²⁴ “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.^(A)

On Not Loving the World

¹⁵ Do not love the world or anything in the world.^(A) If anyone loves the world, love for the Father^[a] is not in them.^{(B) 16} For everything in the world—the lust of the flesh,^(C) the lust of the eyes,^(D) and the pride of life—comes not from the Father but from the world.

¹³ “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.”^(A)

⁴ You adulterous^(A) people,^[a] don’t you know that friendship with the world^(B) means enmity against God?^(C) Therefore, anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God.^(D)

⁹ Those who want to get rich^(A) fall into temptation and a trap^(B) and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. ¹⁰ For the love of money^(C) is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith^(D) and pierced themselves with many griefs.^(E)

¹⁰ Am I now trying to win the approval of human beings, or of God? Or am I trying to please people?^(A) If I were still trying to please people, I would not be a servant of Christ.

¹⁵ But if serving the Lord seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your ancestors served beyond the Euphrates, or the gods of the Amorites,^(A) in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household,^(B) we will serve the Lord.”^(C)

¹⁰ Jesus said to him, “Away from me, Satan!^(A) For it is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.’^[a]”^(B)

¹⁶ Don’t you know that when you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one you obey^(A)—whether you are slaves to sin,^(B) which leads to death,^(C) or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? ¹⁷ But thanks be to God^(D) that, though you used to be slaves to sin,^(E) you have come to obey from your heart the pattern of teaching^(F) that has now claimed your allegiance. ¹⁸ You have been set free from sin^(G) and have become slaves to righteousness.^(H)

¹⁹ I am using an example from everyday life^(I) because of your human limitations. Just as you used to offer yourselves as slaves to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer yourselves as slaves to righteousness^(J) leading to holiness. ²⁰ When you were slaves to sin,^(K) you were free from the control of righteousness.^{(L) 21} What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death!^{(M) 22} But now that you have been set free from sin^(N) and have become slaves of God,^(O) the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life.^(P)