16-18 So, my very dear friends, don’t get thrown off course. Every desirable and beneficial gift comes out of heaven. The gifts are rivers of light cascading down from the Father of Light. There is nothing deceitful in God, nothing two-faced, nothing fickle. He brought us to life using the true Word, showing us off as the crown of all his creatures.

Act on What You Hear

19-21 Post this at all the intersections, dear friends: Lead with your ears, follow up with your tongue, and let anger straggle along in the rear. God’s righteousness doesn’t grow from human anger. So throw all spoiled virtue and cancerous evil in the garbage. In simple humility, let our gardener, God, landscape you with the Word, making a salvation-garden of your life.

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18 He chose to give us birth(A) through the word of truth,(B) that we might be a kind of firstfruits(C) of all he created.

Listening and Doing

19 My dear brothers and sisters,(D) take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak(E) and slow to become angry, 20 because human anger(F) does not produce the righteousness that God desires.

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