Passover and the Festival of Unleavened Bread

16 “In honor of the Lord your God, celebrate the Passover each year in the early spring, in the month of Abib,^[a] for that was the month in which the Lord your God brought you out of Egypt by night. ² Your Passover sacrifice may be from either the flock or the herd, and it must be sacrificed to the Lord your God at the designated place of worship—the place he chooses for his name to be honored. ³ Eat it with bread made without yeast. For seven days the bread you eat must be made without yeast, as when you escaped from Egypt in such a hurry. Eat this bread—the bread of suffering—so that as long as you live you will remember the day you departed from Egypt. ⁴ Let no yeast be found in any house throughout your land for those seven days. And when you sacrifice the Passover lamb on the evening of the first day, do not let any of the meat remain until the next morning.

⁵ “You may not sacrifice the Passover in just any of the towns that the Lord your God is giving you. ⁶ You must offer it only at the designated place of worship—the place the Lord your God chooses for his name to be honored. Sacrifice it there in the evening as the sun goes down on the anniversary of your exodus from Egypt. ⁷ Roast the lamb and eat it in the place the Lord your God chooses. Then you may go back to your tents the next morning. ⁸ For the next six days you may not eat any bread made with yeast. On the seventh day proclaim another holy day in honor of the Lord your God, and no work may be done on that day.

The Festival of Harvest

⁹ “Count off seven weeks from when you first begin to cut the grain at the time of harvest. ¹⁰ Then celebrate the Festival of Harvest^[b] to honor the Lord your God. Bring him a voluntary offering in proportion to the blessings you have received from him. ¹¹ This is a time to celebrate before the Lord your God at the designated place of worship he will choose for his name to be honored. Celebrate with your sons and daughters, your male and female servants, the Levites from your towns, and the foreigners, orphans, and widows who live among you. ¹² Remember that you were once slaves in Egypt, so be careful to obey all these decrees.

The Festival of Shelters

¹³ “You must observe the Festival of Shelters^[c] for seven days at the end of the harvest season, after the grain has been threshed and the grapes have been pressed. ¹⁴ This festival will be a happy time of celebrating with your sons and daughters, your male and female servants, and the Levites, foreigners, orphans, and widows from your towns. ¹⁵ For seven days you must celebrate this festival to honor the Lord your God at the place he chooses, for it is he who blesses you with bountiful harvests and gives you success in all your work. This festival will be a time of great joy for all.

¹⁶ “Each year every man in Israel must celebrate these three festivals: the Festival of Unleavened Bread, the Festival of Harvest, and the Festival of Shelters. On each of these occasions, all men must appear before the Lord your God at the place he chooses, but they must not appear before the Lord without a gift for him. ¹⁷ All must give as they are able, according to the blessings given to them by the Lord your God.

Justice for the People

¹⁸ “Appoint judges and officials for yourselves from each of your tribes in all the towns the Lord your God is giving you. They must judge the people fairly. ¹⁹ You must never twist justice or show partiality. Never accept a bribe, for bribes blind the eyes of the wise and corrupt the decisions of the godly. ²⁰ Let true justice prevail, so you may live and occupy the land that the Lord your God is giving you.

²¹ “You must never set up a wooden Asherah pole beside the altar you build for the Lord your God. ²² And never set up sacred pillars for worship, for the Lord your God hates them.

Discerning False Prophets

4 Dear friends, do not believe everyone who claims to speak by the Spirit. You must test them to see if the spirit they have comes from God. For there are many false prophets in the world. ² This is how we know if they have the Spirit of God: If a person claiming to be a prophet^[a] acknowledges that Jesus Christ came in a real body, that person has the Spirit of God. ³ But if someone claims to be a prophet and does not acknowledge the truth about Jesus, that person is not from God. Such a person has the spirit of the Antichrist, which you heard is coming into the world and indeed is already here.

