Book of Common Prayer

Happy are those who hear the word of God and keep it. John is to write to the seven congregations in Asia. Seven candlesticks, and in the midst of them one like the Son of man.

1 The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave to him so that he could show to his servants things which must shortly come to pass. And he sent and showed it by his angel to his servant John, ² who bore witness of the word of God, and of the testimony of Jesus Christ, and of all the things that he saw. ³ Happy is he who reads and those who hear the words of the prophecy, and keep those things that are written therein. For the time is at hand.

⁴ John, to the seven congregations in Asia. Grace be with you and peace, from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits that are present before his throne, ⁵ and from Jesus Christ, who is a faithful witness, and the first begotten of the dead, and Lord over the kings of the earth.

To him who loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood, ⁶ and made us kings and priests unto God his Father, be glory and dominion forevermore. Amen. ⁷ Behold, he comes with clouds, and all eyes shall see him, and they also who pierced him. And all the kindreds of the earth shall wail. Even so. Amen. ⁸ I am the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, says the Lord Almighty, who is and who was and who is to come.

²³ The same day the Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection, came to him and asked him, ²⁴ saying, Teacher, Moses said that if a man dies having no children, the brother should marry the widow and raise up seed for his brother. ²⁵ There were with us seven brethren. The first married and died without issue, and left his wife to his brother. ²⁶ Likewise the second and the third, down to the seventh. ²⁷ Last of all the woman died also. ²⁸ Now in the resurrection, whose wife will she be of the seven? For they all had her.

²⁹ Jesus answered and said to them, You are deceived, and do not understand the scriptures, nor yet the power of God. ³⁰ For in the resurrection people neither marry nor are married, but are as the angels in heaven. ³¹ As for the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what is spoken to you by God, who says, ³² I am Abraham’s God, and Isaac’s God, and the God of Jacob? God is not the God of the dead, but of the living.

³³ And when the people heard that, they were astonished at his teaching.