Duties of servants. The danger of covetousness. Lessons for the rich.

¹ Whoever are servants under the yoke, let them consider their masters to be worthy of every honor, lest the name and doctrine of the Lord be blasphemed.

² But those who have believing masters, let them not despise them because they are brothers, but rather serve them all the more because they are believing and beloved, participants of the same service. Teach and exhort these things.

³ If anyone teaches otherwise, and does not consent to the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to that doctrine which is in accord with piety,

⁴ then he is arrogant, knowing nothing, yet languishing amid the questions and quarrels of words. From these arise envy, contention, blasphemy, evil suspicions:

⁵ the conflicts of men who have been corrupted in mind and deprived of truth, who consider profit to be piety.

⁶ But piety with sufficiency is great gain.

⁷ For we brought nothing into this world, and there is no doubt that we can take nothing away.

⁸ But, having nourishment and some kind of covering, we should be content with these.

⁹ For those who want to become rich fall into temptation and into the snare of the devil and into many useless and harmful desires, which submerge men in destruction and in perdition.

¹⁰ For desire is the root of all evils. Some persons, hungering in this way, have strayed from the faith and have entangled themselves in many sorrows.

¹¹ But you, O man of God, flee from these things, and truly pursue justice, piety, faith, charity, patience, meekness.

¹² Fight the good fight of faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you have been called, and make a good profession of faith in the sight of many witnesses.

¹³ I charge you, in the sight of God, who enlivens all things, and in the sight of Christ Jesus, who gave the testimony of a good profession under Pontius Pilate,

¹⁴ to observe the commandment, immaculately, irreproachably, unto the return of our Lord Jesus Christ.

¹⁵ For at the proper time, he shall reveal the blessed and only Power, the King of kings and the Lord of lords,

¹⁶ who alone holds immortality, and who inhabits the inaccessible light, whom no man has seen, nor even is able to see, to whom is honor and everlasting dominion. Amen.

¹⁷ Instruct the wealthy of this age not to have a superior attitude, nor to hope in the uncertainty of riches, but in the living God, who offers us everything in abundance to enjoy,

¹⁸ and to do good, to become rich in good works, to donate readily, to share,

¹⁹ to gather for themselves the treasure of a good foundation for the future, so that they may obtain true life.

²⁰ O Timothy, guard what has been deposited with you, avoiding the voice of profane novelties and of opposing ideas, which are falsely called knowledge.

The First Letter to Timothy

²¹ Certain persons, promising these things, have perished from the faith. May grace be with you. Amen.