Encouragement to Be Faithful

³ Timothy, I thank God for you—the God I serve with a clear conscience, just as my ancestors did. Night and day I constantly remember you in my prayers.

God’s Good News

⁸ Let me say first that I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith in him is being talked about all over the world. ⁹ God knows how often I pray for you. Day and night I bring you and your needs in prayer to God, whom I serve with all my heart^[a] by spreading the Good News about his Son.

⁸ Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

23 Gazing intently at the high council,^[a] Paul began: “Brothers, I have always lived before God with a clear conscience!”

¹⁴ “But I admit that I follow the Way, which they call a cult. I worship the God of our ancestors, and I firmly believe the Jewish law and everything written in the prophets.

⁵ The purpose of my instruction is that all believers would be filled with love that comes from a pure heart, a clear conscience, and genuine faith.

¹⁶ Because of this, I always try to maintain a clear conscience before God and all people.

¹⁵ You have been taught the holy Scriptures from childhood, and they have given you the wisdom to receive the salvation that comes by trusting in Christ Jesus.

¹⁹ Cling to your faith in Christ, and keep your conscience clear. For some people have deliberately violated their consciences; as a result, their faith has been shipwrecked.

³ Then Paul said, “I am a Jew, born in Tarsus, a city in Cilicia, and I was brought up and educated here in Jerusalem under Gamaliel. As his student, I was carefully trained in our Jewish laws and customs. I became very zealous to honor God in everything I did, just like all of you today.