Ayub 8:7

8:7 Your beginning ¹  will seem so small,

since your future will flourish. ² 

Yesaya 30:23

30:23 He will water the seed you plant in the ground,

and the ground will produce crops in abundance. ³ 

At that time ⁴  your cattle will graze in wide pastures.

Yesaya 32:15

32:15 This desolation will continue until new life is poured out on us from heaven. ⁵ 

Then the desert will become an orchard

and the orchard will be considered a forest. ⁶ 

Yesaya 32:20

32:20 you will be blessed,

you who plant seed by all the banks of the streams, ⁷ 

you who let your ox and donkey graze. ⁸ 

Matius 13:31-33

The Parable of the Mustard Seed

13:31 He gave ⁹  them another parable: ¹⁰  “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed ¹¹  that a man took and sowed in his field. 13:32 It is the smallest of all the seeds, but when it has grown it is the greatest garden plant and becomes a tree, ¹²  so that the wild birds ¹³  come and nest in its branches.” ¹⁴ 

The Parable of the Yeast

13:33 He told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed with ¹⁵  three measures ¹⁶  of flour until all the dough had risen.” ¹⁷ 

Markus 16:15-16

16:15 He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. 16:16 The one who believes and is baptized will be saved, but the one who does not believe will be condemned.

Kisah Para Rasul 1:15

1:15 In those days ¹⁸  Peter stood up among the believers ¹⁹  (a gathering of about one hundred and twenty people) and said,

Kisah Para Rasul 2:41

2:41 So those who accepted ²⁰  his message ²¹  were baptized, and that day about three thousand people ²²  were added. ²³ 

Kisah Para Rasul 4:4

4:4 But many of those who had listened to ²⁴  the message ²⁵  believed, and the number of the men ²⁶  came to about five thousand.

Kisah Para Rasul 4:1

The Arrest and Trial of Peter and John

4:1 While Peter and John ²⁷  were speaking to the people, the priests and the commander ²⁸  of the temple guard ²⁹  and the Sadducees ³⁰  came up ³¹  to them,

Kolose 3:6-9

3:6 Because of these things the wrath of God is coming on the sons of disobedience. ³²  3:7 You also lived your lives ³³  in this way at one time, when you used to live among them. 3:8 But now, put off all such things ³⁴  as anger, rage, malice, slander, abusive language from your mouth. 3:9 Do not lie to one another since you have put off the old man with its practices

Wahyu 7:9

7:9 After these things I looked, and here was ³⁵  an enormous crowd that no one could count, made up of persons from every nation, tribe, ³⁶  people, and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb dressed in long white robes, and with palm branches in their hands.

[8:7]  ¹ tn The reference to “your beginning” is a reference to Job’s former estate of wealth and peace. The reference to “latter end” is a reference to conditions still in the future. What Job had before will seem so small in comparison to what lies ahead.

[8:7]  ² tn The verb has the idea of “to grow”; here it must mean “to flourish; to grow considerably” or the like. The statement is not so much a prophecy; rather Bildad is saying that “if Job had recourse to God, then….” This will be fulfilled, of course, at the end of the book.

[30:23]  ³ tn Heb “and he will give rain for your seed which you plant in the ground, and food [will be] the produce of the ground, and it will be rich and abundant.”

[30:23]  ⁴ tn Or “in that day” (KJV).

[32:15]  ⁵ tn Heb “until a spirit is emptied out on us from on high.” The words “this desolation will continue” are supplied in the translation for clarification and stylistic purposes. The verb עָרָה (’arah), used here in the Niphal, normally means “lay bare, expose.” The term רוּחַ (ruakh, “spirit”) is often understood here as a reference to the divine spirit (cf. 44:3 and NASB, NIV, CEV, NLT), but it appears here without an article (cf. NRSV “a spirit”), pronominal suffix, or a genitive (such as “of the Lord”). The translation assumes that it carries an impersonal nuance “vivacity, vigor” in this context.

[32:15]  ⁶ sn The same statement appears in 29:17b, where, in conjunction with the preceding line, it appears to picture a reversal. Here it seems to depict supernatural growth. The desert will blossom into an orchard, and the trees of the orchard will multiply and grow tall, becoming a forest.

[32:20]  ⁷ tn Heb “by all the waters.”

[32:20]  ⁸ tn Heb “who set free the foot of the ox and donkey”; NIV “letting your cattle and donkeys range free.”

[32:20]  sn This verse seems to anticipate a time when fertile land is available to cultivate and crops are so abundant that the farm animals can be allowed to graze freely.

[13:31]  ⁹ tn Grk “put before.”

[13:31]  ¹⁰ tn Grk “He set before them another parable, saying.” The participle λέγων (legwn) is redundant and has not been translated.

[13:31]  ¹¹ sn The mustard seed was noted for its tiny size.

[13:32]  ¹² sn This is rhetorical hyperbole, since technically a mustard plant is not a tree. This could refer to one of two types of mustard plant popular in Palestine and would be either ten or twenty-five ft (3 or 7.5 m) tall.

[13:32]  ¹³ tn Grk “the birds of the sky” or “the birds of the heaven”; the Greek word οὐρανός (ouranos) may be translated either “sky” or “heaven,” depending on the context. The idiomatic expression “birds of the sky” refers to wild birds as opposed to domesticated fowl (cf. BDAG 809 s.v. πετεινόν).

