Book of Common Prayer

⁶ “These words,” he said to me, “are trustworthy and true. The Lord, the God of the spirits of the prophets, has sent his angel to show his servants what must soon take place. ⁷ Look, I am coming soon. God’s blessing on the one who keeps the words of the prophecy of this book.”

“I am coming soon!”

⁸ I, John, am the one who heard and saw these things. And when I heard them and saw them, I fell down to worship before the feet of the angel who showed them to me. ⁹ “Look! Don’t do that!” he said to me. “I am a fellow-servant with you, and with the other members of your prophetic family, and with those who keep the words of this book. Worship God!

¹⁰ “Don’t seal up the words of the prophecy of this book,” he added. “The time is near, you see. ¹¹ Let the unjust go on being unjust, and the filthy go on being filthy—and let the just go on doing justice, and let the holy still be holy.

¹² “Look! I am coming soon. I will bring my reward with me, and I will pay everyone back according to what they have done. ¹³ I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.”

¹⁰ “Take care not to despise one of these little ones. I tell you this: in heaven, their angels are always gazing on the face of my father who lives there.

¹² “How does it seem to you? If someone has a hundred sheep and one of them wanders off and goes missing, what will he do? He’ll leave the ninety-nine on the hillside and go off after the one that’s missing, won’t he? ¹³ And when, eventually, he finds it, I’ll tell you the truth: he will celebrate over that one more than over the ninety-nine who didn’t go missing! ¹⁴ It’s the same with your father in heaven. The last thing he wants is for a single one of these little ones to be lost.”

Reconciliation and prayer in the community

¹⁵ “If another disciple sins against you,” Jesus continued, “go and have it out, just between the two of you alone. If they listen to you, you’ve won back a brother or sister. ¹⁶ But if they won’t listen, you should take with you one or two others, so that ‘everything may be established from the mouth of two or three witnesses.’ ¹⁷ If they won’t listen to them, tell it to the assembly. And if they won’t listen to the assembly, you should treat such a person like you would a Gentile or a tax-collector. ¹⁸ I’m telling you the truth: whatever you tie up on earth will have been tied up in heaven; and whatever you untie on earth will have been untied in heaven.

¹⁹ “Again, let me tell you the truth: if two of you come to an agreement on earth about any matter that you want to ask, it will be done for you by my father in heaven. ²⁰ Yes: where two or three come together in my name, I’ll be there amongst them.”