Book of Common Prayer
2 My brothers, we want to talk to you about the time when our Lord Jesus Christ comes again and we are taken to meet him.
2 Do not let your minds be easily upset. Do not be troubled by a spirit, or a message, or a letter. Do not be troubled if you hear that the day of the Lord has already come. Some people will say it came from us.
3 Do not let anyone fool you in any way. Before the day of the Lord comes, many people will stop believing God. The Man of Evil will be seen. He is the evil one who will be destroyed for ever.
13 My brothers, the Lord loves you. We should thank God for you always. Here is why. From the beginning God chose you to be saved. You were saved because the Spirit made you holy and because you believed the true message.
14 God called you to be saved by the good news we brought you. He did this so that you would have some of the honour which the Lord Jesus Christ has.
15 So my brothers, be strong. Hold on to the things we taught you by our words or by letter.
16 God has loved us and made us happy through his kindness. He gave us everlasting comfort and good hope.
17 May our Lord Jesus Christ himself, and God our Father, comfort your hearts and make you strong to do and say everything that is good.
30 `I have no right to do anything myself. I judge the way I am told to judge. The way I judge people is right. I do not do what I myself want to do, but I do what my Father wants me to do. He sent me.
31 `If I talk about myself, then what I say is not true.
32 But someone else also speaks about me. I know what he says about me is true.
33 You sent someone to John and he has told you the truth about me.
34 I do not need to listen to what a person says about me. But I tell you this so that you may be saved.
35 John was a light burning and shining. For a while you were happy to be in his light.
36 But I have something greater than John to talk for me. It is the works that I do. My Father has given me works to finish. The works that I do tell that he sent me.
37 And my Father who sent me has himself talked about me. You have never heard him speak and you do not know what he is like.
38 The word he talks is not in your hearts, because you do not believe the one he sent to you.
39 `You read holy writings carefully. You think that there you will find out how to live for ever. In the same writings you will read about me.
40 And yet you will not come to me for that life.
41 I do not want people to call me great.
42 But I know that you do not love God in your hearts.
43 I have come in my Father's name, but you will not receive me. If another person comes in his own name, then you will receive him.
44 How can you believe? You are always calling each other great, but you do not want the only God to make you great.
45 Do not think that I will carry a complaint against you to my Father. Moses has already carried the complaint against you. He is the very one you trust.
46 If you really believed Moses, you would believe me too, because he wrote about me.
47 But if you do not believe what he wrote, how will you believe what I say?'
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