SONG OF SOLOMON 7

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Admiration by the Bridegroom7:1 “How beautiful are your feet in sandals,

O prince’s daughter!

The curves of your hips are like jewels,

The work of the hands of an artist.

2 “Your navel is like a round goblet

Which never lacks mixed wine;

Your belly is like a heap of wheat

Fenced about with lilies.

3 “Your two breasts are like two fawns,

Twins of a gazelle.

4 “Your neck is like a tower of ivory,

Your eyes like the pools in Heshbon

By the gate of Bath-rabbim;

Your nose is like the tower of Lebanon,

Which faces toward Damascus.

5 “Your head crowns you like Carmel,

And the flowing locks of your head are like purple threads;

The king is captivated by your tresses.

6 “How beautiful and how delightful you are,

My love, with all your charms!

7 “Your stature is like a palm tree,

And your breasts are like its clusters.

8 “I said, ‘I will climb the palm tree,

I will take hold of its fruit stalks.’

Oh, may your breasts be like clusters of the vine,

And the fragrance of your breath like apples,

9 And your mouth like the best wine!”

“It goes

down smoothly for my beloved,

Flowing gently through the lips of those who fall asleep.

The Union of Love10 “I am my beloved’s,

And his desire is for me.

11 “Come, my beloved, let us go out into the country,

Let us spend the night in the villages.

12 “Let us rise early and go to the vineyards;

Let us see whether the vine has budded

And its blossoms have opened,

And whether the pomegranates have bloomed.

There I will give you my love.

13 “The mandrakes have given forth fragrance;

And over our doors are all choice fruits,

Both new and old,

Which I have saved up for you, my beloved.

SONG OF SOLOMON 8

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The Lovers Speak8:1 “Oh that you were like a brother to me

Who nursed at my mother’s breasts.

If I found you outdoors, I would kiss you;

No one would despise me, either.

2 “I would lead you and bring you

Into the house of my mother, who used to instruct me;

I would give you spiced wine to drink from the juice of my pomegranates.

3 “Let his left hand be under my head

And his right hand embrace me.”

4 “I want you to swear, O daughters of Jerusalem,

Do not arouse or awaken my love

Until she pleases.”

5 “Who is this coming up from the wilderness

Leaning on her beloved?”

“Beneath the apple tree I awakened you;

There your mother was in labor with you,

There she was in labor and gave you birth.

6 “Put me like a seal over your heart,

Like a seal on your arm.

For love is as strong as death,

Jealousy is as severe as Sheol;

Its flashes are flashes of fire,

The very flame of the LORD.

7 “Many waters cannot quench love,

Nor will rivers overflow it;

If a man were to give all the riches of his house for love,

It would be utterly despised.”

8 “We have a little sister,

And she has no breasts;

What shall we do for our sister

On the day when she is spoken for?

9 “If she is a wall,

We will build on her a battlement of silver;

But if she is a door,

We will barricade her with planks of cedar.”

10 “I was a wall, and my breasts were like towers;

Then I became in his eyes as one who finds peace.

11 “Solomon had a vineyard at Baal-hamon;

He entrusted the vineyard to caretakers.

Each one was to bring a thousand shekels of silver for its fruit.

12 “My very own vineyard is at my disposal;

The thousand shekels are for you, Solomon,

And two hundred are for those who take care of its fruit.”

13 “O you who sit in the gardens,

My companions are listening for your voice--

Let me hear it!”

14 “Hurry, my beloved,

And be like a gazelle or a young stag

On the mountains of spices.”

PROVERBS 2

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The Pursuit of Wisdom Brings Security2:1 My son, if you will receive my words

And treasure my commandments within you,

2 Make your ear attentive to wisdom,

Incline your heart to understanding;

3 For if you cry for discernment,

Lift your voice for understanding;

4 If you seek her as silver

And search for her as for hidden treasures;

5 Then you will discern the fear of the LORD

And discover the knowledge of God.

6 For the LORD gives wisdom;

From His mouth come knowledge and understanding.

7 He stores up sound wisdom for the upright;

He is a shield to those who walk in integrity,

8 Guarding the paths of justice,

And He preserves the way of His godly ones.

9 Then you will discern righteousness and justice

And equity and every good course.

10 For wisdom will enter your heart

And knowledge will be pleasant to your soul;

11 Discretion will guard you,

Understanding will watch over you,

12 To deliver you from the way of evil,

From the man who speaks perverse things;

13 From those who leave the paths of uprightness

To walk in the ways of darkness;

14 Who delight in doing evil

And rejoice in the perversity of evil;

15 Whose paths are crooked,

And who are devious in their ways;

16 To deliver you from the strange woman,

From the adulteress who flatters with her words;

17 That leaves the companion of her youth

And forgets the covenant of her God;

18 For her house sinks down to death

And her tracks lead to the dead;

19 None who go to her return again,

Nor do they reach the paths of life.

20 So you will walk in the way of good men

And keep to the paths of the righteous.

21 For the upright will live in the land

And the blameless will remain in it;

22 But the wicked will be cut off from the land

And the treacherous will be uprooted from it.

2 TIMOTHY 3

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“Difficult Times Will Come”  3:1 But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come. 2 For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, 3 unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, 4 treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, 5 holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power; Avoid such men as these. 6 For among them are those who enter into households and captivate weak women weighed down with sins, led on by various impulses, 7 always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. 8 Just as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so these men also oppose the truth, men of depraved mind, rejected in regard to the faith. 9 But they will not make further progress; for their folly will be obvious to all, just as Jannes’s and Jambres’s folly was also.
    10 Now you followed my teaching, conduct, purpose, faith, patience, love, perseverance, 11 persecutions, and sufferings, such as happened to me at Antioch, at Iconium and at Lystra; what persecutions I endured, and out of them all the Lord rescued me! 12 Indeed, all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. 13 But evil men and impostors will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. 14 You, however, continue in the things you have learned and become convinced of, knowing from whom you have learned them, 15 and that from childhood you have known the sacred writings which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. 16 All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; 17 so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work.