Study Desk

"Those who come to me cannot be my disciples unless they love me more than they love father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, and themselves as well.

but Jesus called the children to him and said, "Let the children come to me and do not stop them, because the Kingdom of God belongs to such as these.

"Yes," Jesus said to them, "and I assure you that anyone who leaves home or wife or brothers or parents or children for the sake of the Kingdom of God

"Teacher, Moses wrote this law for us: ‘If a man dies and leaves a wife but no children, that man's brother must marry the widow so that they can have children who will be considered the dead man's children.'

Once there were seven brothers; the oldest got married and died without having children.

and then the third. The same thing happened to all seven—they died without having children.

They will be like angels and cannot die. They are the children of God, because they have risen from death.

Jesus turned to them and said, "Women of Jerusalem! Don't cry for me, but for yourselves and your children.

For the days are coming when people will say, ‘How lucky are the women who never had children, who never bore babies, who never nursed them!'

Some, however, did receive him and believed in him; so he gave them the right to become God's children.

They did not become God's children by natural means, that is, by being born as the children of a human father; God himself was their Father.

It was our ancestor Jacob who gave us this well; he and his children and his flocks all drank from it. You don't claim to be greater than Jacob, do you?"

They answered him, "Our father is Abraham." "If you really were Abraham's children," Jesus replied, "you would do the same things that he did.

You are doing what your father did." "God himself is the only Father we have," they answered, "and we are his true children."

You are the children of your father, the Devil, and you want to follow your father's desires. From the very beginning he was a murderer and has never been on the side of truth, because there is no truth in him. When he tells a lie, he is only doing what is natural to him, because he is a liar and the father of all lies.

My children, I shall not be with you very much longer. You will look for me; but I tell you now what I told the Jewish authorities, ‘You cannot go where I am going.'

For God's promise was made to you and your children, and to all who are far away—all whom the Lord our God calls to himself."

God did not then give Abraham any part of it as his own, not even a square foot of ground, but God promised to give it to him, and that it would belong to him and to his descendants. At the time God made this promise, Abraham had no children.

as someone has said, ‘In him we live and move and exist.' It is as some of your poets have said, ‘We too are his children.'

Since we are God's children, we should not suppose that his nature is anything like an image of gold or silver or stone, shaped by human art and skill.