transforming your heart

²⁶And I will give to you a new heart, and I will place in you a new spirit. And I will take away the heart of stone from your body, and I will give to you a heart of flesh.

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

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. ³For I say, through the grace that has been given to me, to all who are among you: Taste no more than it is necessary to taste, but taste unto sobriety and just as God has distributed a share of the faith to each one. ⁴For just as, within one body, we have many parts, though all the parts do not have the same role, ⁵so also we, being many, are one body in Christ, and each one is a part, the one of the other. ⁶And we each have different gifts, according to the grace that has been given to us: whether prophecy, in agreement with the reasonableness of faith;

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.

¹²Create a clean heart in me, O God. And renew an upright spirit within my inmost being.

¹²For the Word of God is living and effective: more piercing than any two-edged sword, reaching to the division even between the soul and the spirit, even between the joints and the marrow, and so it discerns the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

¹⁸May the eyes of your heart be illuminated, so that you may know what is the hope of his calling, and the wealth of the glory of his inheritance with the saints,

¹Therefore, set aside all malice and all deceitfulness, as well as falseness and envy and every detraction. ²Like newborn infants, desire the milk of reasonableness without guile, so that by this you may increase unto salvation, ³if it is true that you have tasted that the Lord is sweet. ⁴And approaching him as if he were a living stone, rejected by men, certainly, but elect and honored by God, ⁵be also yourselves like living stones, built upon him, a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, so as to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. ⁶Because of this, Scripture asserts: “Behold, I am setting in Zion a chief cornerstone, elect, precious. And whoever will have believed in him will not be confounded.”

⁶I am confident of this very thing: that he who has begun this good work in you will perfect it, unto the day of Christ Jesus.

⁸Be sober and vigilant. For your adversary, the devil, is like a roaring lion, traveling around and seeking those whom he might devour.

⁵Have confidence in the Lord with all your heart, and do not depend upon your own prudence.

²³Preserve your heart with all watchfulness, for life proceeds from this.

¹Most beloved, do not be willing to believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see if they are of God. For many false prophets have gone out into the world.

¹In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and God was the Word. ²He was with God in the beginning. ³All things were made through Him, and nothing that was made was made without Him. ⁴Life was in Him, and Life was the light of men. ⁵And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. ⁶There was a man sent by God, whose name was John.