It was not you who chose me, but I who chose you, and I appointed you to go and bear fruit--fruit that should remain, so that the Father might grant you whatever you ask in my Name.
But now that you have been set free from the control of Sin, and have become servants to God, the fruit that you reap is an ever-increasing holiness, and the end Immortal Life.
And he who supplies 'seed to the sower, and bread for eating,' will supply you with seed, and cause it to increase, and will multiply 'the fruits of your righteousness').
For we are God's handiwork, created, by our union with Christ Jesus, for the good actions in doing which God had pre-arranged that we should spend our lives.
It is not that I am anxious for your gifts, but I am anxious to see the abundant return that will be placed to your account. I have enough of everything, and to spare.
Then you will live lives worthy of the Master, and so please God in every way. Your lives will be fruitful in every kind of good action, and your characters will grow through a fuller knowledge of God;
Bearing fruit and growing, as it does, through all the world, just as it did among you, from the very day that you heard of God's loving-kindness, and understood what that loving-kindness really is.
No discipline is pleasant at the time; on the contrary, it is painful. But afterwards its fruit is seen in the peacefulness of a righteous life which is the lot of those who have been trained under it.
Let your daily life among the Gentiles be so upright, that, whenever they malign you as evil-doers, they may learn, as they watch, from the uprightness of your conduct, to praise God 'at the time when he shall visit them.'
and, as living stones, form yourselves into a spiritual House, to be a consecrated Priesthood, for the offering of spiritual sacrifices that will be acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.
But you are 'a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a consecrated nation, God's own People,' entrusted with the proclamation of the goodness of him who called you out of Darkness into his wonderful Light.