ramadan

¹⁶For God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son, so that all who believe in him may not perish, but may have eternal life. ¹⁷For God did not send his Son into the world, in order to judge the world, but in order that the world may be saved through him.

⁶And so, be humbled under the powerful hand of God, so that he may exalt you in the time of visitation. ⁷Cast all your cares upon him, for he takes care of you. ⁸Be sober and vigilant. For your adversary, the devil, is like a roaring lion, traveling around and seeking those whom he might devour. ⁹Resist him by being strong in faith, being aware that the same passions afflict those who are your brothers in the world. ¹⁰But the God of all grace, who has called us to his eternal glory in Christ Jesus, will himself perfect, confirm, and establish us, after a brief time of suffering.

¹⁶And when you fast, do not choose to become gloomy, like the hypocrites. For they alter their faces, so that their fasting may be apparent to men. Amen I say to you, that they have received their reward. ¹⁷But as for you, when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, ¹⁸so that your fasting will not be apparent to men, but to your Father, who is in secret. And your Father, who sees in secret, will repay you.

³⁰I am not able to do anything of myself. As I hear, so do I judge. And my judgment is just. For I do not seek my own will, but the will of him who sent me.

¹Cry out! Cease not! Exalt your voice like a trumpet, and announce to my people their wicked acts, and to the house of Jacob their sins. ²For they also seek me, from day to day, and they are willing to know my ways, like a nation which has done justice and has not abandoned the judgment of their God. They petition me for judgments of justice. They are willing to draw near to God. ³“Why have we fasted, and you have not taken notice? Why have we humbled our souls, and you have not acknowledged it?” Behold, in the day of your fasting, your own will is found, and you petition for payment from all your debtors. ⁴Behold, you fast with strife and contention, and you strike with the fist impiously. Do not choose to fast as you have done even to this day. Then your outcry will be heard on high. ⁵Is this a fast such as I have chosen: for a man to afflict his soul for a day, to contort his head in a circle, and to spread sackcloth and ashes? Should you call this a fast and a day acceptable to the Lord? ⁶Is not this, instead, the kind of fast that I have chosen? Release the constraints of impiety; relieve the burdens that oppress; freely forgive those who are broken; and break apart every burden.

⁶Jesus said to him: “I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father, except through me.

¹In the first year of Darius, the son of Ahasuerus, of the offspring of the Medes, who ruled over the kingdom of the Chaldeans, ²in year one of his reign, I, Daniel, understood in the books the number of the years, concerning the word of the Lord which came to Jeremiah, the prophet, that the desolation of Jerusalem would be completed in seventy years. ³And I set my face to the Lord, my God, to ask and make supplication with fasting, and sackcloth, and ashes. ⁴And I prayed to the Lord, my God, and I confessed, and I said, “I beg you, O Lord God, great and terrible, preserving the covenant and mercy for those who love you and keep your commandments. ⁵We have sinned, we have committed iniquity, we acted impiously and have withdrawn, and we have turned aside from your commandments as well as your judgments. ⁶We have not obeyed your servants, the prophets, who have spoken in your name to our kings, our leaders, our fathers, and all the people of the land.

⁵⁸Jesus said to them, “Amen, amen, I say to you, before Abraham was made, I am.”

⁷Behold, he arrives with the clouds, and every eye shall see him, even those who pierced him. And all the tribes of the earth shall lament for themselves over him. Even so. Amen. ⁸“I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End,” says the Lord God, who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty. ⁹I, John, your brother, and a sharer in the tribulation and in the kingdom and in patient endurance for Christ Jesus, was on the island which is called Patmos, because of the Word of God and the testimony to Jesus. ¹⁰I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and I heard behind me a great voice, like that of a trumpet, ¹¹saying, “What you see, write in a book, and send it to the seven Churches, which are in Asia: to Ephesus, and to Smyrna, and to Pergamus, and to Thyatira, and to Sardis, and to Philadelphia, and to Laodicea.” ¹²And I turned around, so as to see the voice which was speaking with me. And having turned around, I saw seven golden lampstands.

¹The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave to him, in order to make known to his servants the things that must soon occur, and which he signified by sending his Angel to his servant John;

⁶And we have all become like the unclean. And all our justices are like a rag of menstruation. And we have all fallen away, like a leaf. And our iniquities have carried us away, like the wind.