Genesis 18:18–23

⁸And the scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith, preached before the gospel unto Abraham, saying, In thee shall all nations be blessed.

⁴And I will make thy seed to multiply as the stars of heaven, and will give unto thy seed all these countries; and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed;

¹⁴That the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.

²And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing:

³And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.

¹⁷That in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven, and as the sand which is upon the sea shore; and thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies;

¹⁸And in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; because thou hast obeyed my voice.

²⁵Ye are the children of the prophets, and of the covenant which God made with our fathers, saying unto Abraham, And in thy seed shall all the kindreds of the earth be blessed.

²⁶Unto you first God, having raised up his Son Jesus, sent him to bless you, in turning away every one of you from his iniquities.

³Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ:

¹⁷His name shall endure for ever: his name shall be continued as long as the sun: and men shall be blessed in him: all nations shall call him blessed.

⁴One that ruleth well his own house, having his children in subjection with all gravity;

⁵(For if a man know not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church of God?)

⁶And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart:

⁷And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.

⁹Only take heed to thyself, and keep thy soul diligently, lest thou forget the things which thine eyes have seen, and lest they depart from thy heart all the days of thy life: but teach them thy sons, and thy sons’ sons;

¹⁰Specially the day that thou stoodest before the Lord thy God in Horeb, when the Lord said unto me, Gather me the people together, and I will make them hear my words, that they may learn to fear me all the days that they shall live upon the earth, and that they may teach their children.

⁴And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.

¹⁵And that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.

²⁰¶ My son, keep thy father’s commandment, and forsake not the law of thy mother:

²¹Bind them continually upon thine heart, and tie them about thy neck.

²²When thou goest, it shall lead thee; when thou sleepest, it shall keep thee; and when thou awakest, it shall talk with thee.

⁴⁶And he said unto them, Set your hearts unto all the words which I testify among you this day, which ye shall command your children to observe to do, all the words of this law.

⁹¶ And thou, Solomon my son, know thou the God of thy father, and serve him with a perfect heart and with a willing mind: for the Lord searcheth all hearts, and understandeth all the imaginations of the thoughts: if thou seek him, he will be found of thee; but if thou forsake him, he will cast thee off for ever.

¹²Let the deacons be the husbands of one wife, ruling their children and their own houses well.

¹⁹Nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure, having this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are his. And, Let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity.

¹⁹And ye shall teach them your children, speaking of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.

²⁰And thou shalt write them upon the door posts of thine house, and upon thy gates:

²¹That your days may be multiplied, and the days of your children, in the land which the Lord sware unto your fathers to give them, as the days of heaven upon the earth.

⁶Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.

¹⁵The eyes of the Lord are upon the righteous, and his ears are open unto their cry.

¹⁵And if it seem evil unto you to serve the Lord, choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.

⁴The Lord is in his holy temple, the Lord’s throne is in heaven: his eyes behold, his eyelids try, the children of men.

²I will open my mouth in a parable: I will utter dark sayings of old:

³Which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us.

⁴We will not hide them from their children, shewing to the generation to come the praises of the Lord, and his strength, and his wonderful works that he hath done.

⁵For he established a testimony in Jacob, and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers, that they should make them known to their children:

⁶That the generation to come might know them, even the children which should be born; who should arise and declare them to their children:

⁷That they might set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments:

⁸And might not be as their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation; a generation that set not their heart aright, and whose spirit was not stedfast with God.

⁹The children of Ephraim, being armed, and carrying bows, turned back in the day of battle.

⁵And it was so, when the days of their feasting were gone about, that Job sent and sanctified them, and rose up early in the morning, and offered burnt offerings according to the number of them all: for Job said, It may be that my sons have sinned, and cursed God in their hearts. Thus did Job continually.

¹⁴I am the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine.

³⁰Wherefore the Lord God of Israel saith, I said indeed that thy house, and the house of thy father, should walk before me for ever: but now the Lord saith, Be it far from me; for them that honour me I will honour, and they that despise me shall be lightly esteemed.

³¹Behold, the days come, that I will cut off thine arm, and the arm of thy father’s house, that there shall not be an old man in thine house.

