because his only daughter, who was twelve years old, was dying. As Jesus went along, the people were crowding him from every side.

"Take your son," God said, "your only son, Isaac, whom you love so much, and go to the land of Moriah. There on a mountain that I will show you, offer him as a sacrifice to me."

"Don't hurt the boy or do anything to him," he said. "Now I know that you honor and obey God, because you have not kept back your only son from him."

And now, sir, all my relatives have turned against me and are demanding that I hand my son over to them, so that they can kill him for murdering his brother. If they do this, I will be left without a son. They will destroy my last hope and leave my husband without a son to keep his name alive."

"Now go to the town of Zarephath, near Sidon, and stay there. I have commanded a widow who lives there to feed you."

She answered, "By the living LORD your God I swear that I don't have any bread. All I have is a handful of flour in a bowl and a bit of olive oil in a jar. I came here to gather some firewood to take back home and prepare what little I have for my son and me. That will be our last meal, and then we will starve to death."

She said to Elijah, "Man of God, why did you do this to me? Did you come here to remind God of my sins and so cause my son's death?"

Elijah took the boy back downstairs to his mother and said to her, "Look, your son is alive!"

and Elisha said to her, "By this time next year you will be holding a son in your arms." "Oh!" she exclaimed. "Please, sir, don't lie to me. You are a man of God!"

The servant carried the boy back to his mother, who held him in her lap until noon, at which time he died.

"I will fill the descendants of David and the other people of Jerusalem with the spirit of mercy and the spirit of prayer. They will look at the one whom they stabbed to death, and they will mourn for him like those who mourn for an only child. They will mourn bitterly, like those who have lost their first-born son.

People who were in deepest misery praised me, and I helped widows find security.

So Peter got ready and went with them. When he arrived, he was taken to the room upstairs, where all the widows crowded around him, crying and showing him all the shirts and coats that Dorcas had made while she was alive.

Peter reached over and helped her get up. Then he called all the believers, including the widows, and presented her alive to them.

But if a widow has children or grandchildren, they should learn first to carry out their religious duties toward their own family and in this way repay their parents and grandparents, because that is what pleases God.

A widow who is all alone, with no one to take care of her, has placed her hope in God and continues to pray and ask him for his help night and day.

What God the Father considers to be pure and genuine religion is this: to take care of orphans and widows in their suffering and to keep oneself from being corrupted by the world.

Everyone there was crying and mourning for the child. Jesus said, "Don't cry; the child is not dead---she is only sleeping!"

and many Judeans had come to see Martha and Mary to comfort them about their brother's death.