Not every one that saith, ... Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. -- Holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord. -- Add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; and to knowledge temperance; and to temp-erance patience; and to patience godliness; and to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity. For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and hath forgotten that he was purged from his old sins. Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall.
**As the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that he might deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.**
O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. -- For which cause we faint not; but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day.
We know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. Therefore we are always confident, knowing that, whilst we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord. We are willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord.
Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.
