Study Desk

Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.

who have been chosen and destined by God the Father and sanctified by the Spirit to be obedient to Jesus Christ and to be sprinkled with his blood: May grace and peace be yours in abundance.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! By his great mercy he has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,

who are being protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

Through him you have come to trust in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are set on God.

You have been born anew, not of perishable but of imperishable seed, through the living and enduring word of God.

like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.

Conduct yourselves honorably among the Gentiles, so that, though they malign you as evildoers, they may see your honorable deeds and glorify God when he comes to judge.

As servants of God, live as free people, yet do not use your freedom as a pretext for evil.

Honor everyone. Love the family of believers. Fear God. Honor the emperor.

For it is a credit to you if, being aware of God, you endure pain while suffering unjustly.

It was in this way long ago that the holy women who hoped in God used to adorn themselves by accepting the authority of their husbands.

For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, in order to bring you to God. He was put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit,

who in former times did not obey, when God waited patiently in the days of Noah, during the building of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were saved through water.

And baptism, which this prefigured, now saves you—not as a removal of dirt from the body, but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ,

who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, with angels, authorities, and powers made subject to him.

so as to live for the rest of your earthly life no longer by human desires but by the will of God.

For this is the reason the gospel was proclaimed even to the dead, so that, though they had been judged in the flesh as everyone is judged, they might live in the spirit as God does.

Like good stewards of the manifold grace of God, serve one another with whatever gift each of you has received.

Whoever speaks must do so as one speaking the very words of God; whoever serves must do so with the strength that God supplies, so that God may be glorified in all things through Jesus Christ. To him belong the glory and the power forever and ever. Amen.