Book of Common Prayer

Therefore I Exhort You To Walk Worthily of Your Calling, Keeping The Unity of The Spirit

4 Therefore I, the prisoner in the Lord, exhort you to walk worthily of the calling with which you were called, ² with all humblemindedness and gentleness, with patience bearing-with one another in love, ³ being diligent to keep^[a] the unity of ^[b] the Spirit in the bond of ^[c] peace—

God Made Us One, And Gave Gifts And Grace To Each One of Us

⁴ There is one body and one Spirit, just as you also were called in one hope of your calling; ⁵ one Lord, one faith, one baptism; ⁶ one God and Father of all, the One over all and through all and in all; ⁷ and to each one of us grace was given according to the measure of the gift of Christ.

For Scripture Says Jesus Ascended On High And Gave Gifts To His People

⁸ For this reason it says, “having ascended to on-high, He led captivity captive^[d], He gave gifts to people” [Ps 68:18].

⁹ Now what does the “He ascended” mean except that He also descended into the lower parts of the earth^[e]? ¹⁰ The One having descended is Himself also the One having ascended far above all the heavens, in order that He might fill all things.

He Gave Gifted People To Equip The Saints To Build Up The Body of Christ To Maturity

¹¹ And He Himself gave some as apostles, and others as prophets, and others as evangelists, and others as shepherds and teachers, ¹² for^[f] the equipping^[g] of the saints for the work of ministry^[h], for the building-up of the body of Christ ¹³ until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature^[i] man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, ¹⁴ so that we may no longer be children, being tossed-about and carried-around by every wind of teaching, by the trickery of people, by craftiness with-regard-to^[j] the scheme of ^[k] error^[l], ¹⁵ but that while speaking-the-truth in love, we may grow as to all things into Him Who is the head— Christ, ¹⁶ from Whom the whole body, being fitted-together^[m] and held-together by every joint of supply according to the working in measure of each individual part, is producing the growth of the body for the building-up of itself in love.

A Great Multitude Comes To Jesus To Be Healed

⁷ And Jesus withdrew^[a] to the sea with His disciples, and a great multitude from Galilee followed. And from Judea, ⁸ and from Jerusalem, and from Idumea and beyond the Jordan and around Tyre and Sidon, a great multitude hearing all that He was doing came to Him. ⁹ And He said to His disciples that a small-boat should be standing-ready-for Him because of the crowd— in order that they might not be pressing^[b] Him. ¹⁰ For He cured many, so that they were falling-upon Him in order that all who were having scourges^[c] might touch Him. ¹¹ And the unclean spirits, whenever they were seeing Him, were falling-before Him and crying-out, saying that “You are the Son of God”. ¹² And He was sternly rebuking them in order that they might not make Him known.

The Twelve Are Appointed

¹³ And He goes up on the mountain and summons whom He was wanting. And they went to Him. ¹⁴ And He appointed twelve, whom He also named apostles, in order that they might be with Him, and in order that He might send them out to proclaim ¹⁵ and to have authority to cast out the demons. ¹⁶ And He appointed the twelve, even Peter (He put the name on Simon), ¹⁷ and James, the son of Zebedee, and John, the brother of James (and He put on them the name Boanerges, which means “sons of thunder”), ¹⁸ and Andrew, and Philip, and Bartholomew, and Matthew, and Thomas, and James, the son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus, and Simon, the Cananaean^[d], ¹⁹ and Judas Iscariot, who also handed Him over.