And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in strips of cloth and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.

(just as it is written in the law of the Lord, "Every firstborn male will be set apart to the Lord"),

because those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that his Son would be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters.

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation,

He is the head of the body, the church, as well as the beginning, the firstborn from among the dead, so that he himself may become first in all things.

But when he again brings his firstborn into the world, he says, "Let all the angels of God worship him!"

By faith he kept the Passover and the sprinkling of the blood, so that the one who destroyed the firstborn would not touch them.

and congregation of the firstborn, who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous, who have been made perfect,

and from Jesus Christ -- the faithful witness, the firstborn from among the dead, the ruler over the kings of the earth. To the one who loves us and has set us free from our sins at the cost of his own blood