⁵When I call to remembrance the unfeigned faith that is in thee, which dwelt first in thy grandmother Lois, and thy mother Eunice; and I am persuaded that in thee also.

¹⁹The living, the living, he shall praise thee, as I do this day: the father to the children shall make known thy truth.

⁶For the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous: but the way of the ungodly shall perish.

²⁰And what can David say more unto thee? for thou, Lord God, knowest thy servant.

³¹Paul said to the centurion and to the soldiers, Except these abide in the ship, ye cannot be saved.

²You only have I known of all the families of the earth: therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities.

¹⁷He saith unto him the third time, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me? Peter was grieved because he said unto him the third time, Lovest thou me? And he said unto him, Lord, thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee. Jesus saith unto him, Feed my sheep.

²³For there stood by me this night the angel of God, whose I am, and whom I serve,

²⁴Saying, Fear not, Paul; thou must be brought before Cæsar: and, lo, God hath given thee all them that sail with thee.

²³¶ And Abraham took Ishmael his son, and all that were born in his house, and all that were bought with his money, every male among the men of Abraham’s house; and circumcised the flesh of their foreskin in the selfsame day, as God had said unto him.

²⁴And Abraham was ninety years old and nine, when he was circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin.

²⁵And Ishmael his son was thirteen years old, when he was circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin.

²⁶In the selfsame day was Abraham circumcised, and Ishmael his son.

²⁷And all the men of his house, born in the house, and bought with money of the stranger, were circumcised with him.

¹³For we will destroy this place, because the cry of them is waxen great before the face of the Lord; and the Lord hath sent us to destroy it.

⁴⁹Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom, pride, fulness of bread, and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters, neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy.

⁵⁰And they were haughty, and committed abomination before me: therefore I took them away as I saw good.

⁹¶ The shew of their countenance doth witness against them; and they declare their sin as Sodom, they hide it not. Woe unto their soul! for they have rewarded evil unto themselves.

¹³But the men of Sodom were wicked and sinners before the Lord exceedingly.

¹⁰And he said, What hast thou done? the voice of thy brother’s blood crieth unto me from the ground.

⁴Behold, the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth.

⁷For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah his pleasant plant: and he looked for judgment, but behold oppression; for righteousness, but behold a cry.

⁷¶ O Lord, though our iniquities testify against us, do thou it for thy name’s sake: for our backslidings are many; we have sinned against thee.

⁸And I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land unto a good land and a large, unto a land flowing with milk and honey; unto the place of the Canaanites, and the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites.

⁵And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded.

²²The Lord God of gods, the Lord God of gods, he knoweth, and Israel he shall know; if it be in rebellion, or if in transgression against the Lord, (save us not this day,)

³Thou shalt not hearken unto the words of that prophet, or that dreamer of dreams: for the Lord your God proveth you, to know whether ye love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul.

²And thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, and to prove thee, to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldest keep his commandments, or no.

⁵For the Lord had said unto Moses, Say unto the children of Israel, Ye are a stiffnecked people: I will come up into the midst of thee in a moment, and consume thee: therefore now put off thy ornaments from thee, that I may know what to do unto thee.

⁷Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech.

¹⁰I the Lord search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings.

¹⁵And he said unto them, Ye are they which justify yourselves before men; but God knoweth your hearts: for that which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God.

³For, behold, the Lord cometh forth out of his place, and will come down, and tread upon the high places of the earth.

¹O LORD, thou hast searched me, and known me.

²Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising, thou understandest my thought afar off.

³Thou compassest my path and my lying down, and art acquainted with all my ways.

⁴For there is not a word in my tongue, but, lo, O Lord, thou knowest it altogether.

⁵Thou hast beset me behind and before, and laid thine hand upon me.

⁶Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain unto it.

⁷Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence?

⁸If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there.

⁹If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea;

¹⁰Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me.

¹¹If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me.

¹²Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to thee.

¹³For thou hast possessed my reins: thou hast covered me in my mother’s womb.

¹⁴I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvellous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well.

¹⁵My substance was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth.

¹⁶Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them.

