I said, Surely you will fear me, you will receive instruction; so that their dwelling should not be cut off, however I punished them: but they rose early, and corrupted all their doings.
For our rejoicing is this, the testimony of our conscience, that in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of God, we have had our conduct in the world, and more abundantly towards you.
And now, Israel, what does the LORD your God require of you, but to fear the LORD your God, to walk in all his ways, and to love him, and to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul,
This charge I commit to you, son Timothy, according to the prophecies which came beforehand concerning you, that you by them might wage a good warfare;
I thank God, whom I serve, receiving from my forefathers, with a pure conscience, that without ceasing I have remembrance of you in my prayers night and day;
When I call to remembrance the genuine faith that is in you, which dwelt first in your grandmother Lois, and your mother Eunice; and I am persuaded in you also.
Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water.
How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?
Seeing you have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit for genuine love of the brethren, see that you love one another with a pure heart earnestly:
This represents baptism which also now saves us (not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the response of a good conscience toward God,) by the resurrection of Jesus Christ:
In this the children of God are made known, and the children of the devil: whoever does not do righteousness is not of God, neither he that does not love his brother.