For those who have filled the deacon's office wisely and well, are already gaining for themselves an honourable standing, and are acquiring great freedom of speech in proclaiming the faith which rests on Christ Jesus.

But, for fear I may be hindered, I now write, so that you may have rules to guide you in dealing with God's household. For this is what the Church of the ever-living God is, and it is the pillar and foundation-stone of the truth.

through the hypocrisy of men who teach falsely and have their own consciences seared as with a hot iron;

forbidding people to marry, and insisting on abstinence from foods which God has created to be partaken of, with thankfulness, by those who believe and have a clear knowledge of the truth.

If you warn the brethren of these dangers you will be a good and faithful servant of Christ Jesus, inwardly feeding on the lessons of the faith and of the sound teaching of which you have been, and are, so close a follower.

But worldly stories, fit only for credulous old women, have nothing to do with.

and here is the motive of our toiling and wrestling, because we have our hopes fixed on the ever-living God, who is the Saviour of all mankind, and especially of believers.

She must have been true to her one husband, and well reported of for good deeds, as having brought up children, received strangers hospitably, washed the feet of God's people, given relief to the distressed, and devoted herself to good works of every kind.

I would therefore have the younger women marry, bear children, rule in domestic matters, and furnish the Adversary with no excuse for slander.

For already some of them have gone astray, following Satan.

And those who have believing masters should not be wanting in respect towards them because they are their brethren, but should serve them all the more willingly because those who profit by the faithful service rendered are believers and are friends.

and if we have food and clothing, with these we will be satisfied.

For from love of money all sorts of evils arise; and some have so hankered after money as to be led astray from the faith and be pierced through with countless sorrows.

of which some have spoken boastfully in connexion with the true faith, and have erred. Grace be with you all.

of which I have been appointed a preacher, Apostle and teacher, to the Gentiles.

That indeed is the reason why I suffer as I do. But I am not ashamed, for I know in whom my trust reposes, and I am confident that He has it in His power to keep what I have entrusted to Him safe until that day.

Provide yourself with an outline of the sound teaching which you have heard from my lips, and be true to the faith and love which are in Christ Jesus.

Of this you are aware, that all the Christians in Roman Asia have deserted me: and among them Phygelus and Hermogenes.

All that you have been taught by me in the hearing of many witnesses, you must hand on to trusty men who shall themselves, in turn, be competent to instruct others also.

In the matter of the truth they have gone astray, saying that the Resurrection is already past, and so they are overthrowing the faith of some.

destitute of natural affection, unforgiving, slanderers. They will have no self-control, but will be brutal, opposed to goodness,

But they will have no further success; for their folly will be as clearly manifest to all men, as that of the opponents of Moses came to be.

But you have intimately known my teaching, life, aims, faith, patience, love, resignation,

and the persecutions and sufferings which I have endured; the things which happened to me in Antioch, Iconium and Lystra. You know the persecutions I endured, and how the Lord delivered me out of them all.

But you must cling to the things which you have learnt and have been taught to believe, knowing who your teachers were,

and that from infancy you have known the sacred writings which are able to make you wise to obtain salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.

For a time is coming when they will not tolerate wholesome instruction, but, wanting to have their ears tickled, they will find a multitude of teachers to satisfy their own fancies;

I have gone through the glorious contest; I have run the race; I have guarded the faith.

Luke is the only friend I now have with me. Call for Mark on your way and bring him with you, for he is a great help to me in my ministry.

Tychicus I have sent to Ephesus.

I have left you behind in Crete in order that you may set right the things which still require attention, and appoint Elders in every town, as I directed you to do;

This is a faithful saying, and on these various points I would have you insist strenuously, in order that those who have their faith fixed on God may be careful to set an example of good actions. For these are not only good in themselves, but are also useful to mankind.

After a first and second admonition, have nothing further to do with any one who will not be taught;

After I have sent Artemas or Tychicus to you, lose no time in joining me at Nicopolis; for I have decided to pass the winter there.

