Special to CosmicTribune.com, November 4, 2022

WORDS OF LIFE

22 Jesus went through one town and village after another, teaching as he made his way to Jerusalem.

23 Someone asked him, ‘Lord, will only a few be saved?’ He said to them, 24 ‘Strive to enter through the narrow door; for many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able.

25 When once the owner of the house has got up and shut the door, and you begin to stand outside and to knock at the door, saying, “Lord, open to us”, then in reply he will say to you, “I do not know where you come from.”

26 Then you will begin to say, “We ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets.”

27 But he will say, “I do not know where you come from; go away from me, all you evildoers!”

28 There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth when you see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrown out.

29 Then people will come from east and west, from north and south, and will eat in the kingdom of God. 30 Indeed, some are last who will be first, and some are first who will be last.’

31 At that very hour some Pharisees came and said to him, ‘Get away from here, for Herod wants to kill you.’

32 He said to them, ‘Go and tell that fox for me, “Listen, I am casting out demons and performing cures today and tomorrow, and on the third day I finish my work.

33 Yet today, tomorrow, and the next day I must be on my way, because it is impossible for a prophet to be killed away from Jerusalem.”

34 Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!

— Luke 13:22-34

²⁰ “‘And you took your sons and daughters whom you bore to me and sacrificed them as food to the idols. Was your prostitution not enough? ²¹ You slaughtered my children and sacrificed them to the idols.

— Ezekiel 16:20-21

⁵⁹ Yes, thus says the Lord God: I will deal with you as you have done, you who have despised the oath, breaking the covenant; ⁶⁰ yet I will remember my covenant with you in the days of your youth, and I will establish with you an everlasting covenant. ⁶¹ Then you will remember your ways, and be ashamed when I^[h] take your sisters, both your elder and your younger, and give them to you as daughters, but not on account of my^[i] covenant with you. ⁶² I will establish my covenant with you, and you shall know that I am the Lord, ⁶³ in order that you may remember and be confounded, and never open your mouth again because of your shame, when I forgive you all that you have done, says the Lord God.

— Ezekiel 16:59-63