Forbidden Gospels and Epistles, Complete

CHAPTER I.

1 De­mas and Her­mo­genes be­come Paul’s com­pan­ions. 4 Paul vis­its One­sipho­rus. 8 In­vit­ed by De­mos and Her­mo­genes. 11 Preach­es to the house­hold of One­sipho­rus. 12 His ser­mon.

WHEN Paul went up to Ico­ni­um, af­ter his flight from An­ti­och, De­mas and Her­mo­genes be­came his com­pan­ions, who were then full of hypocrisy.

2 But Paul look­ing on­ly at the good­ness of God, did them no harm, but loved them great­ly.

3 Ac­cord­ing­ly he en­deav­oured to make agree­able to them all the or­acles and doc­trines of Christ, and the de­sign of the Gospel of God’s well-​beloved son; in­struct­ing them in the knowl­edge of Christ, as it was re­vealed to him.

4 And a cer­tain man named One­sipho­rus, hear­ing that Paul was come to Ico­ni­um, went out speed­ily to meet him, to­geth­er with his wife Lec­tra, and his sons Sim­mia and Zeno, to in­vite him to their house.

5 For Ti­tus had giv­en them a de­scrip­tion of Paul’s per­son­age, they as yet not know­ing him in per­son, but on­ly be­ing ac­quaint­ed with his char­ac­ter.

6 They went in the king’s high­way to Lystra, and stood there wait­ing for him, com­par­ing all who passed by with that de­scrip­tion which Ti­tus had giv­en them.

7 At length they saw a man com­ing (name­ly Paul), of a low stature, bald on the head; with crooked thighs, hand­some legs, hol­low-​eyes; and a crooked nose; full of grace, for some­times he ap­peared as a man, some­times he had the coun­te­nance of an an­gel. And Paul saw One­sipho­rus, and was glad.

8 And One­sipho­rus said: Hail, thou ser­vant of the blessed God. Paul replied, The grace of God be with thee and thy fam­ily.

9 But De­nies and Her­mo­genes were moved with en­vy, and, un­der a show of great re­li­gion, De­mas said, And are not we al­so ser­vants of the blessed God? Why didst thou not salute us?

10 One­sipho­rus replied, Be­cause I have not per­ceived in you the fruits of righ­teous­ness; nev­er­the­less, if ye are of that sort, ye shall be wel­come to my house al­so.

11 Then Paul went in­to the house of One­sipho­rus, and there was great joy among the fam­ily on that ac­count: and they em­ployed them­selves in prayer, break­ing of bread, and hear­ing Paul preach the word of God con­cern­ing tem­per­ance and the res­ur­rec­tion, in the fol­low­ing man­ner:

12 Blessed are the pure in heart; for they shall see God.

13 Blessed are they who keep their flesh un­de­filed (or pure); for they shall be the tem­ple of God.

14 Blessed are the tem­per­ate (or chaste); for God will re­veal him­self to them.

15 Blessed are they who aban­don their world­ly en­joy­ments; for they shall be ac­cept­ed of God.

16 Blessed are they who have wives, as though they had them not; for they shall be made an­gels of God.

17 Blessed are they who trem­ble at the word of God; for they shall be com­fort­ed.

18 Blessed are they who keep their bap­tism pure; for they shall find peace with the Fa­ther, Son, and Holy Ghost.

19 Blessed are they who pur­sue the wis­dom or doc­trine of Je­sus Christ; for they shall be called the sons of the Most High.

20 Blessed are they who ob­serve the in­struc­tions of Je­sus Christ; for they shall dwell in eter­nal light.

21 Blessed are they, who for the love of Christ aban­don the glo­ries of the world, for they shall judge an­gels, and be placed at the right hand of Christ, and shall not suf­fer the bit­ter­ness of the last judg­ment.

22 Blessed are the bod­ies and souls of vir­gins; for they are ac­cept­able to God, and shall not lose the re­ward of their vir­gin­ity; for the word of their (heav­en­ly) Fa­ther shall prove ef­fec­tu­al to their sal­va­tion in the day of his Son, and they shall en­joy rest for ev­er­more.