Working through Forest Deal's comments on UDB HEB

59-HEB.usfm

@@ -66,8 +66,6 @@
 
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 \v 1 So, since that is true, we must pay very great attention to what we have heard about God's Son, so that we do not gradually stop believing it.
 
@@ -92,7 +90,7 @@
 \p God has determined that mankind will rule over everything. That means that nothing will be left out from him ruling it. But now, at this present time, we do not see mankind ruling over everything.
 
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-\v 9 However, we do know about Jesus, who appeared in this life as a little less important than the angels. Because he suffered and died, God has made him the most important of all. He has made Jesus king over everything, because Jesus died for all mankind. It was because God was so kind to us that this happened.
+\v 9 However, we do know about Jesus, who appeared in this life as a little less important than the angels. Because he suffered and died, God has made him the most important of all. He has made Jesus king over everything because Jesus died for all mankind. It was because God was so kind to us that this happened.
 
 
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@@ -124,8 +122,6 @@
 
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 \v 1 My fellow believers, God has set you apart and has chosen you to belong to himself. So consider Jesus. He is God's apostle to us and is also the high priest whom we say we believe in together.
 \v 2 He faithfully served God, who appointed him, just like Moses faithfully served all of God's people, whom we call God's house.
@@ -151,17 +147,17 @@
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 \v 12 So, fellow believers, be careful that none of you stops trusting in Christ because of evil in your heart, which would cause you to reject the only God who actually lives.
-\v 13 Instead, each of you must encourage each other every day, while you still have the opportunity. If you are stubborn, others will deceive you and lead you to sin.
+\v 13 Instead, each of you must encourage each other every day while you still have the opportunity. If you are stubborn, others will deceive you and lead you to sin.
 
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-\v 14 We are now joined to Christ if we continue to seriously and confidently trust in him, from the time we first trusted in him to the time when we die.
+\v 14 We are now joined to Christ if we continue to seriously and confidently trust in him from the time we first trusted in him to the time when we die.
 \v 15 The psalmist wrote in the scripture that God said,
-\q "Now, when you hear me speaking to you, do not stubbornly disobey me as your ancestors did when they rebelled against me."
+\q "If you hear me speaking to you today, do not stubbornly disobey me as your ancestors did when they rebelled against me."
 
 
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-\v 16 Remember who it was who rebelled against God, even though they heard him speak to them. It was all of God's people who Moses led out of Egypt.
+\v 16 Who were the ones who rebelled against God even though they heard him speak to them? It was all of God's people who Moses led out of Egypt.
 \v 17 And remember who it was with whom God was disgusted for forty years. It was God's people who sinned, and their dead bodies lay there in the desert.
 \v 18 And remember about whom God solemnly declared, "They will not enter the land where I would let them rest." It was those Israelites who disobeyed God.
 \v 19 So, from that example we know that it was because they did not keep trusting in God that they were unable to enter the land where God would allow them to rest.
@@ -169,8 +165,6 @@
 
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 \v 1 God has promised that we would rest, but we must be careful, because we can miss God's place of rest.
 \v 2 We have heard the good news about how Jesus gives us God's rest, just as the Israelites heard God promise that they would rest in Canaan. But just as that message did not help many Israelites because they did not trust God as Joshua and Caleb did, the good news about Christ will not help us if we do not trust God.
@@ -179,8 +173,8 @@
 \v 3 We who have believed in Christ are able to enter the place of rest because God said,
 \q "Because I was angry with the people of Israel, I solemnly declared, 'They will not enter the land where I would let them rest.'"
 \p God said this even though his plans had been finished from the time he created the world.
-\v 4 What was written in the scriptures about the seventh day after he had spent six days creating the world, shows that this is true:
-\q "Then, on the seventh day, God rested from his work of creating everything."
+\v 4 In fact, somewhere in the Scriptures God spoke about the seventh day using these words:
+\q "Then, on the seventh day, God rested from his work."
 \p
 \v 5 But note again what God said about the Israelites in the passage that I quoted previously:
 \q "They will not enter the land where I would let them rest."
@@ -197,8 +191,6 @@
 \v 8 If Joshua had led the Israelites to enter the only place of resting God would give them, then much later God would not have spoken again about another day of rest. But he did give them another promise of rest.
 \v 9 So, just as God rested on the seventh day after he finished creating everything, there remains a time when God's people will rest eternally.
 \v 10 Whoever enters God's place of resting has ceased from his work, just as God finished doing his work of creating everything.
-
-
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 \v 11 So we eagerly enter into the rest of God by following Christ, so that the example of those who disobey will not influence us and ruin us too.
 
