Counsel
I urge you, brothers [and sisters], by God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living holy sacrifice pleasing to God. This is your reasonable service. And do not pattern yourselves after this age, but transform yourselves through a renewal of the mind, to study the nature of the will of God, what is good, and pleasing, and perfect.
For through the grace that has been granted to me I say to every one among you: Do not think thoughts beyond the thoughts you should have, but think to be moderate, according to the measure of faith God has given to each. As in our bodies we have many parts, but the parts do not all have the same function, so we many are one body in Christ, and individually parts of each other. We have different gifts which vary according to the grace that has been given us. If the gift is for prophecy, it should be based on faith. If one is gifted for service, he should serve; the teacher should teach, the comforter should bring comfort; the contributer should show his generosity, the leader his energy, the charitable man his graciousness. Let love be sincere. Hate the bad, hold fast to the good; love each other as brothers, prize each other more than yourselves; be unflagging in energy, seething with enthusiasm, serving the Lord, rejoicing in hope, steadfast against oppression, devoted to prayer; contribute to the needs of the saints, cultivate hospitality. Bless your persecutors, bless them, do not curse them. Rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep. Agree with each other in your thoughts, and do not be haughty but accommodate yourselves to modest thoughts. Do not be wise in your own estimation. Return no one evil for evil. Have good intentions in regard to all men. If it is possible, be for your part at peace with all men. Do not avenge yourselves, dear friends, but give way to God’s anger, since it is written: ‘Mine is the vengeance, mine the retribution, says the Lord.’ Then if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; so doing, you will heap coals of fire on his head. Do not let yourselves be overcome by evil, but overcome evil through good.
Exoristos
Porter Doran
Iannes
Epiktetos
Anonymous
Honored to be counted worthy of receiving such a message, brother.
-David
I’d enjoy the rest of Romans 12, too! And thank you for (giving to us) the blessing that is *you*, my friend! I shall work on ‘Romans’ now, to see if I can remember that song, too! I bet Jen remembers it! ;-) Blessing to us all, if I’m not mistaken!
I love to see the Bible quoted in places other than a page, and especially in large-ish portions. It makes me able to see them differently! Thank you, Porter :)
I’d guess he could do it from memory, or ‘as if’ the Word were written in his mind and heart (I suspect so) and he needs no text to guide him. Something I try to ‘detect’ in someone, who has ‘the Bible stuck in his (or her) head so hard it won’t come out… so it comes out all the time’ or something. Porter also quotes whole passages of Shakespeare, but has never been to a play. Most folks literally HATE READING that Elizabethan garbage (to them), but not our man. I went to a performance at Reed College, and saw the actors actually spitting out their lines. I guess Elizabethans must have slobbered, but that was not written in the plays, explicitly. I guess it was implied spit. Or inferred, by me. Oh, the words!
♥
–g
I *wish* I could remember whole passages of Bible or Shakespeare, Galen. The Mennonites did make us memorize a lot for the few years we were in their little school — for example, the whole books of James and 1 John — but I don’t remember a verse of all that now. The noggin isn’t what it used to be at fourteen, you know.
Well, you remember enough for now, and the effects of all that memorization that you did not choose for yourself might only now be coming up to the front of your noggin. Things can really slide around inside the mind, especially when they include so many things you did not invite to join in with your thought process. We have to take in what is “offered” even when they don’t know what they are doing more than we. You tend to show (my opinion is) that you “know” what the Bible has in it, and why it was put there: for those who cannot remember. Some, who actually do not try to learn, will pretend to have it memorized.
♥
–g