Earlier

All Israel, foreigners and citizens alike, with their elders, officers, and judges, stood on both sides of the ark of the covenant of the LORD facing the Levitical priests who carried it. Half of the people stood in front of Mount Gerizim and half of them in front of Mount Ebal, as Moses the servant of the LORD had commanded earlier, to bless the people of Israel.

Earlier, when David was in Edom, Joab the commander of the army had gone to bury the dead and had struck down every male in Edom.

In earlier times Phinehas son of Eleazar had been in charge of the gatekeepers, and the LORD was with him.

Now the LORD was with Jehoshaphat because he walked in the earlier ways of his father David. He did not seek the Baals,

This is the message that the LORD spoke earlier concerning Moab.

And the ten horns are ten kings who will rise from this kingdom. After them another king, different from the earlier ones, will rise and subdue three kings.

In the third year of the reign of King Belshazzar, a vision appeared to me, Daniel, subsequent to the one that had appeared to me earlier.

…while I was still praying, Gabriel, the man I had seen in the earlier vision, came to me in swift flight about the time of the evening sacrifice.

Are these not the words that the LORD proclaimed through the earlier prophets, when Jerusalem and its surrounding towns were populous and prosperous, and the Negev and the foothills were inhabited?’”

They made their hearts like flint and would not listen to the law or to the words that the LORD of Hosts had sent by His Spirit through the earlier prophets. Therefore great anger came from the LORD of Hosts.

Nicodemus, who had gone to Jesus earlier and who himself was one of them, asked,

Although God overlooked the ignorance of earlier times, He now commands all people everywhere to repent.

I am afraid that when I come again, my God will humble me before you, and I will be grieved over many who have sinned earlier and have not repented of their acts of impurity, sexual immorality, and debauchery.

I already warned you the second time I was with you. So now in my absence I warn those who sinned earlier and everyone else: If I return, I will not spare anyone,