@@ -206,14 +198,12 @@
 \v 12 God's words are alive and powerful, and they are able to cut like a sharp sword—cutting so deep that it can separate out the difference between our soul and our spirit. God's words are just like a sword that cuts deeply, down so deep they can cut into us like a sharp sword cuts through the joints of an animal. Those words cut even into the hardest places in us, like a sword that can cut down into the marrow within the bones. God's words are like a judge, deciding what thoughts are good or what thoughts are bad, and his words test the motives hidden deep within each of our hearts.
 \v 13 God knows everything about everyone. Nothing is hidden from him. Everything is completely open to him and he sees everything we do. We must all appear before God and we must tell him how we have lived our lives.
 
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 \v 14 So we have a great high priest who ascended through the heavens when he returned to God's presence. He is Jesus, God's Son. So let us courageously say openly that we trust Jesus Christ.
 \v 15 Our high priest can indeed have mercy on us and encourage us, we who tend to sin easily, because Satan also tempted him to sin in every way that he tempts us to sin—but he did not sin.
 \v 16 So let us come boldly to Christ, who rules from heaven and does for us what we do not deserve, so that he might kindly help us and have mercy on us when we need him to do so.
 
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@@ -239,16 +229,13 @@
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 \v 9 By accomplishing everything that God wanted him to do, he has now become fully able to save eternally all who obey him.
 \v 10 God has designated him to be our high priest in the way that Melchizedek was a high priest.
-
-
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 \v 11 I want to tell you much about the many ways in which Christ resembles Melchizedek. This is hard for me to explain to you because you find it so difficult to understand.
 
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 \v 12 You became Christians long ago. So by now you should be teaching God's truths to others. But you still need someone to teach you again the elementary truths of the words of God from the scriptures, starting from the beginning. You need those basic truths like babies need milk. You are not ready to learn more difficult things, things that are like the solid food that mature people need.
 \v 13 Remember that those who are still learning these elementary truths do not understand what God says about becoming righteous. Neither do they yet know right from wrong. They are just like babies who need milk!
-\v 14 But the more difficult spiritual truth is for people who know God better, just like solid food is for people who are adults. They can tell the difference between what is good and what is evil, because they have trained themselves by learning what is right and what is wrong.
-
+\v 14 But the more difficult spiritual truth is for people who know God better, just like solid food is for people who are adults. They can tell the difference between what is good and what is evil because they have trained themselves by learning what is right and what is wrong.
 
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@@ -267,9 +254,10 @@
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 \v 9 You can see that I am warning you, dear friends, not to reject Christ. At the same time, I am certain that you are doing better than that. You are doing the things that are in conformity with the fact that God is saving you.
 \v 10 Since God always acts justly, he will not overlook all you have done for him; he will not overlook how you have loved and helped your fellow believers, and how you are still helping them.
+
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-\v 11 We greatly desire that each of you continue to show the same effort you are showing now, so that to the very end of your lives, you will be sure you will receive all that God promised to give you.
-\v 12 I do not want you to be lazy. Instead, I want you to do what other believers have done, those who are receiving what God promised them, because they trusted in him and were patient.
+\v 11 We greatly desire that all of you continue to show the same effort you are showing now, so that to the very end of your lives you will be sure you will receive all that God promised to give you.
+\v 12 I do not want you to be lazy. Instead, I want you to do what other believers have done, those who are receiving what God promised them because they trusted in him and were patient.
 
 
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@@ -284,7 +272,7 @@
 \v 18 He did that to strongly encourage us, because he has done two things that cannot change: He promised to help us, and he told us that he would declare himself guilty if he did not help us. Now, God cannot lie. That is why we have trusted in him, just as he has encouraged us to do.
 
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-\v 19 Yes, we confidently expect to receive what God has promised to do for us. It is as if we were a ship, whose anchor is holding us firmly in one place. The one we confidently expect to hold us is Jesus, because he has gone into God's very presence. This is why he is just like the high priests who go behind the curtain into the innermost part of the temple, where God is present.
+\v 19 Yes, we confidently expect to receive what God has promised to do for us. It is as if we were a ship whose anchor is holding us firmly in one place. The one we confidently expect to hold us is Jesus, because he has gone into God's very presence. This is why he is just like the high priests who go behind the curtain into the innermost part of the temple, where God is present.
 \v 20 Jesus went into God's presence ahead of us to allow us to enter in that same place with God, too. Jesus has become a high priest forever, in the way that Melchizedek was a high priest.
 
