Study Desk

Salmon was the father of Boaz. (His mother was Rahab.) Boaz was the father of Obed. (His mother was Ruth.) Obed was the father of Jesse.

Jesse was the father of King David. David was the father of Solomon. (His mother had been Uriah's wife.)

Josiah was the grandfather of Jehoiachin and his brothers, who lived during the time that the people were taken away to Babylon.

This is how the birth of Jesus the Messiah happened. His mother Mary was engaged to marry Joseph. But before they married, he learned that she was expecting a baby. (She was pregnant by the power of the Holy Spirit.)

She will give birth to a son. You will name him Jesus. Give him that name because he will save his people from their sins."

The wise men came to the house where the child was with his mother Mary. They bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened the boxes of gifts they had brought for him. They gave him treasures of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

After the wise men left, an angel from the Lord came to Joseph in a dream. The angel said, "Get up! Take the child with his mother and escape to Egypt. Herod wants to kill the child and will soon start looking for him. Stay in Egypt until I tell you to come back."

and said, "Get up! Take the child with his mother and go to Israel. Those who were trying to kill the child are now dead."

But he heard that Archelaus was now king in Judea. Archelaus became king when his father Herod died. So Joseph was afraid to go there. Then, after being warned in a dream, he went away to the area of Galilee.

John's clothes were made from camel's hair, and he had a leather belt around his waist. For food, he ate locusts and wild honey.

"I baptize you with water to show that you have changed your hearts and lives. But there is someone coming later who is able to do more than I can. I am not good enough to be the slave who takes off his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.

He will come ready to clean the grain. He will separate the good grain from the straw, and he will put the good part into his barn. Then he will burn the useless part with a fire that cannot be stopped."

He said to Jesus, "If you are the Son of God, jump off, because the Scriptures say, ‘God will command his angels to help you, and their hands will catch you, so that you will not hit your foot on a rock.'"

From that time Jesus began to tell people his message: "Change your hearts and lives, because God's kingdom is now very near."

When Jesus saw the crowds of people there, he went up on a hill and sat down. His followers came and sat next to him.

Great blessings belong to those who work to bring peace. God will call them his sons and daughters.

But I tell you that if a man looks at a woman and wants to sin sexually with her, he has already committed that sin with her in his mind.

"It was also said, ‘Any man who divorces his wife must give her a written notice of divorce.'

But I tell you that any man who divorces his wife, except for the problem of sexual sin, is causing his wife to be guilty of adultery. And whoever marries a divorced woman is guilty of adultery.

"Whoever hears these teachings of mine and obeys them is like a wise man who built his house on rock.