Book of Common Prayer

Born of God

3 Look at the remarkable love the father has given us—that we should be called God’s children! That indeed is what we are. That’s why the world doesn’t know us, because it didn’t know him. ² Beloved ones, we are now, already, God’s children; it hasn’t yet been revealed what we are going to be. We know that when he is revealed we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. ³ All who have this hope in him make themselves pure, just as he is pure.

⁴ Everyone who goes on sinning is breaking the law; sin, in fact, is lawlessness. ⁵ And you know that he was revealed so that he might take away sins, and there is no sin in him. ⁶ Everyone who abides in him does not go on sinning. Everyone who goes on sinning has not seen him, or known him.

⁷ Children, don’t let anyone deceive you. The person who does righteousness is righteous, just as he is righteous. ⁸ The person who goes on sinning is from the devil, because the devil is a sinner from the very start. The son of God was revealed for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil. ⁹ Everyone who is fathered by God does not go on sinning, because God’s offspring remain in him; they cannot go on sinning, because they have been fathered by God. ¹⁰ That is how it is clear who are the children of God and who are the children of the devil: everyone who does not do what is right is not of God, particularly those who do not love their brother or sister.

¹⁵ The people were very excited, and everyone was questioning in their hearts whether John might not be the Messiah. ¹⁶ To all of them John responded: “I am baptizing you with water. But someone is coming who is stronger than I am. I don’t deserve to untie his sandal-strap. He will baptize you with the holy spirit and with fire. ¹⁷ He will have his winnowing-fork to hand, ready to sort out the mess on his threshing floor and gather the corn into his barn. Any rubbish he will burn with a fire that will never go out.”

¹⁸ John urged his news on the people with many other words. ¹⁹ But Herod the Tetrarch—whom John had accused in the matter of his brother’s wife Herodias, and for all the evil things which Herod had done— ²⁰ added this to his list of crimes: he shut John up in prison.

Jesus’ baptism and genealogy

²¹ So it happened that, as all the people were being baptized, Jesus too was baptized, and was praying. The heaven was opened, ²² and the holy spirit descended in a bodily form, like a dove, upon him. There came a voice from heaven: “You are my son, my dear son! I’m delighted with you.”