 
@@ -310,10 +298,10 @@
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 \v 11 God gave the law to his people at the same time he gave regulations about the priests. So if the priests who were descended from Aaron and his ancestor Levi could have provided a way for God to forgive people for disobeying those laws, those priests would have been adequate. In that case, no other priest like Melchizedek would have been necessary.
-\v 12 But we know those priests were not adequate, because a new type of priest like Melchizedek has come. And since God has appointed a new type of priest, he also had to change the law.
+\v 12 But we know those priests were not adequate, because a new type of priest like Melchizedek has come. And since God appointed a new type of priest, he also had to change the law.
 
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-\v 13 Jesus, the one about whom I am saying these things, is not a descendant of Levi. Instead, he came from the tribe of Judah, which never gave any person who served as priest.
+\v 13 Jesus, the one about whom I am saying these things, is not a descendant of Levi. Instead, he comes from the tribe of Judah, which never gave any person who served as priest.
 \v 14 The scriptures clearly state this. And in fact, Moses never said that any of Judah's descendants would become priests.
 
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@@ -351,7 +339,6 @@
 \v 27 The Jewish high priests need to sacrifice animals day by day as well as year by year. They do this, firstly, to cover their own sins, and then to cover the sins of other people. But because Jesus never sinned, he does not need to do that. The only thing he needed to do to save people was to sacrifice himself once, and that is exactly what he did!
 \v 28 We need a high priest like Jesus, because the priests, who were appointed as commanded in the law, sinned like all humans sin. But God solemnly declared after he had given his laws to Moses that he would appoint his Son to be high priest. Now his Son, who is God the Son, Jesus, is forever the only perfect high priest.
 
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@@ -362,17 +349,15 @@
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 \v 3 God appoints every high priest to offer gifts and sacrifices for the people's sins. So since Christ became a high priest, he also had to offer something.
 \v 4 Since there are already priests who offer gifts as God's law requires, if Christ were now living on the earth, he would not be a high priest at all.
-\v 5 The priests in Jerusalem perform rituals that are only a copy of what Christ does in heaven. This is because when Moses was about to set up the sacred tent, God told him, "Be sure that you make everything according to what I showed you on Mount Sinai!"
+\v 5 The priests in Jerusalem perform rituals that are only a copy of what Christ does in heaven. This is why when Moses was about to set up the sacred tent, God told him, "Be sure that you make everything according to what I showed you on Mount Sinai!"
 
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 \v 6 But now Christ serves in a much better way than the Jewish priests do. In the same way, the new covenant that he established between God and people is better than the old one. When he established the new covenant, he promised us better things than the laws that God gave Moses.
-
-
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 \v 7 God needed to make this new covenant, because the first covenant had not done everything well.
 
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-\v 8 Because God declared that the Israelites were guilty of not obeying the first covenant, he wanted a new covenant. This is what a prophet wrote about that:
+\v 8 Because God declared that the Israelites were guilty of not obeying the first covenant he wanted a new covenant. This is what a prophet wrote about that:
 \q "The Lord says, 'Listen! There will soon be a time
 \q when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and the people of Judah.
 \q
@@ -384,20 +369,20 @@
 
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 \v 10 'This is the covenant that I will make with the Israelites,
-\q after the first covenant has ended,' says the Lord:
-\q 'I will enable them to understand my laws,
-\q and I will enable them to obey them sincerely from their hearts.
+\q after the first covenant has ended.
+\q I will enable them to understand my laws,
+\q and I will help them to obey my laws them sincerely and from their hearts.
 \q I will be their God, and they will be my people.
 \q
 
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 \v 11 No one will need to teach a fellow citizen
-\q or tell his fellow kinsmen, 'You acknowledge that the Lord is God,'
+\q or tell his fellow kinsmen, "You acknowledge that the Lord is God,"
 \q because all my people will acknowledge me.
 \q Everyone among my people, from the least important to the most important, will know me.
 \q
 \v 12 I will mercifully forgive them for the wicked things they have done.
-\q I will no longer consider that they are guilty for their sins."
+\q I will no longer consider that they are guilty for their sins.'"
 
