Ecclesiastes 7:27

I, the Preacher, was king over Israel in Jerusalem.

The words of the Preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem:

But the Lord said to him, “Go your way, for he is my chosen vessel to bear my name before the nations and kings, and the children of Israel.

For this I was appointed as a preacher, an apostle, and a teacher of the Gentiles.

The beginning of the words of his mouth is foolishness; and the end of his talk is mischievous madness.

I tell the truth in Christ. I am not lying, my conscience testifying with me in the Holy Spirit

To me, the very least of all saints, was this grace given, to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ,

Let not many of you be teachers, my brothers, knowing that we will receive heavier judgment.

I applied my heart to seek and to search out by wisdom concerning all that is done under the sky. It is a heavy burden that God has given to the sons of men to be afflicted with.

delivering you from the people, and from the Gentiles, to whom I send you,

Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, set apart for the Good News of God,

Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Haven’t I seen Jesus Christ, our Lord? Aren’t you my work in the Lord?

Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ according to the commandment of God our Savior and the Lord Jesus Christ our hope;

The sons of Jacob came in from the field when they heard it. The men were grieved, and they were very angry, because he had done folly in Israel in lying with Jacob’s daughter, a thing ought not to be done.

Get up! Sanctify the people, and say, ‘Sanctify yourselves for tomorrow, for Yahweh, the God of Israel, says, “There is a devoted thing among you, Israel. You cannot stand before your enemies until you take away the devoted thing from among you.”

She answered him, “No, my brother, do not force me! For no such thing ought to be done in Israel. Don’t you do this folly.

Solomon reigned in Jerusalem over all Israel forty years.

You have also appointed prophets to proclaim of you at Jerusalem, saying, ‘There is a king in Judah!’ Now it will be reported to the king according to these words. Come now therefore, and let’s take counsel together.”

I have proclaimed glad news of righteousness in the great assembly. Behold, I will not seal my lips, Yahweh, you know.

The works of his hands are truth and justice. All his precepts are sure.

The proverbs of Solomon, the son of David, king of Israel:

so as to turn your ear to wisdom, and apply your heart to understanding;

Let a bear robbed of her cubs meet a man, rather than a fool in his folly.

Turn your ear, and listen to the words of the wise. Apply your heart to my teaching.

As a dog that returns to his vomit, so is a fool who repeats his folly.

I searched in my heart how to cheer my flesh with wine, my heart yet guiding me with wisdom, and how to lay hold of folly, until I might see what it was good for the sons of men that they should do under heaven all the days of their lives.

I turned myself to consider wisdom, madness, and folly; for what can the king’s successor do? Just that which has been done long ago.

Then I said in my heart, “As it happens to the fool, so will it happen even to me; and why was I then more wise?” Then I said in my heart that this also is vanity.

Therefore I began to cause my heart to despair concerning all the labor in which I had labored under the sun.

I turned around, and my heart sought to know and to search out, and to seek wisdom and the scheme of things, and to know that wickedness is stupidity, and that foolishness is madness.

All this I have seen, and applied my mind to every work that is done under the sun. There is a time in which one man has power over another to his hurt.

When I applied my heart to know wisdom, and to see the business that is done on the earth (even though eyes see no sleep day or night),

For all this I laid to my heart, even to explore all this: that the righteous, and the wise, and their works, are in the hand of God; whether it is love or hatred, man doesn’t know it; all is before them.

This is an evil in all that is done under the sun, that there is one event to all: yes also, the heart of the sons of men is full of evil, and madness is in their heart while they live, and after that they go to the dead.

The Preacher sought to find out acceptable words, and that which was written blamelessly, words of truth.

The Lord Yahweh’s Spirit is on me, because Yahweh has anointed me to preach good news to the humble. He has sent me to bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and release to those who are bound,

covetings, wickedness, deceit, lustful desires, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, and foolishness.

John answered, “A man can receive nothing unless it has been given him from heaven.

The Jews therefore said among themselves, “Where will this man go that we won’t find him? Will he go to the Dispersion among the Greeks, and teach the Greeks?

You didn’t choose me, but I chose you and appointed you, that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain; that whatever you will ask of the Father in my name, he may give it to you.

As they served the Lord and fasted, the Holy Spirit said, “Separate Barnabas and Saul for me, for the work to which I have called them.”

When they had arrived, and had gathered the assembly together, they reported all the things that God had done with them, and that he had opened a door of faith to the nations.

But Paul and Barnabas stayed in Antioch, teaching and preaching the word of the Lord, with many others also.

“He said to me, ‘Depart, for I will send you out far from here to the Gentiles.’”

but declared first to them of Damascus, at Jerusalem, and throughout all the country of Judea, and also to the Gentiles, that they should repent and turn to God, doing works worthy of repentance.

For God is my witness, whom I serve in my spirit in the Good News of his Son, how unceasingly I make mention of you always in my prayers,

How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe in him whom they have not heard? How will they hear without a preacher?

For I speak to you who are Gentiles. Since then as I am an apostle to Gentiles, I glorify my ministry;

or service, let’s give ourselves to service; or he who teaches, to his teaching;

that I should be a servant of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles, serving as a priest of the Good News of God, that the offering up of the Gentiles might be made acceptable, sanctified by the Holy Spirit.

Paul, called to be an apostle of Jesus Christ through the will of God, and our brother Sosthenes,

As the truth of Christ is in me, no one will stop me from this boasting in the regions of Achaia.

The God and Father of the Lord Jesus Christ, he who is blessed forever more, knows that I don’t lie.

to reveal his Son in me, that I might preach him among the Gentiles, I didn’t immediately confer with flesh and blood,

Now about the things which I write to you, behold, before God, I’m not lying.

but to the contrary, when they saw that I had been entrusted with the Good News for the uncircumcised, even as Peter with the Good News for the circumcised—

and when they perceived the grace that was given to me, James and Cephas and John, those who were reputed to be pillars, gave to Barnabas and me the right hand of fellowship, that we should go to the Gentiles, and they to the circumcision.

yet knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, even we believed in Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ, and not by the works of the law, because no flesh will be justified by the works of the law.

So then, those who are of faith are blessed with the faithful Abraham.

if it is so that you have heard of the administration of that grace of God which was given me toward you,

but the latter out of love, knowing that I am appointed for the defense of the Good News.

if it is so that you continue in the faith, grounded and steadfast, and not moved away from the hope of the Good News which you heard, which is being proclaimed in all creation under heaven, of which I, Paul, was made a servant.

according to the Good News of the glory of the blessed God, which was committed to my trust.

to which I was appointed a preacher and an apostle—I am telling the truth in Christ, not lying—a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth.

Remember Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, of the offspring of David, according to my Good News,

and didn’t spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah with seven others, a preacher of righteousness, when he brought a flood on the world of the ungodly;

but he was rebuked for his own disobedience. A mute donkey spoke with a man’s voice and stopped the madness of the prophet.

As for you, the anointing which you received from him remains in you, and you don’t need for anyone to teach you. But as his anointing teaches you concerning all things, and is true, and is no lie, and even as it taught you, you will remain in him.

“Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach to it the message that I give you.”