Help Zenas the lawyer forward on his journey with special care, and Apollos, so that they may have all they require.

because I hear of your love and of the faith which you have towards the Lord Jesus and which you manifest towards all God's people;

For I have found great joy and comfort in your love, because the hearts of God's people have been, and are, refreshed through you, my brother.

I entreat you on behalf of my own child whose father I have become while in my chains--I mean Onesimus.

For to which of the angels did God ever say, "My Son art Thou: I have this day become Thy Father;" and again, "I will be a Father to Him, and He shall be My Son"?

For this reason we ought to pay the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard, for fear we should drift away from them.

For both He who sanctifies and those whom He is sanctifying have all one Father; and for this reason He is not ashamed to speak of them as His brothers;

Therefore I was greatly grieved with that generation, and I said, 'They are ever going astray in heart, and have not learnt to know My paths.'

For we have, all alike, become sharers with Christ, if we really hold our first confidence firm to the End;

Therefore let us be on our guard lest perhaps, while He still leaves us a promise of being admitted to His rest, some one of you should be found to have fallen short of it.

We who have believed are soon to be admitted to the true rest; as He has said, "As I swore in My anger, they shall not be admitted to My rest," although God's works had been going on ever since the creation of the world.

And no created thing is able to escape its scrutiny; but everything lies bare and completely exposed before the eyes of Him with whom we have to do.

Inasmuch, then, as we have in Jesus, the Son of God, a great High Priest who has passed into Heaven itself, let us hold firmly to our profession of faith.

For we have not a High Priest who is unable to feel for us in our weaknesses, but one who was tempted in every respect just as we are tempted, and yet did not sin.

So Christ also did not claim for Himself the honour of being made High Priest, but was appointed to it by Him who said to Him, "My Son art Thou: I have to-day become Thy Father;"

Concerning Him we have much to say, and much that it would be difficult to make clear to you, since you have become so dull of apprehension.

For although, considering the long time you have been believers, you ought now to be teachers of others, you really need some one to teach you over again the very rudiments of the truths of God, and you have come to require milk instead of solid food.

Such persons are mere babes. But solid food is for adults--that is, for those who through constant practice have their spiritual faculties carefully trained to distinguish good from evil.

For it is impossible, in the case of those who have once for all been enlightened, and have tasted the sweetness of the heavenly gift, and have been made partakers of the Holy Spirit,

and have realized how good the word of God is and how mighty are the powers of the coming Age, and then fell away--

But we, even while we speak in this tone, have a happier conviction concerning you, my dearly-loved friends--a conviction of things which point towards salvation.

For God is not unjust so that He is unmindful of your labour and of the love which you have manifested towards Himself in having rendered services to His people and in still rendering them.

He added an oath, in order that, through two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for Him to prove false, we may possess mighty encouragement--we who, for safety, have hastened to lay hold of the hope set before us.

That hope we have as an anchor of the soul--an anchor that can neither break nor drag. It passes in behind the veil,

Now think how great this priest-king must have been to whom Abraham the patriarch gave a tenth part of the best of the spoil.

And those of the descendants of Levi who receive the priesthood are authorized by the Law to take tithes from the people, that is, from their brethren, though these have sprung from Abraham.

On the one hand we have here the abrogation of an earlier code because it was weak and ineffective--

for the Law brought no perfect blessing--but on the other hand we have the bringing in of a new and better hope by means of which we draw near to God.

And they have been appointed priests many in number, because death prevents their continuance in office:

Now in connexion with what we have been saying the chief point is that we have a High Priest who has taken His seat at the right hand of the throne of God's Majesty in the heavens,

Every High Priest, however, is appointed to offer both bloodless gifts and sacrifices. Therefore this High Priest also must have some offering to present.

For if that first Covenant had been free from imperfection, there would have been no attempt to introduce another.

