Letters to the Churches

quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, from weakness were made strong, waxed mighty in war, turned to flight armies of aliens.

Women received their dead by a resurrection: and others were tortured, not accepting their deliverance; that they might obtain a better resurrection:

and others had trial of mockings and scourgings, yea, moreover of bonds and imprisonment:

they were stoned, they were sawn asunder, they were tempted, they were slain with the sword: they went about in sheepskins, in goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, ill-treated

(of whom the world was not worthy), wandering in deserts and mountains and caves, and the holes of the earth.

And these all, having had witness borne to them through their faith, received not the promise,

God having provided some better thing concerning us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect.

Therefore let us also, seeing we are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us,

looking unto Jesus the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising shame, and hath sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

For consider him that hath endured such gainsaying of sinners against himself, that ye wax not weary, fainting in your souls.

Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin:

and ye have forgotten the exhortation which reasoneth with you as with sons, My son, regard not lightly the chastening of the Lord, Nor faint when thou art reproved of him;

For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, And scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.

It is for chastening that ye endure; God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father chasteneth not?

But if ye are without chastening, whereof all have been made partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons.

Furthermore, we had the fathers of our flesh to chasten us, and we gave them reverence: shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and live?

For they indeed for a few days chastened us as seemed good to them; but he for our profit, that we may be partakers of his holiness.

All chastening seemeth for the present to be not joyous but grievous; yet afterward it yieldeth peaceable fruit unto them that have been exercised thereby, even the fruit of righteousness.

Wherefore lift up the hands that hang down, and the palsied knees;

and make straight paths for your feet, that that which is lame be not turned out of the way, but rather be healed.

Follow after peace with all men, and the sanctification without which no man shall see the Lord:

looking carefully lestthere beany man that falleth short of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby the many be defiled;

lest there be any fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for one mess of meat sold his own birthright.

For ye know that even when he afterward desired to inherit the blessing, he was rejected; for he found no place for a change of mind in his father, though he sought it diligently with tears.

For ye are not come unto a mount that might be touched, and that burned with fire, and unto blackness, and darkness, and tempest,