The Bible, quoted
in its own voices.

When they received it, they murmured against the master of the household, saying, ‘These last have spent one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat!’ “But he answered one of them, ‘Friend, I am doing you no wrong. Didn’t you agree with me for a denarius? Take that which is yours, and go your way. It is my desire to give to this last just as much as to you. Isn’t it lawful for me to do what I want to with what I own? Or is your eye evil, because I am good?’ So the last will be first, and the first last. For many are called, but few are chosen.”

And, ‘Whoever swears by the altar, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gift that is on it, he is obligated.’ You blind fools! For which is greater, the gift, or the altar that sanctifies the gift? He therefore who swears by the altar, swears by it and by everything on it. He who swears by the temple, swears by it and by him who has been living in it. He who swears by heaven, swears by the throne of God and by him who sits on it. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint, dill, and cumin, and have left undone the weightier matters of the law: justice, mercy, and faith. But you ought to have done these, and not to have left the other undone.

For our boasting is this: the testimony of our conscience that in holiness and sincerity of God, not in fleshly wisdom but in the grace of God, we behaved ourselves in the world, and more abundantly toward you. For we write no other things to you than what you read or even acknowledge, and I hope you will acknowledge to the end— as also you acknowledged us in part—that we are your boasting, even as you also are ours, in the day of our Lord Jesus.

My eye runs down with streams of water, for the destruction of the daughter of my people. My eye pours down and doesn’t cease, without any intermission, until the LORD looks down, and sees from heaven. My eye affects my soul, because of all the daughters of my city.

“Why do you test me? Bring me a denarius, that I may see it.” “Whose is this image and inscription?” “Give to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”

Concerning the prophets: My heart within me is broken. All my bones shake. I am like a drunken man, and like a man whom wine has overcome, because of the LORD, and because of his holy words. “For the land is full of adulterers; for because of the curse the land mourns. The pastures of the wilderness have dried up. Their course is evil, and their might is not right; for both prophet and priest are profane. Yes, in my house I have found their wickedness,” says the LORD. Therefore their way will be to them as slippery places in the darkness. They will be driven on, and fall therein; for I will bring evil on them, even the year of their visitation,” says the LORD. “I have seen folly in the prophets of Samaria. They prophesied by Baal, and caused my people Israel to err. In the prophets of Jerusalem I have also seen a horrible thing: they commit adultery and walk in lies. They strengthen the hands of evildoers, so that no one returns from his wickedness. They have all become to me as Sodom, and its inhabitants as Gomorrah.”

I thank God that I baptized none of you except Crispus and Gaius, so that no one should say that I had baptized you into my own name. (I also baptized the household of Stephanas; besides them, I don’t know whether I baptized any other.) For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the Good News—not in wisdom of words, so that the cross of Christ wouldn’t be made void. For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are dying, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise. I will bring the discernment of the discerning to nothing.”

The Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. Grace be with you. Amen.

My anguish, my anguish! I am pained at my very heart! My heart trembles within me. I can’t hold my peace, because you have heard, O my soul, the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war. Destruction on destruction is decreed, for the whole land is laid waste. Suddenly my tents are destroyed, and my curtains gone in a moment. How long will I see the standard and hear the sound of the trumpet?

“If any man wants to be first, he shall be last of all, and servant of all.”