[13:32]  ¹⁴ sn The point of the parable seems to be that while the kingdom of God may appear to have insignificant and unnoticeable beginnings (i.e., in the ministry of Jesus), it will someday (i.e., at the second advent) be great and quite expansive. The kingdom, however, is not to be equated with the church, but rather the church is an expression of the kingdom. Also, there is important OT background in the image of the mustard seed that grew and became a tree: Ezek 17:22-24 pictures the reemergence of the Davidic house where people can find calm and shelter. Like the mustard seed, it would start out small but grow to significant size.

[13:33]  ¹⁵ tn Grk “hid in.”

[13:33]  ¹⁶ sn This measure was a saton, the Greek name for the Hebrew term “seah.” Three of these was a very large quantity of flour, since a saton is a little over 16 pounds (7 kg) of dry measure (or 13.13 liters). So this was over 47 lbs (21 kg) of flour total, enough to feed over a hundred people.

[13:33]  ¹⁷ tn Grk “it was all leavened.”

[13:33]  sn The parable of the yeast and the dough teaches that the kingdom of God will start small but eventually grow to permeate everything. Jesus’ point was not to be deceived by its seemingly small start, the same point made in the parable of the mustard seed, which preceded this one.

[1:15]  ¹⁸ tn Grk “And in those days.” Because of the difference between Greek style, which often begins sentences or clauses with “and,” and English style, which generally does not, καί (kai) has not been translated here.

[1:15]  ¹⁹ tn Or “brethren” (but the term includes both male and female believers present in this gathering, as indicated by those named in vv. 13-14).

[2:41]  ²⁰ tn Or “who acknowledged the truth of.”

[2:41]  ²¹ tn Grk “word.”

[2:41]  ²² tn Grk “souls” (here an idiom for the whole person).

[2:41]  ²³ tn Or “were won over.”

[4:4]  ²⁴ tn Or “had heard.”

[4:4]  ²⁵ tn Or “word.”

[4:4]  ²⁶ tn In the historical setting it is likely that only men are referred to here. The Greek term ἀνήρ (anhr) usually refers to males or husbands rather than people in general. Thus to translate “of the people” would give a false impression of the number, since any women and children were apparently not included in the count.

[4:1]  ²⁷ tn Grk “While they”; the referents (Peter and John) have been specified in the translation for clarity.

[4:1]  ²⁸ tn Or “captain.”

[4:1]  ²⁹ tn Grk “the official of the temple,” a title for the commander of the Jewish soldiers guarding the temple (thus the translation, “the commander of the temple guard”). See L&N 37.91.

[4:1]  sn The commander of the temple guard was the title of the officer commanding the Jewish soldiers responsible for guarding and keeping order in the temple courts in Jerusalem.

[4:1]  ³⁰ sn The Sadducees controlled the official political structures of Judaism at this time, being the majority members of the Sanhedrin. They were known as extremely strict on law and order issues (Josephus, J. W. 2.8.2 [2.119], 2.8.14 [2.164-166]; Ant. 13.5.9 [13.171-173], 13.10.6 [13.293-298], 18.1.2 [18.11], 18.1.4 [18.16-17], 20.9.1 [20.199]; Life 2 [10-11]). See also Matt 3:7; 16:1-12; 22:23-34; Mark 12:18-27; Luke 20:27-38; Acts 5:17; 23:6-8.

[4:1]  ³¹ tn Or “approached.” This verb often denotes a sudden appearing (BDAG 418 s.v. ἐφίστημι 1).

[3:6]  ³² tc The words ἐπὶ τοὺς υἱοὺς τῆς ἀπειθείας (epi tou" Juiou" th" apeiqeia", “on the sons of disobedience”) are lacking in Ì⁴⁶ B b sa, but are found in א A C D F G H I Ψ 075 0278 33 1739 1881 Ï lat sy bo. The words are omitted by several English translations (NASB, NIV, ESV, TNIV). This textual problem is quite difficult to resolve. On the one hand, the parallel account in Eph 5:6 has these words, thus providing scribes a motive for adding them here. On the other hand, the reading without the words may be too hard: The ἐν οἷς (en |oi") of v. 7 seems to have no antecedent without υἱούς already in the text, although it could possibly be construed as neuter referring to the vice list in v. 5. Further, although the witness of B is especially important, there are other places in which B and Ì⁴⁶ share errant readings of omission. Nevertheless, the strength of the internal evidence against the longer reading is at least sufficient to cause doubt here. The decision to retain the words in the text is less than certain.

[3:6]  sn The expression sons of disobedience is a Semitic idiom that means “people characterized by disobedience.” In this context it refers to “all those who are disobedient.” Cf. Eph 5:6.

[3:7]  ³³ tn Grk “you also walked.” The verb περιπατέω (peripatew) is commonly used in the NT to refer to behavior or conduct of one’s life (L&N 41.11).

[3:8]  ³⁴ tn The Greek article with τὰ πάντα (ta panta) is anaphoric, referring to the previous list of vices, and has been translated here as “all such things.”

[7:9]  ³⁵ tn The phrase “and here was” expresses the sense of καὶ ἰδού (kai idou).

[7:9]  ³⁶ tn Here καί (kai) has not been translated before each of the following categories, since English normally uses a coordinating conjunction only between the last two elements in a series of three or more.