"You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt lose its savor, in what way shall it be salted? It is henceforth good for nothing but to be thrown out and trodden under foot of men.

"Behold! the birds in the sky! They neither sow, nor reap, nor gather into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them; and are not you worth more than they?

"Why be anxious then about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow. They toil not, neither do they spin.

Then he told them many truths in parables. "Behold," he said, "the sower went forth to sow; and as he sowed, some seed fell by the roadside, and the birds came and ate it. read more. Some fell on rocky ground where there was not much earth. Now because it had no depth of soil, it sprang up at once; but when the sun rose it was scorched, and withered away because it had no root. Some fell among thorns, and the thorns sprang up and choked it. But some fell on good soil, and bore a crop, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. He who has ears, let him hear!"

He told them another parable. He said, "The kingdom of heaven is like leaven which a woman took and hid in three measures of flour, until the whole was leavened."

That is why God has given them up to passions of dishonor; for on the one hand their women actually changed the natural function of sex into that which is against nature;

For when Gentiles, who have no law, obey by natural instinct the commands of the Law, they even though they have no law, are a law to themselves.

And shall not those who are physically uncircumcised, but who keep the Law, condemn you who are a breaker of the Law, although you have a written law and circumcision?

for if God spared not the natural branches, neither will he spare you.

For if you were cut out of that which is by nature a mere wild olive tree, and have been grafted, contrary to nature, into a fruitful olive tree, how much more shall these, the natural branches, be regrafted into their own olive tree?

Nor does nature itself teach you that it is a disgrace to a man to have long hair,

And when you sow the seed you are not sowing the body that it will become, but bare grain, of wheat perhaps, or some other grain. But God gives it what body he pleases, and to each kind of seed its own body.

"We are Jews by birth, and not 'Gentile sinners';

But once, when you Gentiles had no knowledge of God, you were slaves to gods which have no real being.

And among them we all once passed our lives, indulging the passions of our flesh, carrying out the dictates of our senses and temperament, and were by nature the children of wrath like all the rest.

For while every kind of beast and bird, and of reptiles and sea-creatures are tamable, and actually have been tamed by mankind,

By these he has granted his promises to us, precious and splendid; so that through them you may become partners of the divine nature, now that you have escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.

Nor does nature itself teach you that it is a disgrace to a man to have long hair,

And among them we all once passed our lives, indulging the passions of our flesh, carrying out the dictates of our senses and temperament, and were by nature the children of wrath like all the rest.

For they only disciplined us for a few days, as seemed good to them; but he does it for our profit, that we may share his holiness.

By these he has granted his promises to us, precious and splendid; so that through them you may become partners of the divine nature, now that you have escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.

For if you were cut out of that which is by nature a mere wild olive tree, and have been grafted, contrary to nature, into a fruitful olive tree, how much more shall these, the natural branches, be regrafted into their own olive tree?

Nor does nature itself teach you that it is a disgrace to a man to have long hair,

"We are Jews by birth, and not 'Gentile sinners';

And among them we all once passed our lives, indulging the passions of our flesh, carrying out the dictates of our senses and temperament, and were by nature the children of wrath like all the rest.