Book of Common Prayer

¹⁸ My son Timothy, here is what I tell you to do. And it is what the prophets said about you before. Remember their words, and fight like a good soldier.

¹⁹ Keep on believing. Do only what you know is right. Some people have not done that and they have stopped believing.

²⁰ Hymenaeus and Alexander are among them. I have given them to Satan so that they will be punished and learn not to teach things that do not respect God.

2 First of all, I want God's people to do this. They must talk to God for all the people. They must ask God to help them. They must ask God to give them what they need. They must thank God for all that he gives them.

² They must talk to God for all the kings and all rulers. They must do this so that we may live in peace and quiet, so that we may please God and do what is right.

³ This is a good thing. And God, our Saviour, is pleased when people do it.

⁴ He wants all people to be saved and to know what is true.

⁵ There is one God. There is also one man who can open the way between God and all people. That man is Christ Jesus.

⁶ He gave his life to set all men free. This matter was told at the right time.

⁷ I was chosen to tell about this and to be an apostle. I am telling the truth. I am not lying. I was chosen to teach people who are not Jews. I must teach them to believe and to know what is true.

⁸ So I want men in every place to talk to God. They must have clean lives when they lift up their hands to talk to God. They must not be angry. They must have faith in God.

³³ `Either make a tree good and its fruit good, or make a tree bad and its fruit bad. People know what kind of tree it is by the fruit on it.

³⁴ You family of snakes! How can you say good things? You are wrong! The mouth will say what is in the heart.

³⁵ A good man has stored up good things in his heart, so he will say good things. A bad man has stored up wrong things in his heart, so he will say wrong things.

³⁶ I tell you this. On the day when people are judged, they will pay for every empty word they have said.

³⁷ Because of your words, you will be called good. Or because of your words, you will be punished.'

³⁸ Then some of the scribes and Pharisees said to him, `Teacher, we want you to show us a sign.'

³⁹ But Jesus answered them, `The people today are bad. They have gone away from God. They want a sign. No sign will be given them but the sign of the prophet Jonah.

⁴⁰ Jonah was inside the big sea animal for three days and three nights. So the Son of Man will be in the ground for three days and three nights.

⁴¹ When people are judged, the men of the city of Nineveh will stand up and speak against the people of today. The people of Nineveh stopped their wrong ways when Jonah told them God's word. And the one who is here is greater than Jonah.

⁴² When people are judged, the Queen of the South will stand up and speak against the people of today. She came a long way to hear the wise talk of Solomon. And the one who is here is greater than Solomon.'