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@@ -406,28 +391,25 @@
 
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 \v 1 In the first covenant God regulated how people of Israel should worship, and he told them to make a place to worship him.
 \v 2 The sanctuary that the Israelites set up was the sacred tent. In its outer room there were the lampstand and the table on which they put the bread on display before God. That room was called the holy place.
 
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 \v 3 Behind the curtain on one side of the holy place there was another room. That was called the very holy place.
-\v 4 It had an altar covered with gold for burning incense. It also had the sacred chest. All its sides were covered with gold. In it was the golden pot which contained pieces of the food they called manna. In the chest there was also Aaron's walking stick that had budded to prove that he was God's true priest. In the chest were also the stone tablets on which God had written the Ten Commandments.
-\v 5 On top of the chest were figures of winged creatures that symbolized God's glory. Their wings overshadowed the sacred chest's lid where the high priest sprinkled the blood to atone for the sins of the people. I cannot now write about these things in detail.
+\v 4 There was an altar in the holy place that was covered with gold. It was used for burning incense. The sacred chest was also there. All its sides were covered with gold. In the holy place was the golden pot which contained pieces of the food they called manna. Inside the chest there was also Aaron's walking stick that had budded to prove that he was God's true priest. Inside the chest were also the stone tablets on which God had written the Ten Commandments.
+\v 5 On top of the chest were figures of winged creatures that symbolized God's glory. Their wings overshadowed the sacred chest's lid. This sacred chest was where the high priest sprinkled the blood to atone for the sins of the people. I cannot now write about these things in detail.
 
 
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 \v 6 After they have arranged all these things in this way, the Jewish priests habitually go into the outer room of the tent to do their tasks.
-\v 7 But into the inner room only the high priest goes once a year. He always takes the blood of animals that they have slaughtered. He offers the blood to God for his own sins and for the sins that the other Israelites have committed. This includes the sins they committed but they did not know they were committing sins.
+\v 7 But into the inner room only the high priest goes once a year. He always takes the blood of animals that they have slaughtered. He offers the blood to God for his own sins and for the sins that the other Israelites have committed. This offering of the blood also covered any other sins the people committed when they broke some laws because they didn’t know about them.
 
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 \v 8 By those things the Holy Spirit indicated that God did not reveal the way for ordinary people to enter into the inner room, the very holy place, while the outer room still existed. In a similar way, he did not reveal the way for ordinary people to enter the presence of God while the Jews offered sacrifices in the old way.
-\v 9 This was a symbol for the time in which we are now living. The gifts and sacrifices offered in the sacred tent cannot make a person always know right from wrong or always do right from our hearts and in a way that he pleases God.
-
-\v 10 Those rules about what to eat and drink, and about what to wash—all those rules are no longer any good because God has made a new covenant with us. This new covenant is a much better system.
+\v 9 This was a symbol for the time in which we are now living. The gifts and sacrifices offered in the sacred tent cannot make people always know right from wrong or always do right from their hearts in a way that pleases God.
+\v 10 Those rules about what to eat and drink and about what to wash—all those rules are no longer any good because God has made a new covenant with us. This new covenant is a much better system.
 
 
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@@ -436,8 +418,8 @@
 \v 12 When a high priest goes into the inner room in the tent each year, he takes goats' blood and calves' blood to offer as a sacrifice. But Christ did not do that. It was as though he went into that very holy place only once because he gave his own blood on the cross, just one time. By doing that, he redeemed us forever, because his blood flowed from himself.
 
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-\v 13 The priests sprinkle on people goats' blood and bulls' blood and the water that has been filtered through the ashes of a red heifer that they have completely burned. By performing that ritual, they then say that God will now accept that the people should worship him.
-\v 14 If all that is true, then it became even more true when Christ, who had never sinned, sacrificed himself to God—he did this by the power of God's eternal Spirit. Because he sacrificed himself, God now forgives us for having sinned, for having done things that would have made us die forever. Now it is as though we had never sinned; now we can worship the true God.
+\v 13 The priests sprinkle on the people the blood of goats and bulls with the ashes of the calf that was burned in offering. This act of worship, this sprinking of blood, was the way they were made pure so they could worship God. 
+\v 14 Since all this was true, we see now how much more God has accomplished by the blood of Christ!  By the power of God's eternal Spirit, Christ offered himself to God as the perfect sacrifice for our sins. Now we can serve the living God and no longer do the things that lead to death. 
 
