Proverbs 24:9–11

¹⁹For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies:

⁵Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ;

⁷Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.

²²Repent therefore of this thy wickedness, and pray God, if perhaps the thought of thine heart may be forgiven thee.

⁸Scornful men bring a city into a snare: but wise men turn away wrath.

⁴And Jesus knowing their thoughts said, Wherefore think ye evil in your hearts?

⁸He that deviseth to do evil shall be called a mischievous person.

⁵¶ And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

¹⁴O Jerusalem, wash thine heart from wickedness, that thou mayest be saved. How long shall thy vain thoughts lodge within thee?

²⁸But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.

¹⁰Cast out the scorner, and contention shall go out; yea, strife and reproach shall cease.

²¹And the Lord smelled a sweet savour; and the Lord said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man’s sake; for the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as I have done.

⁷For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he: Eat and drink, saith he to thee; but his heart is not with thee.

¹¹³I hate vain thoughts: but thy law do I love.

²⁸¶ Hast thou not known? hast thou not heard, that the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary? there is no searching of his understanding.

²⁹He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might he increaseth strength.

³⁰Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall:

³¹But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.

¹³Wherefore I desire that ye faint not at my tribulations for you, which is your glory.

⁴⁶And lest your heart faint, and ye fear for the rumour that shall be heard in the land; a rumour shall both come one year, and after that in another year shall come a rumour, and violence in the land, ruler against ruler.

¹AND David said in his heart, I shall now perish one day by the hand of Saul: there is nothing better for me than that I should speedily escape into the land of the Philistines; and Saul shall despair of me, to seek me any more in any coast of Israel: so shall I escape out of his hand.

³For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds.

⁴Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin.

⁵And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him:

⁵But now it is come upon thee, and thou faintest; it toucheth thee, and thou art troubled.

¹THEREFORE seeing we have this ministry, as we have received mercy, we faint not;

³And hast borne, and hast patience, and for my name’s sake hast laboured, and hast not fainted.

¹³I know thy works, and where thou dwellest, even where Satan’s seat is: and thou holdest fast my name, and hast not denied my faith, even in those days wherein Antipas was my faithful martyr, who was slain among you, where Satan dwelleth.

⁸(For his disciples were gone away unto the city to buy meat.)

⁴Deliver the poor and needy: rid them out of the hand of the wicked.

⁶Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke?

⁷Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? when thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh?

¹⁶Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.

¹⁷But whoso hath this world’s good, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?

¹⁷And I brake the jaws of the wicked, and plucked the spoil out of his teeth.

⁸Then said Abishai to David, God hath delivered thine enemy into thine hand this day: now therefore let me smite him, I pray thee, with the spear even to the earth at once, and I will not smite him the second time.

⁹And David said to Abishai, Destroy him not: for who can stretch forth his hand against the Lord’s anointed, and be guiltless?

³¹And by chance there came down a certain priest that way: and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side.

³²And likewise a Levite, when he was at the place, came and looked on him, and passed by on the other side.

²³And they were instant with loud voices, requiring that he might be crucified. And the voices of them and of the chief priests prevailed.

²⁴And Pilate gave sentence that it should be as they required.

²⁵And he released unto them him that for sedition and murder was cast into prison, whom they had desired; but he delivered Jesus to their will.

¹⁷Then all the Greeks took Sosthenes, the chief ruler of the synagogue, and beat him before the judgment seat. And Gallio cared for none of those things.

³¹And as they went about to kill him, tidings came unto the chief captain of the band, that all Jerusalem was in an uproar.

³²Who immediately took soldiers and centurions, and ran down unto them: and when they saw the chief captain and the soldiers, they left beating of Paul.

¹⁰And when there arose a great dissension, the chief captain, fearing lest Paul should have been pulled in pieces of them, commanded the soldiers to go down, and to take him by force from among them, and to bring him into the castle.

²³And he called unto him two centurions, saying, Make ready two hundred soldiers to go to Cæsarea, and horsemen threescore and ten, and spearmen two hundred, at the third hour of the night;

²⁴And provide them beasts, that they may set Paul on, and bring him safe unto Felix the governor.

²⁵And he wrote a letter after this manner:

²⁶Claudius Lysias unto the most excellent governor Felix sendeth greeting.

²⁷This man was taken of the Jews, and should have been killed of them: then came I with an army, and rescued him, having understood that he was a Roman.

²⁸And when I would have known the cause wherefore they accused him, I brought him forth into their council:

²⁹Whom I perceived to be accused of questions of their law, but to have nothing laid to his charge worthy of death or of bonds.

³⁰And when it was told me how that the Jews laid wait for the man, I sent straightway to thee, and gave commandment to his accusers also to say before thee what they had against him. Farewell.

³¹Then the soldiers, as it was commanded them, took Paul, and brought him by night to Antipatris.

³²On the morrow they left the horsemen to go with him, and returned to the castle:

³³Who, when they came to Cæsarea, and delivered the epistle to the governor, presented Paul also before him.

³⁴And when the governor had read the letter, he asked of what province he was. And when he understood that he was of Cilicia;

³⁵I will hear thee, said he, when thine accusers are also come. And he commanded him to be kept in Herod’s judgment hall.