"Jerusalem, Jerusalem! You kill the prophets, you stone the messengers God has sent you! How many times I wanted to put my arms around all your people, just as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you would not let me!

How can you say that you are wise and that you know my laws? Look, the laws have been changed by dishonest scribes.

But concerning Israel he says, "All day long I held out my hands to welcome a disobedient and rebellious people."

In our work together with God, then, we beg you who have received God's grace not to let it be wasted.

I refuse to reject the grace of God. But if a person is put right with God through the Law, it means that Christ died for nothing!

For I have not held back from announcing to you the whole purpose of God.

All things are done according to God's plan and decision; and God chose us to be his own people in union with Christ because of his own purpose, based on what he had decided from the very beginning.