⁴ But you belong to God, my dear children. You have already won a victory over those people, because the Spirit who lives in you is greater than the spirit who lives in the world. ⁵ Those people belong to this world, so they speak from the world’s viewpoint, and the world listens to them. ⁶ But we belong to God, and those who know God listen to us. If they do not belong to God, they do not listen to us. That is how we know if someone has the Spirit of truth or the spirit of deception.

Loving One Another

⁷ Dear friends, let us continue to love one another, for love comes from God. Anyone who loves is a child of God and knows God. ⁸ But anyone who does not love does not know God, for God is love.

⁹ God showed how much he loved us by sending his one and only Son into the world so that we might have eternal life through him. ¹⁰ This is real love—not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins.

¹¹ Dear friends, since God loved us that much, we surely ought to love each other. ¹² No one has ever seen God. But if we love each other, God lives in us, and his love is brought to full expression in us.

¹³ And God has given us his Spirit as proof that we live in him and he in us. ¹⁴ Furthermore, we have seen with our own eyes and now testify that the Father sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. ¹⁵ All who declare that Jesus is the Son of God have God living in them, and they live in God. ¹⁶ We know how much God loves us, and we have put our trust in his love.

God is love, and all who live in love live in God, and God lives in them. ¹⁷ And as we live in God, our love grows more perfect. So we will not be afraid on the day of judgment, but we can face him with confidence because we live like Jesus here in this world.

¹⁸ Such love has no fear, because perfect love expels all fear. If we are afraid, it is for fear of punishment, and this shows that we have not fully experienced his perfect love. ¹⁹ We love each other^[b] because he loved us first.

²⁰ If someone says, “I love God,” but hates a fellow believer,^[c] that person is a liar; for if we don’t love people we can see, how can we love God, whom we cannot see? ²¹ And he has given us this command: Those who love God must also love their fellow believers.^[d]

Faith in the Son of God

5 Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ^[e] has become a child of God. And everyone who loves the Father loves his children, too. ² We know we love God’s children if we love God and obey his commandments. ³ Loving God means keeping his commandments, and his commandments are not burdensome. ⁴ For every child of God defeats this evil world, and we achieve this victory through our faith. ⁵ And who can win this battle against the world? Only those who believe that Jesus is the Son of God.

⁶ And Jesus Christ was revealed as God’s Son by his baptism in water and by shedding his blood on the cross^[f]—not by water only, but by water and blood. And the Spirit, who is truth, confirms it with his testimony. ⁷ So we have these three witnesses^[g]— ⁸ the Spirit, the water, and the blood—and all three agree. ⁹ Since we believe human testimony, surely we can believe the greater testimony that comes from God. And God has testified about his Son. ¹⁰ All who believe in the Son of God know in their hearts that this testimony is true. Those who don’t believe this are actually calling God a liar because they don’t believe what God has testified about his Son.

¹¹ And this is what God has testified: He has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. ¹² Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have God’s Son does not have life.

Conclusion

¹³ I have written this to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know you have eternal life. ¹⁴ And we are confident that he hears us whenever we ask for anything that pleases him. ¹⁵ And since we know he hears us when we make our requests, we also know that he will give us what we ask for.

¹⁶ If you see a fellow believer^[h] sinning in a way that does not lead to death, you should pray, and God will give that person life. But there is a sin that leads to death, and I am not saying you should pray for those who commit it. ¹⁷ All wicked actions are sin, but not every sin leads to death.

¹⁸ We know that God’s children do not make a practice of sinning, for God’s Son holds them securely, and the evil one cannot touch them. ¹⁹ We know that we are children of God and that the world around us is under the control of the evil one.

²⁰ And we know that the Son of God has come, and he has given us understanding so that we can know the true God.^[i] And now we live in fellowship with the true God because we live in fellowship with his Son, Jesus Christ. He is the only true God, and he is eternal life.

²¹ Dear children, keep away from anything that might take God’s place in your hearts.^[j]

Psalm 138

A psalm of David.