It is God’s will that you should be sanctified: that you should avoid sexual immorality; that each of you should learn to control his own body in a way that is holy and honorable, not in passionate lust like the heathen, who do not know God; and that in this matter no one should wrong his brother or take advantage of him.  (1Th 4:3-6 NIV)

There’s a class of people, who are quite put off if you quote verses like this even if it’s not about the last part that they are concerned: “no one should wrong his brother or take advantage of him.” That’s mainly because people often think that fraud and cheating is much less serious than adultery, and that stealing is quite harmless if compared with infidelity. However its one divine legislator and one Spirit, who admonishes to leave both these temptations and who rejects both as serious sins and crimes…

Live o Lord in our hearts! Let us recognize what we have in you. Let holy deeds flourish, bless and complete your word in our souls by the strength of your Holy Spirit. Amen. (Hermann Bezzel)

Lord you are my witness that my heart is not at peace, but that it falls down before you pleading with great desire that you may grace it with pure simplicity and unify it with you in holy covenant.

Dear Lord, I come to you as I am, lead me to the cross that I be healed by you, who holds heaven and earth in his hands – hold me and heal me. (Wilhelm Löhe, 1808-1872)

This is a translation of Wilhelm Löhe’s devotion for Monday after the Sunday Reminiscere (Second Sunday in Lent), which was shortened somewhat because the 2^nd part was not comprehensible. It’s his  hymn, which was translated literally, but not poetically. Both are found on Pg. 125 in Lob sei Dir ewig, o Jesu!   (Eternal Praise to you o Jesus!) edited by A. Schuster and puplished in the Freimund Verlag, Neuendettelsau 1949.