But into the second, the High Priest goes only on one day of the year, and goes alone, taking with him blood, which he offers on his own behalf and on account of the sins which the people have ignorantly committed.

For if the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkling those who have contracted defilement make them holy so as to bring about ceremonial purity,

And because of this He is the negotiator of a new Covenant, in order that, since a life has been given in atonement for the offences committed under the first Covenant, those who have been called may receive the eternal inheritance which has been promised to them.

In that case Christ would have needed to suffer many times, from the creation of the world onwards; but as a matter of fact He has appeared once for all, at the Close of the Ages, in order to do away with sin by the sacrifice of Himself.

For then would not the sacrifices have ceased to be offered, because the consciences of the worshippers--who in that case would now have been cleansed once for all--would no longer be burdened with sins?

Then I said, 'I have come--in the roll of the book it is written concerning Me--to do Thy will, O God.'"

After saying the words I have just quoted, "Sacrifices and offerings or whole burnt-offerings and sin-offerings Thou hast not desired or taken pleasure in" --all such being offered in obedience to the Law--

He then adds, "I have come to do Thy will." He does away with the first in order to establish the second.

It is through that divine will that we have been set free from sin, through the offering of Jesus Christ as our sacrifice once for all.

But where these have been forgiven no further offering for sin is required.

Since then, brethren, we have free access to the Holy place through the blood of Jesus,

and since we have a great Priest who has authority over the house of God,

For you not only showed sympathy with those who were imprisoned, but you even submitted with joy when your property was taken from you, being well aware that you have in your own selves a more valuable possession and one which will remain.

Through faith Enoch was taken from the earth so that he did not see death, and he could not be found, because God had taken him; for before he was taken we have evidence that he truly pleased God.

And if they had cherished the remembrance of the country they had left, they would have found an opportunity to return;

In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted so as to endanger your lives;

and you have quite forgotten the encouraging words which are addressed to you as sons, and which say, "My son, do not think lightly of the Lord's discipline, and do not faint when He corrects you;

Now, at the time, discipline seems to be a matter not for joy, but for grief; yet it afterwards yields to those who have passed through its training a result full of peace--namely, righteousness.

For you have not come to a material object all ablaze with fire, and to gloom and darkness and storm and trumpet-blast and the sound of words--

On the contrary you have come to Mount Zion, and to the city of the ever-living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, to countless hosts of angels,

His voice then shook the earth, but now we have His promise, "Yet again I will, once for all, cause not only the earth to tremble, but Heaven also."

Do not neglect to show kindness to strangers; for, in this way, some, without knowing it, have had angels as their guests.

Your lives should be untainted by love for money. Be content with what you have; for God Himself has said, "I will never, never let go your hand: I will never never forsake you."

Do not be drawn aside by all sorts of strange teaching; for it is well to have the heart made stedfast through God's grace, and not by special kinds of food, from which those who scrupulously attend to them have derived no benefit.

We Christians have an altar from which the ministers of the Jewish Tent have no right to eat.

For we have no permanent city here, but we are longing for the city which is soon to be ours.

Obey your leaders and be submissive to them. For they are keeping watch over your souls as those who will have to give account; that they may do this with joy and not with lamentation. For that would be of no advantage to you.

Keep on praying for us; for we are sure that we have clear consciences, and we desire to live nobly in every respect.

Bear with me, brethren, when I thus exhort you; for, in fact, it is but a short letter that I have written to you.

Only let endurance have perfect results so that you may become perfect and complete, deficient in nothing.

But let him ask in faith and have no doubts; for he who has doubts is like the surge of the sea, driven by the wind and tossed into spray.

is it not plain that in your hearts you have little faith, seeing that you have become judges full of wrong thoughts?

But *you* have put dishonour upon the poor man. Yet is it not the rich who grind you down? Are not they the very people who drag you into the Law courts? --

For He who said, "Do not commit adultery," also said, "Do not commit murder," and if you are a murderer, although not an adulterer, you have become an offender against the Law.