Exodus 11

A Final Plague Threatened

¹The Lord said to Moses, “Yet sone plague more I will bring upon Pharaoh and upon Egypt. Afterward he will let you go from here. tWhen he lets you go, he will drive you away completely. ²Speak now in the hearing of the people, that uthey ask, every man of his neighbor and every woman of her neighbor, for silver and gold jewelry.” ³vAnd the Lord gave the people favor in the sight of the Egyptians. Moreover, the man Moses was very great in the land of Egypt, in the sight of Pharaoh's servants and in the sight of the people.

⁴So Moses said, “Thus says the Lord: w‘About midnight I will go out in the midst of Egypt, ⁵and every firstborn in the land of Egypt shall die, from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sits on his throne, even to the firstborn of the slave girl who is xbehind the handmill, and all the firstborn of the cattle. ⁶yThere shall be a great cry throughout all the land of Egypt, such as there has never been, nor ever will be again. ⁷But not a dog shall growl zagainst any of the people of Israel, either man or beast, that you may know that the Lord amakes a distinction between Egypt and Israel.’ ⁸And ball these your servants shall come down to me and bow down to me, saying, ‘Get out, you and all the people who follow you.’ And after that I will go out.” And he went out from Pharaoh in hot anger. ⁹Then the Lord said to Moses, c“Pharaoh will not listen to you, that dmy wonders may be multiplied in the land of Egypt.”

¹⁰Moses and Aaron did all these wonders before Pharaoh, and the Lord ehardened Pharaoh's heart, and he did not let the people of Israel go out of his land.

Exodus 12:1–21

The Passover

¹The Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, ²f“This month shall be for you the beginning of months. It shall be the first month of the year for you. ³Tell all the congregation of Israel that on the tenth day of this month every man shall take a lamb gaccording to their fathers' houses, a lamb for a household. ⁴And if the household is too small for a lamb, then he and his nearest neighbor shall take according to the number of persons; according to what each can eat you shall make your count for the lamb. ⁵Your lamb shall be hwithout blemish, a male a year old. You may take it from the sheep or from the goats, ⁶and you shall keep it until the ifourteenth day of this month, when the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill their lambs at twilight.1

⁷“Then they shall take some of the blood and put it on the jtwo doorposts and the lintel of the houses in which they eat it. ⁸They shall eat the flesh that night, roasted on the fire; with kunleavened bread and bitter herbs they shall eat it. ⁹Do not eat any of it raw or boiled in water, but lroasted, its head with its legs and its inner parts. ¹⁰And myou shall let none of it remain until the morning; anything that remains until the morning you shall burn. ¹¹In this manner you shall eat it: with nyour belt fastened, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand. And you shall eat it in haste. oIt is the Lord's Passover. ¹²For pI will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and I will strike all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and on qall the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: rI am the Lord. ¹³sThe blood shall be a sign for you, on the houses where you are. And when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and no plague will befall you to destroy you, when I strike the land of Egypt.

¹⁴“This day shall be tfor you a memorial day, and you shall keep it as a feast to the Lord; throughout your generations, as a ustatute forever, you shall keep it as a feast. ¹⁵vSeven days you shall eat unleavened bread. On the first day you shall remove leaven out of your houses, for if anyone eats what is leavened, from the first day until the seventh day, wthat person shall be cut off from Israel. ¹⁶On the first day you shall hold a xholy assembly, and on the seventh day a holy assembly. No work shall be done on those days. But what everyone needs to eat, that alone may be prepared by you. ¹⁷And you shall observe the Feast of Unleavened Bread, for yon this very day I brought your zhosts out of the land of Egypt. Therefore you shall observe this day, throughout your generations, as a statute forever. ¹⁸aIn the first month, from the fourteenth day of the month at evening, you shall eat unleavened bread until the twenty-first day of the month at evening. ¹⁹bFor seven days no leaven is to be found in your houses. If anyone eats what is leavened, bthat person will be cut off from the congregation of Israel, cwhether he is a sojourner or a native of the land. ²⁰You shall eat nothing leavened; in all your dwelling places you shall eat unleavened bread.”

²¹Then Moses called all the elders of Israel and said to them, “Go and select lambs for yourselves daccording to your clans, and kill the Passover lamb.

Healing of a Man on the Sabbath

¹One Sabbath, pwhen he went to dine at the house of a ruler of the Pharisees, they were qwatching him carefully. ²And behold, there was a man before him who had dropsy. ³And Jesus responded to rthe lawyers and Pharisees, saying, s“Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath, or not?” ⁴But they remained silent. Then he took him and healed him and sent him away. ⁵And he said to them, t“Which of you, having a son1 or an ox that has fallen into a well on a Sabbath day, will not immediately pull him out?” ⁶uAnd they could not reply to these things.

