Woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing their babies in those days!

I fear for you that my work for you may have been in vain.

But understand this, that in the last days difficult ¹  times will come.

The magicians said ¹  to Pharaoh, “It is the finger ²  of God!” But Pharaoh’s heart remained hard, ³  and he did not listen to them, just as the Lord had predicted.

not to many peoples of unintelligible speech and difficult language, whose words you cannot understand ¹  – surely if ²  I had sent you to them, they would listen to you!

But Jesus ¹  replied, ²  “Woe to you experts in religious law as well! ³  You load people ⁴  down with burdens difficult to bear, yet you yourselves refuse to touch ⁵  the burdens with even one of your fingers!

‘I know your works as well as your ¹  labor and steadfast endurance, and that you cannot tolerate ²  evil. You have even put to the test ³  those who refer to themselves as apostles (but are not), and have discovered that they are false.

The Philistines stayed right on the heels ¹  of Saul and his sons. They ²  struck down Saul’s sons Jonathan, Abinadab, and Malki-Shua.

If a man dies, will he live again? ¹  All the days of my hard service ²  I will wait ³  until my release comes. ⁴ 

I reported, ¹  “All of them are the most stubborn of rebels! ²  They are as hard as bronze or iron. They go about telling lies. They all deal corruptly.

But the gate is narrow and the way is difficult that leads to life, and there are few who find it.

But because of your stubbornness ¹  and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath for yourselves in the day of wrath, when God’s righteous judgment is revealed! ² 

in hard work and toil, ¹  through many sleepless nights, in hunger and thirst, many times without food, in cold and without enough clothing. ² 

Now we ask you, brothers and sisters, ¹  to acknowledge those who labor among you and preside over you in the Lord and admonish you,

ram skins dyed red, ¹  fine leather, ²  acacia ³  wood,

He made the frames ¹  for the tabernacle of acacia wood ²  as uprights. ³ 

The rest ¹  turned and ran toward the wilderness, heading toward the cliff of Rimmon. But the Israelites ²  caught ³  five thousand of them on the main roads. They stayed right on their heels ⁴  all the way to Gidom and struck down two thousand more.

The king ¹  said to him, ‘I will judge you by your own words, ²  you wicked slave! ³  So you knew, did you, that I was a severe ⁴  man, withdrawing what I didn’t deposit and reaping what I didn’t sow?

By all these things, ¹  I have shown you that by working in this way we must help ²  the weak, ³  and remember the words of the Lord Jesus that he himself said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’” ⁴ 

The ¹  sky ²  above your heads will be bronze and the earth beneath you iron.