the desires of your youth, yet truly, pursue justice, faith, hope, charity, and peace, along with those who call upon the Lord from a pure heart.

¹I reached an agreement with my eyes, that I would not so much as think about a virgin.

²But his will is with the law of the Lord, and he will meditate on his law, day and night.

⁸A time of love, and a time of hatred. A time of war, and a time of peace.

³And you have patient endurance for the sake of my name, and you have not fallen away. ⁴But I have this against you: that you have relinquished your first charity. ⁵And so, call to mind the place from which you have fallen, and do penance, and do the first works. Otherwise, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place, unless you repent. ⁶But this you have, that you hate the deeds of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate. ⁷Whoever has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the Churches. To him who prevails, I will give to eat from the Tree of Life, which is in the Paradise of my God. ⁸And to the Angel of the Church of Smyrna write: Thus says the First and the Last, he who was dead and now lives:

¹Stand firm, and do not be willing to be again held by the yoke of servitude. ²Behold, I, Paul, say to you, that if you have been circumcised, Christ will be of no benefit to you. ³For I again testify, about every man circumcising himself, that he is obligated to act according to the entire law. ⁴You are being emptied of Christ, you who are being justified by the law. You have fallen from grace. ⁵For in spirit, by faith, we await the hope of justice. ⁶For in Christ Jesus, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision prevails over anything, but only faith which works through charity.