 \p
 \v 15 By dying for us, Christ made for God a new covenant with us. We were trying to please God by means of the first covenant, but we were still guilty of having sinned. When he died, he freed us from having to die for our own sins. As a result, all of us whom God has called to know him will receive what he has promised to give us forever.
@@ -447,7 +429,7 @@
 
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 \v 18 And so God put the first covenant into effect only by means of animals' blood that flowed when the priests sacrificed them.
-\v 19 After Moses had declared to all the Israelites everything that God commanded in the laws that God gave him, he took calves' and goats' blood mixed with water. He dipped into this blood scarlet wool that he tied around a sprig of hyssop. Then he sprinkled with some of the blood the scroll itself containing God's laws. Then he sprinkled more of that blood on all the people.
+\v 19 After Moses had declared to all the Israelites everything that God commanded in the laws that God gave him, he took calves' and goats' blood mixed with water. He tied scarlet wool around a sprig of hyssop and dipped it into this blood. Then with some of the blood he sprinkled the scroll itself, the scroll that contained God's laws.
 \v 20 He said to them, "This is the blood that brings into effect the covenant that God commanded that you obey."
 
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-\v 8 First Christ said, "It is not sacrifices and offerings and animals that the priests have completely burned up and other offerings to atone for those who have sinned that you have really wanted. They have not pleased you." He said that even though those things were offered according to the laws that God gave Moses!
-\v 9 Then, concerning his offering himself as a sacrifice to atone for people's sin, he said, "Listen! I have come here to do what you want me to do!" Thus Christ got rid of the first way of atoning for sin, in order to establish the second way of atoning for sin.
+\v 8 First Christ said, "It is not sacrifices and offerings and animals that the priests have completely burned up and other offerings to atone for those who have sinned that you have really wanted. They have not pleased you." He said that, even though those things were offered according to the laws that God gave Moses!
+\v 9 Then, concerning his offering himself as a sacrifice to atone for people's sin, he said, "Listen! I have come here to do what you want me to do!" God made useless the first offerings and sacrifices and put the sacrifice of Christ in their place.
 \v 10 Because Jesus Christ did what God wanted him to do, God set us apart for himself. This happened when Jesus Christ offered his own body once as a sacrifice, a sacrifice that he will never need to repeat.
 
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 \v 11 As every priest stands daily in front of the altar, he performs rituals and offers the same kind of sacrifices that could never remove the guilt for anyone's sins.
 \v 12 But Christ offered a sacrifice that will be enough forever, and he offered it only one time! After that, he sat down to rule beside God in the place of highest honor.
-\v 13 From now on, he is waiting for God to completely defeat all his enemies.
+\v 13 From now on he is waiting for God to completely defeat all his enemies.
 \v 14 By offering himself once as the sacrifice for sin, he perfected forever those in whom God has worked his cleansing and purity.
 
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-\v 15 The Holy Spirit also confirms to us that that is true. First he says:
+\v 15 The Holy Spirit also confirms to us that that is true. First he said:
 \q
 \v 16 "When the time of the first covenant with my people has finished,
 \q I will make a new covenant with them.
@@ -525,7 +507,8 @@
 \v 19 So, my fellow believers, because we trust in what Jesus accomplished when his own blood flowed for us, we can confidently go into God's very presence that was symbolized by the very holy place in the sacred tent.
 \v 20 He has enabled us to go into God's presence by making a new way in which we can live forever. This new way is Jesus, who died for us.
 \v 21 Christ is a great priest who rules over us, we who are God's people.
-\v 22 So we must approach God sincerely by confidently trusting in Jesus. It is he who has made our hearts pure from having sinned. It is as if he sprinkled his own blood over our hearts, and as if he had washed our bodies in pure water.
+\v 22 So we must approach God sincerely by confidently trusting in Jesus. It is he who had made our hearts pure from having sinned. It is as if he sprinkled his own blood over our hearts and as if he had washed our bodies in pure water.
+
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 \v 23 We must unwaveringly keep stating what we believe. Since God faithfully does all he promised to do, we must confidently expect him to do these things.
 \v 24 And let us think how each of us can best encourage each other to love one another and to do good deeds.
@@ -538,10 +521,10 @@
 
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 \v 28 Everyone who rejected the laws that God gave Moses had to die without mercy when at least two or three people testified against him.
-\v 29 That was severe punishment. But Christ is God's Son, and he is also God. If anyone rejects the covenant that he has made and despises the blood that flowed from him—if that person rejects the blood in exchange for which God forgave him—if that person rejects the Spirit of God, who acted so kindly toward him—then God will punish him very, very severely.
+\v 29 That was a severe punishment. But how much greater punishment would there be for a person who despises the Son of God? If anyone despises the covenant made with the blood of Christ—the blood that purified them from all their sin—what will happen to them? If a person rejects the gracious Spirit of God, who acted so kindly toward him, how much worse would God punish that person? 
 
