Live as Servants of God

¹¹ Beloved, I urge you as aliens and exiles to abstain from the desires of the flesh that wage war against the soul. ¹² Conduct yourselves honourably among the Gentiles, so that, though they malign you as evildoers, they may see your honourable deeds and glorify God when he comes to judge.^[a]

¹³ For the Lord’s sake accept the authority of every human institution,^[b] whether of the emperor as supreme, ¹⁴ or of governors, as sent by him to punish those who do wrong and to praise those who do right. ¹⁵ For it is God’s will that by doing right you should silence the ignorance of the foolish. ¹⁶ As servants^[c] of God, live as free people, yet do not use your freedom as a pretext for evil. ¹⁷ Honour everyone. Love the family of believers.^[d] Fear God. Honour the emperor.

Sorrow Will Turn into Joy

¹⁶ ‘A little while, and you will no longer see me, and again a little while, and you will see me.’ ¹⁷ Then some of his disciples said to one another, ‘What does he mean by saying to us, “A little while, and you will no longer see me, and again a little while, and you will see me”; and “Because I am going to the Father”?’ ¹⁸ They said, ‘What does he mean by this “a little while”? We do not know what he is talking about.’ ¹⁹ Jesus knew that they wanted to ask him, so he said to them, ‘Are you discussing among yourselves what I meant when I said, “A little while, and you will no longer see me, and again a little while, and you will see me”? ²⁰ Very truly, I tell you, you will weep and mourn, but the world will rejoice; you will have pain, but your pain will turn into joy. ²¹ When a woman is in labour, she has pain, because her hour has come. But when her child is born, she no longer remembers the anguish because of the joy of having brought a human being into the world. ²² So you have pain now; but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you.