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Faith in Action (continued)
12:1 Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about
with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every
weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let
us run with patience the race that is set before us,
12:2 Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our
faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the
cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right
hand of the throne of God.
12:3 For consider him that endured such contradiction of
sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in
your minds.
God Disciplines His
Children
12:4 Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving
against sin.
12:5 And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh
unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the
chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of
him:
12:6 For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth
every son whom he receiveth.
12:7 If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with
sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not?
12:8 But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are
partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons.
12:9 Furthermore we have had fathers of our flesh which
corrected us, and we gave them reverence: shall we not much
rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and
live?
12:10 For they verily for a few days chastened us after
their own pleasure; but he for our profit, that we might be
partakers of his holiness.
12:11 Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be
joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the
peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are
exercised thereby.
12:12 Wherefore lift up the hands which hang down, and the
feeble knees;
12:13 And make straight paths for your feet, lest that
which is lame be turned out of the way; but let it rather be
healed.
Warning and
Encouragement
12:14 Follow peace with all men, and holiness,
without which no man shall see the Lord:
12:15 Looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of
God; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you,
and thereby many be defiled;
12:16 Lest there be any fornicator, or profane person, as
Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright.
12:17 For ye know how that afterward, when he would have
inherited the blessing, he was rejected: for he found no
place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with
tears.
The Mountain of Fear and
the Mountain of Joy
12:18 For ye are not come unto the mount that might
be touched, and that burned with fire, nor unto blackness,
and darkness, and tempest,
12:19 And the sound of a trumpet, and the voice of words;
which voice they that heard intreated that the word should
not be spoken to them any more:
12:20 (For they could not endure that which was commanded,
And if so much as a beast touch the mountain, it shall be
stoned, or thrust through with a dart:
12:21 And so terrible was the sight, that Moses said, I
exceedingly fear and quake:)
12:22 But ye are come unto mount Sion, and unto the city of
the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an
innumerable company of angels,
12:23 To the general assembly and church of the firstborn,
which are written in heaven, and to God the Judge of all,
and to the spirits of just men made perfect,
12:24 And to Jesus the mediator of the new covenant, and to
the blood of sprinkling, that speaketh better things that
that of Abel.
12:25 See that ye refuse not him that speaketh. For if they
escaped not who refused him that spake on earth, much more
shall not we escape, if we turn away from him that speaketh
from heaven:
12:26 Whose voice then shook the earth: but now he hath
promised, saying, Yet once more I shake not the earth only,
but also heaven.
12:27 And this word, Yet once more, signifieth the removing
of those things that are shaken, as of things that are made,
that those things which cannot be shaken may remain.
12:28 Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be
moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God
acceptably with reverence and godly fear:
12:29 For our God is a consuming fire.
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Cults 
Why Did God Permit Sin?