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-\v 30 We can be sure of this, since we know that God said, "The right and power to give people what they deserve for having sinned belongs to me. I will punish them as they deserve." And Moses wrote, "The Lord will judge his people."
+\v 30 We can be sure of this since we know that God said, "The right and power to give people what they deserve for having sinned belongs to me. I will punish them as they deserve." And Moses wrote, "The Lord will judge his people."
 \v 31 It will be a terrible thing if the all-powerful God who really lives seizes and punishes you!
 
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@@ -552,26 +535,26 @@
 
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 \v 35 So do not become discouraged when they cause you to suffer, because if you continue to trust in God, he will greatly reward you.
-\v 36 You must patiently continue to trust in him in order that, because of your doing what God wants you to do, he will give you what he has promised.
+\v 36 You must learn to be patient, so that you may do what God wants you to do and he will give you what he has promised.
 \v 37 A prophet wrote in the scriptures:
 \q "In just a short time the one I promised would come will surely come;
 \q he will not delay coming.
 \q
 
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-\v 38 But those who belong to me, who act righteously, will continue to live trusting in me.
+\v 38 But those who belong to me, who act righteously, 
+\q will continue to live by trusting in me.
 \q If they are cowards and stop trusting in me,
-\q I will not be pleased with them.
+\q I will not be pleased with them."
 \p
-\v 39 But we are not people who are cowards and cause God to destroy us. Instead, we are people who trust in him, so that he will save us forever.
-
+\v 39 But we are not people who are cowards, those who cause God to destroy us. Instead, we are people who trust in him, and because we trust him, God saves us.
 
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 \c 11
 \p
-\v 1 Faith is when people trust God and they are sure they will receive the things they confidently expect him to give them. Faith is when people are certain they will see those things happen, though, for now, those things cannot be seen.
+\v 1 When we trust in God we are sure that we will receive what we hope for. When we trust in God he gives us proof about things we cannot see. 
 \v 2 Because our ancestors trusted in God, he approved of them.
-\v 3 Because we trust in God, we understand that God formed the universe by commanding that it exist. So the things we see were not made from things that already existed.
+\v 3 Because we trust in God, we understand that God formed the universe by commanding it to exist. So the things we see were not made from things that already existed.
 
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@@ -593,8 +576,8 @@
 \v 10 Abraham was waiting to live in the permanent city that God himself would design and build.
 
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-\v 11 And even though Sarah was unable to have children because of her old-age, Abraham received the ability to father a child, because he considered Yahweh to be faithful because he had made the promise to him that he would have a son. 
-\v 12 So, although Abraham was too old to have children, from that one man people descended who are as many in number as the stars in the sky and are as countless as the grains of sand along the shore, just like God promised him.
+\v 11 And even though Sarah was unable to have children because of her old age, Abraham received the ability to father a child, because he considered Yahweh to be faithful because he had made the promise to him that he would have a son. 
+\v 12 So, although Abraham was too old to have children, from that one man descended people who are as many in number as the stars in the sky and are as countless as the grains of sand along the shore, just as God promised him.
 
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@@ -603,7 +586,7 @@
 
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 \v 15 If they had been thinking that their true native land was the place from which they had come, they could have simply returned there.
-\v 16 But, instead, they desired a better place in which to live. They desired a home in heaven. So God has prepared a city for them to live with him, and he is pleased for them to say that he is their God.
+\v 16 Instead, they desired a better place in which to live. They desired a home in heaven. Therefore, God was pleased for them to call him their God. He even prepared a city for them to live in with him.
 
