“Be ¹  careful not to display your righteousness merely to be seen by people. ²  Otherwise you have no reward with your Father in heaven.

Do not give what is holy to dogs or throw your pearls before pigs; otherwise they will trample them under their feet and turn around and tear you to pieces. ¹ 

Now ¹  they wanted to arrest him (but they feared the crowd), because they realized that he told this parable against them. So ²  they left him and went away. ³ 

Two days before the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the chief priests and the experts in the law ¹  were trying to find a way ²  to arrest Jesus ³  by stealth and kill him.

For this reason the Jewish leaders ¹  were trying even harder to kill him, because not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was also calling God his own Father, thus making himself equal with God.

The person who speaks on his own authority ¹  desires ²  to receive honor ³  for himself; the one who desires ⁴  the honor ⁵  of the one who sent him is a man of integrity, ⁶  and there is no unrighteousness in him.

Then the people ¹  who were with Mary ²  in the house consoling her saw her ³  get up quickly and go out. They followed her, because they thought she was going to the tomb to weep ⁴  there.

(Now the slaves ¹  and the guards ²  were standing around a charcoal fire they had made, warming themselves because it was cold. ³  Peter also was standing with them, warming himself.) ⁴ 

Meanwhile Simon Peter was standing in the courtyard ¹  warming himself. They said to him, “You aren’t one of his disciples too, are you?” ²  Peter ³  denied it: “I am not!”

saying, “We gave ¹  you strict orders ²  not to teach in this name. ³  Look, ⁴  you have filled Jerusalem ⁵  with your teaching, and you intend to bring this man’s blood ⁶  on us!”

But some men from the Synagogue ¹  of the Freedmen (as it was called), ²  both Cyrenians and Alexandrians, as well as some from Cilicia and the province of Asia, ³  stood up and argued with Stephen.

Now while Peter was puzzling over ¹  what the vision he had seen could signify, the men sent by Cornelius had learned where Simon’s house was ²  and approached ³  the gate.

but since it concerns points of disagreement ¹  about words and names and your own law, settle ²  it yourselves. I will not be ³  a judge of these things!”

And why not say, “Let us do evil so that good may come of it”? – as some who slander us allege that we say. ¹  (Their ²  condemnation is deserved!)

For ignoring the righteousness that comes from God, and seeking instead to establish their own righteousness, they did not submit to God’s righteousness.

(for rulers cause no fear for good conduct but for bad). Do you desire not to fear authority? Do good and you will receive its commendation,

For the one who was called in the Lord as a slave is the Lord’s freedman. In the same way, the one who was called as a free person is Christ’s slave.

I am saying this for your benefit, not to place a limitation on you, but so that without distraction you may give notable and constant service to the Lord.

If from a human point of view I fought with wild beasts at Ephesus, ¹  what did it benefit me? If the dead are not raised, let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die. ² 

And what I am doing I will continue to do, so that I may eliminate any opportunity for those who want a chance to be regarded as our equals ¹  in the things they boast about.