“Indeed, a time is coming,” ¹  says the Lord, ²  “when I will cause people and animals to sprout up in the lands of Israel and Judah. ³ 

you will give a young bull for a sin offering to the Levitical priests who are descended from Zadok, who approach me to minister to me, declares the sovereign Lord.

“We are descendants ¹  of Abraham,” they replied, ²  “and have never been anyone’s slaves! How can you say, ³  ‘You will become free’?”

I know that you are Abraham’s descendants. ¹  But you want ²  to kill me, because my teaching ³  makes no progress among you. ⁴ 

But God spoke as follows: ‘Your ¹  descendants will be foreigners ²  in a foreign country, whose citizens will enslave them and mistreat them for four hundred years. ³ 

For the promise ¹  to Abraham or to his descendants that he would inherit the world was not fulfilled through the law, but through the righteousness that comes by faith.

But his father refused and said, “I know, my son, I know. He too will become a nation and he too will become great. In spite of this, his younger brother will be even greater and his descendants will become a multitude ¹  of nations.”

When Pharaoh stubbornly refused ¹  to release us, the Lord killed all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of people to the firstborn of animals. ²  That is why I am sacrificing ³  to the Lord the first male offspring of every womb, but all my firstborn sons I redeem.’

Say to them, ‘Throughout your generations, ¹  if any man from all your descendants approaches the holy offerings which the Israelites consecrate ²  to the Lord while he is impure, ³  that person must be cut off from before me. ⁴  I am the Lord.

No man ¹  from the descendants of Aaron who is diseased or has a discharge ²  may eat the holy offerings until he becomes clean. The one ³  who touches anything made unclean by contact with a dead person, ⁴  or a man who has a seminal emission, ⁵ 

He will love and bless you, and make you numerous. He will bless you with many children, ¹  with the produce of your soil, your grain, your new wine, your oil, the offspring of your oxen, and the young of your flocks in the land which he promised your ancestors to give you.

The Lord your God will make the labor of your hands ¹  abundantly successful and multiply your children, ²  the offspring of your cattle, and the produce of your soil. For the Lord your God will once more ³  rejoice over you to make you prosperous ⁴  just as he rejoiced over your ancestors,

The Lord sent a messenger ¹  and he wiped out all the soldiers, princes, and officers in the army of the king of Assyria. So Sennacherib ²  returned home humiliated. ³  When he entered the temple of his god, some of his own sons ⁴  struck him down with the sword.

So I, the Lord, tell you not to be afraid, you descendants of Jacob, my servants. ¹  Do not be terrified, people of Israel. For I will rescue you and your descendants from a faraway land where you are captives. ²  The descendants of Jacob will return to their land and enjoy peace. They will be secure and no one will terrify them. ³ 

and say to them: “‘This is what the sovereign Lord says: On the day I chose Israel I swore ¹  to the descendants ²  of the house of Jacob and made myself known to them in the land of Egypt. I swore ³  to them, “I am the Lord your God.”

This is the record ¹  of the family line ²  of Adam. When God created humankind, ³  he made them ⁴  in the likeness of God.

“Look! I now confirm ¹  my covenant with you and your descendants after you ² 

But I will execute judgment on the nation that they will serve. ¹  Afterward they will come out with many possessions.

Then I will confirm my covenant ¹  between me and you, and I will give you a multitude of descendants.” ² 

I will make you ¹  extremely ²  fruitful. I will make nations of you, and kings will descend from you. ³