The Parable of the Wedding Feast

⁷Now he told a parable to those who were invited, when he noticed vhow they chose the places of honor, saying to them, ⁸“When you are invited by someone to a wedding feast, do not sit down in a place of honor, lest someone more distinguished than you be invited by him, ⁹and he who invited you both will come and say to you, ‘Give your place to this person,’ and then you will begin with shame to take the lowest place. ¹⁰But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, wso that when your host comes he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at table with you. ¹¹For xeveryone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”

The Parable of the Great Banquet

¹²He said also to the man who had invited him, “When you give ya dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers2 or your relatives or rich neighbors, zlest they also invite you in return and you be repaid. ¹³But when you give a feast, ainvite bthe poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, ¹⁴and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. For you will be repaid cat dthe resurrection of the just.”

¹⁵When one of those who reclined at table with him heard these things, he said to him, e“Blessed is everyone who will feat bread in the kingdom of God!” ¹⁶But he said to him, g“A man once hgave a great banquet and invited many. ¹⁷And at the time for the banquet he isent his servant3 to say to those who had been invited, ‘Come, for everything is now ready.’ ¹⁸But they all alike began to make excuses. The first said to him, ‘I have bought a field, and I must go out and see it. Please have me excused.’ ¹⁹And another said, ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I go to examine them. Please have me excused.’ ²⁰And another said, j‘I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come.’ ²¹So the servant came and reported these things to his master. Then the master of the house became angry and said to his servant, ‘Go out quickly to the streets and lanes of the city, and bring in kthe poor and crippled and blind and lame.’ ²²And the servant said, ‘Sir, what you commanded has been done, and still there is room.’ ²³And the master said to the servant, ‘Go out to the highways and hedges and compel people to come in, that my house may be filled. ²⁴For I tell you,4 mnone of those men who were invited shall taste my banquet.’”

The Cost of Discipleship

²⁵Now great crowds accompanied him, and he turned and said to them, ²⁶n“If anyone comes to me and odoes not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, pyes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. ²⁷qWhoever does not rbear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. ²⁸For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not sfirst sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it? ²⁹Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, ³⁰saying, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish.’ ³¹Or what king, going out to encounter another king in war, will not tsit down first and deliberate whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand? ³²And if not, while the other is yet a great way off, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace. ³³uSo therefore, any one of you who vdoes not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.

Salt Without Taste Is Worthless

³⁴w“Salt is good, xbut if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? ³⁵It is of no use either for the soil or for the manure pile. It is thrown away. yHe who has ears to hear, let him hear.”

Job's Summary Defense

¹And Job again ztook up his discourse, and said:

²“Oh, that I were as in the months of old,

as in the days when God watched over me,

³when his alamp shone upon my head,

and by his light I walked through darkness,

⁴as I was in my prime,1

when the bfriendship of God was upon my tent,

⁵when the Almighty was yet with me,

when my cchildren were all around me,

⁶when my steps were dwashed with ebutter,

and fthe rock poured out for me streams of goil!

⁷When I went out to hthe gate of the city,

when I prepared my seat in the square,

⁸the young men saw me and withdrew,

and the aged rose and stood;

⁹the princes refrained from talking

and ilaid their hand on their mouth;

¹⁰the voice of the nobles was hushed,

and their jtongue stuck to the roof of their mouth.

¹¹When the ear heard, it called me blessed,

and when the eye saw, it approved,

¹²because I kdelivered the poor who cried for help,

and the fatherless who had none to help him.

¹³lThe blessing of him who was mabout to perish came upon me,

and I caused nthe widow's heart to sing for joy.

¹⁴I oput on righteousness, and it clothed me;

my justice was like a robe and pa turban.

¹⁵I was qeyes to the blind

and feet to the lame.

¹⁶I was a father to the needy,

and I searched out rthe cause of him whom I did not know.

¹⁷I sbroke tthe fangs of the unrighteous

and made him drop his prey from his teeth.

¹⁸uThen I thought, ‘I shall die in my vnest,

and I shall multiply my days as wthe sand,

¹⁹my xroots spread out to ythe waters,

with the dew all night on my zbranches,

²⁰my glory fresh with me,

and my abow ever bnew in my hand.’

²¹“Men listened to me and waited

and kept silence for my counsel.

²²After I spoke they did not speak again,

and my word cdropped upon them.

²³They waited for me as for the rain,

and they dopened their mouths as for the espring rain.

²⁴I smiled on them when they had no confidence,

and fthe light of my gface they did not cast down.

