24 “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.(A)

Do Not Worry(B)

25 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry(C) about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? 26 Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them.(D) Are you not much more valuable than they?(E) 27 Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life[a]?(F)

28 “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29 Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor(G) was dressed like one of these. 30 If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith?(H) 31 So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them.(I) 33 But seek first his kingdom(J) and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.(K) 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

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Footnotes

  1. Matthew 6:27 Or single cubit to your height

The Greatest Commandment(A)

34 Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees,(B) the Pharisees got together. 35 One of them, an expert in the law,(C) tested him with this question: 36 “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”

37 Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’[a](D) 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[b](E) 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”(F)

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Footnotes

  1. Matthew 22:37 Deut. 6:5
  2. Matthew 22:39 Lev. 19:18

And have you completely forgotten this word of encouragement that addresses you as a father addresses his son? It says,

“My son, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline,
    and do not lose heart(A) when he rebukes you,
because the Lord disciplines the one he loves,(B)
    and he chastens everyone he accepts as his son.”[a](C)

Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as his children.(D) For what children are not disciplined by their father? If you are not disciplined—and everyone undergoes discipline(E)—then you are not legitimate, not true sons and daughters at all. Moreover, we have all had human fathers who disciplined us and we respected them for it. How much more should we submit to the Father of spirits(F) and live!(G) 10 They disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, in order that we may share in his holiness.(H) 11 No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace(I) for those who have been trained by it.

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Footnotes

  1. Hebrews 12:6 Prov. 3:11,12 (see Septuagint)

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