Book of Common Prayer

¹⁶ My dear brothers, do not fool yourselves.

¹⁷ Every good thing and every fine gift comes from heaven. It comes from the Father of all light. He does not change and he makes no shadow by turning.

¹⁸ He made us his children because he wanted us. He made us his children by giving us his true word. He made us his children so that we would be the first and best of all he made.

¹⁹ My dear brothers, do not forget this. Every man should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to be angry.

²⁰ When a man is angry, he does not do what God says is right.

²¹ So stop all your dirty living. Stop doing so many wrong things. Listen quietly to the word that has been put in your hearts. It is able to save you.

²² But obey God's word. Do not just listen to it. If you just listen to it, you fool yourselves.

²³ Anyone who just listens to the word, and does not obey it, is like a man who looks at his face in a looking glass.

²⁴ He looks at himself and goes away, and right away he forgets what he looked like.

²⁵ But there is a law that is all right. It sets people free from their old ways. Anyone who looks into that law and remembers it, is happy because he obeys the law. He does not just listen to the law and forget it, but he obeys what the law says.

²⁶ Some of you think that you are doing what God wants. But you are not careful what you say. If you are like that, you are fooling yourself. And you are not doing what God wants.

²⁷ This is what God the Father wants. It is clean and right. Go and help those who have no father and mother. Go and help widow women whose husbands are dead. These people have troubles. And keep yourself clean from the wrong things in the world.

16 Jesus also talked to his disciples. He said, `A rich man had a manager in charge of his things. People told the rich man that the manager was wasting his things.

² he called the manager and asked him, "What is this I hear about you? Tell me what you have done. You cannot be my manager any more."

³ `Then the manager thought to himself, "What will I do? My master is taking my work away from me. I am not strong enough to go out and dig. I am ashamed to beg.

⁴ I know what I will do. Then, when I lose my job, these people will take me into their own homes."

⁵ `So he called to him everyone who owed his master something. He asked the first man, "How much do you owe my master?"

⁶ He answered, "A hundred tins of oil." The manager said, "Take your paper. Sit down right now and write on it fifty."

⁷ Then he asked the next man, "How much do you owe?" He said, "A hundred bags of grain." The manager said, "Take your paper and write on it eighty."

⁸ `Then the master praised the manager who did wrong. He praised him because he did what was wise. The people of this world are wiser than the people who have the Light. They know how to get along with people like themselves.

⁹ `I tell you this. Money may be a wrong thing, but use it to make friends for yourselves. Then when your money is spent, they will be glad to see you come into that place where people live for ever.