¹⁷How precious also are thy thoughts unto me, O God! how great is the sum of them!

¹⁸If I should count them, they are more in number than the sand: when I awake, I am still with thee.

¹⁹Surely thou wilt slay the wicked, O God: depart from me therefore, ye bloody men.

²⁰For they speak against thee wickedly, and thine enemies take thy name in vain.

²¹Do not I hate them, O Lord, that hate thee? and am not I grieved with those that rise up against thee?

²²I hate them with perfect hatred: I count them mine enemies.

²³Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts:

²⁴And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

¹²And it shall come to pass at that time, that I will search Jerusalem with candles, and punish the men that are settled on their lees: that say in their heart, The Lord will not do good, neither will he do evil.

¹⁶For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:

¹¹Wherefore? because I love you not? God knoweth.

¹³Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do.

¹THE sin of Judah is written with a pen of iron, and with the point of a diamond: it is graven upon the table of their heart, and upon the horns of your altars;

²²There is no darkness, nor shadow of death, where the workers of iniquity may hide themselves.

³⁸For I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me.

⁸Thou hast set our iniquities before thee, our secret sins in the light of thy countenance.

¹AND there came two angels to Sodom at even; and Lot sat in the gate of Sodom: and Lot seeing them rose up to meet them; and he bowed himself with his face toward the ground;

¹I EXHORT therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men;

⁵⁵But he, being full of the Holy Ghost, looked up stedfastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the right hand of God,

³⁰And I sought for a man among them, that should make up the hedge, and stand in the gap before me for the land, that I should not destroy it: but I found none.

²⁰Shall evil be recompensed for good? for they have digged a pit for my soul. Remember that I stood before thee to speak good for them, and to turn away thy wrath from them.

²³Therefore he said that he would destroy them, had not Moses his chosen stood before him in the breach, to turn away his wrath, lest he should destroy them.

¹AND the Lord appeared unto him in the plains of Mamre: and he sat in the tent door in the heat of the day;

²And he lift up his eyes and looked, and, lo, three men stood by him: and when he saw them, he ran to meet them from the tent door, and bowed himself toward the ground,

¹THEN said the Lord unto me, Though Moses and Samuel stood before me, yet my mind could not be toward this people: cast them out of my sight, and let them go forth.

¹⁶¶ And the men rose up from thence, and looked toward Sodom: and Abraham went with them to bring them on the way.

²²And they fell upon their faces, and said, O God, the God of the spirits of all flesh, shall one man sin, and wilt thou be wroth with all the congregation?

¹⁷And David spake unto the Lord when he saw the angel that smote the people, and said, Lo, I have sinned, and I have done wickedly: but these sheep, what have they done? let thine hand, I pray thee, be against me, and against my father’s house.

⁴But Abimelech had not come near her: and he said, Lord, wilt thou slay also a righteous nation?

²⁵That be far from thee to do after this manner, to slay the righteous with the wicked: and that the righteous should be as the wicked, that be far from thee: Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?

²²Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water.

¹⁷Shall even he that hateth right govern? and wilt thou condemn him that is most just?

⁴The Lord is in his holy temple, the Lord’s throne is in heaven: his eyes behold, his eyelids try, the children of men.

⁵The Lord trieth the righteous: but the wicked and him that loveth violence his soul hateth.

⁶Upon the wicked he shall rain snares, fire and brimstone, and an horrible tempest: this shall be the portion of their cup.

⁷For the righteous Lord loveth righteousness; his countenance doth behold the upright.

⁵But if our unrighteousness commend the righteousness of God, what shall we say? Is God unrighteous who taketh vengeance? (I speak as a man)

⁶God forbid: for then how shall God judge the world?

²¹And their nobles shall be of themselves, and their governor shall proceed from the midst of them; and I will cause him to draw near, and he shall approach unto me: for who is this that engaged his heart to approach unto me? saith the Lord.

³Doth God pervert judgment? or doth the Almighty pervert justice?

²⁸But it is good for me to draw near to God: I have put my trust in the Lord God, that I may declare all thy works.

¹⁷Elias was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain: and it rained not on the earth by the space of three years and six months.