²⁵I chose their way and sat as chief,

and I lived like ha king among his troops,

like one who comforts mourners.

The Resurrection of Christ

¹Now I would remind you, brothers,1 of the gospel gI preached to you, which you received, hin which you stand, ²and by which iyou are being saved, if you jhold fast to the word I preached to you—kunless you believed in vain.

³For lI delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died mfor our sins nin accordance with the Scriptures, ⁴that he was buried, that he was raised oon the third day pin accordance with the Scriptures, ⁵and that qhe appeared to Cephas, then rto the twelve. ⁶Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. ⁷Then he appeared to sJames, then tto all the apostles. ⁸Last of all, as to one untimely born, uhe appeared also to me. ⁹For vI am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because wI persecuted the church of God. ¹⁰But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, xI worked harder than any of them, ythough it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me. ¹¹Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed.

The Resurrection of the Dead

¹²Now if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, zhow can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? ¹³But if there is no resurrection of the dead, athen not even Christ has been raised. ¹⁴And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. ¹⁵We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified about God that bhe raised Christ, whom he did not raise if it is true that the dead are not raised. ¹⁶For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. ¹⁷And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and cyou are still in your sins. ¹⁸Then those also who dhave fallen asleep in Christ have perished. ¹⁹If in Christ we have hope2 in this life only, ewe are of all people most to be pitied.

²⁰But in fact fChrist has been raised from the dead, gthe firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. ²¹For as hby a man came death, iby a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. ²²For jas in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. ²³But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then kat his coming lthose who belong to Christ. ²⁴Then comes the end, when he delivers mthe kingdom to God the Father after destroying nevery rule and every authority and power. ²⁵For he must reign ountil he has put all his enemies under his feet. ²⁶The last enemy to be pdestroyed is death. ²⁷For q“God3 has put all things in subjection under his feet.” But when it says, “all things are put in subjection,” it is plain that he is excepted who put all things in subjection under him. ²⁸When rall things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to him who put all things in subjection under him, that sGod may be all in all.

²⁹Otherwise, what do people mean by being baptized on behalf of the dead? If the dead are not raised at all, why are people baptized on their behalf? ³⁰Why are we tin danger every hour? ³¹I protest, brothers, by umy pride in you, which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, vI die every day! ³²What do I gain if, humanly speaking, wI fought with beasts at Ephesus? If the dead are not raised, x“Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.” ³³yDo not be deceived: z“Bad company ruins good morals.”4 ³⁴aWake up from your drunken stupor, as is right, and do not go on sinning. For bsome have no knowledge of God. cI say this to your shame.

The Resurrection Body

³⁵But someone will ask, d“How are the dead raised? With what kind of body do they come?” ³⁶You foolish person! eWhat you sow does not come to life unless it dies. ³⁷And what you sow is not the body that is to be, but a bare kernel, perhaps of wheat or of some other grain. ³⁸But God gives it a body as he has chosen, and to each kind of seed its own body. ³⁹For not all flesh is the same, but there is one kind for humans, another for animals, another for birds, and another for fish. ⁴⁰There are heavenly bodies and earthly bodies, but the glory of the heavenly is of one kind, and the glory of the earthly is of another. ⁴¹There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars; for star differs from star in glory.

⁴²fSo is it with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown is perishable; what is raised is imperishable. ⁴³It is sown in dishonor; git is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness; it is raised in power. ⁴⁴It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a natural body, there is also a spiritual body. ⁴⁵Thus it is written, h“The first man Adam became a living being”;5 ithe last Adam became a jlife-giving spirit. ⁴⁶But it is not the spiritual that is first but the natural, and then the spiritual. ⁴⁷kThe first man was from the earth, la man of dust; mthe second man is from heaven. ⁴⁸As was the man of dust, so also are those who are of the dust, and as is the man of heaven, nso also are those who are of heaven. ⁴⁹Just oas we have borne the image of the man of dust, pwe shall6 also bear the image of the man of heaven.

Mystery and Victory

⁵⁰I tell you this, brothers: qflesh and blood rcannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. ⁵¹Behold! I tell you a mystery. sWe shall not all sleep, tbut we shall all be changed, ⁵²in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For uthe trumpet will sound, and vthe dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. ⁵³For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and wthis mortal body must put on immortality. ⁵⁴When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written:

x“Death is swallowed up in victory.”

⁵⁵y“O death, where is your victory?

O death, where is your sting?”

⁵⁶The sting of death is sin, and zthe power of sin is the law. ⁵⁷But thanks be to God, awho gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

⁵⁸bTherefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in cthe work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord dyour labor is not in vain.