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@@ -615,14 +598,14 @@
 \p
 \v 20 Because Isaac trusted God, he prayed that God would bless his sons Jacob and Esau after he died.
 \p
-\v 21 Because Jacob trusted God, as he was dying, he prayed God would bless each of the sons of his own son Joseph. He worshiped God as he leaned upon his walking stick before he died.
+\v 21 Because Jacob trusted God, as he was dying he prayed God would bless each of the sons of his own son Joseph. He worshiped God as he leaned upon his walking stick before he died.
 \v 22 Because Joseph trusted God, when he was about to die in Egypt, he thought ahead to the time when the Israelites would leave Egypt, and he instructed his people to carry his bones with them when they left Egypt.
 
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-\v 23 Because Moses' father and mother trusted God, they hid their son for three months shortly after he was born, because they saw that the child was beautiful. They were not afraid of disobeying what the king of Egypt had commanded, that all the Jewish male babies must die.
-\v 24 The daughter of the king, whom they called Pharaoh, raised Moses, but when Moses had grown up, because he trusted God, he refused to accept the royal privileges that would have been his if people considered him as "the son of Pharaoh's daughter."
-\v 25 He decided that it was better for others to mistreat him for a time along with God's people, than to temporarily enjoy living sinfully in the king's palace.
+\v 23 Moses' mother and father show us how they trusted in God. For three months after their son was born they hid him, because they saw that the child was beautiful. They were not afraid of disobeying the command from the king of Egypt. The king's command declared that all the Jewish male babies must be killed.
+\v 24 The daughter of the king whom they called Pharaoh raised Moses, but when Moses had grown up, because he trusted God, he refused to accept the royal privileges that would have been his if people were to call him by the title "Moses, son of Pharaoh's daughter."
+\v 25 He decided that it was better for others to mistreat him for a time along with God's people than to temporarily enjoy living sinfully in the king's palace.
 \v 26 He decided that if he suffered for Christ, it would be worth far more in God's sight than owning the treasures of Egypt that he would receive as one of Pharaoh's family. He looked forward to the time when God would give him an eternal reward.
 
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-\v 29 Because the Israelites trusted God when they walked through the Sea of Reeds, it was as though they were walking on dry land! But, when the army of Egypt also attempted to cross where the sea had been, they drowned, because the sea came back and flooded them!
+\v 29 Because the Israelites trusted God when they walked through the Sea of Reeds, it was as though they were walking on dry land! But when the army of Egypt also attempted to cross where the sea had been, they drowned because the sea came back and flooded them!
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 \v 30 Because the Israelite people trusted God, the walls around the city of Jericho collapsed, after the Israelites marched around the walls for seven days.
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 \v 34 Some escaped from burning up in fire. Some escaped from others who tried to kill them with swords. Some became well again after being sick. Some became powerful when they fought wars. Some caused armies that came from foreign lands to run away from them.
 
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-\v 35 Some women who trusted God received their relatives back again when God made them live again after they had died. But others who trusted God were tortured until they died. They were tortured because they refused to agree when their enemies said, "We will release you if you deny that you believe in God." They refused to do that, because they wanted to live with God forever, which is better than continuing to live on earth.
+\v 35 Some women who trusted God received their relatives back again when God made them live again after they had died. But others who trusted God were tortured until they died. They were tortured because they refused to agree when their enemies said, "We will release you if you deny that you believe in God." They refused to do that because they wanted to live with God forever, which is better than continuing to live on earth.
 \v 36 Other people who trusted God were mocked. Some had their backs cut open by being struck with whips. Some were chained and put in prison.
 \v 37 Some of those believers were stoned to death. Others were sawn completely in two. Others were killed with swords. Others of these people who trusted God wandered around the land wearing garments made only of skins from sheep and goats. They did not have any money. People constantly oppressed them and harmed them.
 \v 38 The people on earth who caused those who trusted in God to suffer like this were so bad that they did not deserve to live with people like those who trusted God. Some who trusted God wandered in deserts and mountains. Some lived in caves and in other large holes in the ground.
 
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-\v 39 Although God approved of all these people because they trusted him, he did not give them what he had promised them.
-\v 40 God knew ahead of time that what he would give us and them later would be better than giving them immediately what he promised. What God intends is that only when they and we are together will we have all that God intends us to have.
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+\v 39 Although God approved of all these people because they trusted him, he had not yet given them all that he had promised for them to have.
+\v 40 God had an even better plan for us. His purpose was that when we are brought together with those who trusted in God before, and we are all gathered together in heaven, then they will receive everything that God had promised to all who trust him, and we will receive every promise together with them. 
 
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