Money and wealth

³ If anyone teaches another doctrine and disagrees with the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ and with godly teaching,

⁴ he is conceited and understands nothing. Instead, he has an unhealthy interest in controversies and semantics, out of which come envy, strife, abusive talk, evil suspicions,

⁵ and constant friction between men of depraved mind who are devoid of the truth. These men regard godliness as a means of gain.

⁶ Of course, godliness with contentment is great gain.

⁷ For we brought nothing into the world, so we cannot carry anything out of it.

⁸ But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with these.

⁹ Those who want to be rich, however, fall into temptation and become ensnared by many foolish and harmful desires that plunge them into ruin and destruction.

¹⁰ For the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. By craving it, some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many sorrows.

¹⁰ He who loves money is never satisfied by money, and he who loves wealth is never satisfied by income. This too is futile.

¹¹ When good things increase, so do those who consume them; what then is the profit to the owner, except to behold them with his eyes?

¹² The sleep of the worker is sweet, whether he eats little or much, but the abundance of the rich man permits him no sleep.

¹³ There is a grievous evil I have seen under the sun: wealth hoarded to the harm of its owner,

¹⁴ or wealth lost in a failed venture, so when that man has a son there is nothing to pass on.

¹⁵ As a man came from his mother’s womb, so he will depart again, naked as he arrived. He takes nothing for his labor to carry in his hands.

³³ Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide yourselves with purses that will not wear out, an inexhaustible treasure in heaven, where no thief approaches and no moth destroys.

³⁴ For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

⁸ The master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly. For the sons of this age are more shrewd in dealing with their own kind than are the sons of light.

⁹ I tell you, use worldly wealth to make friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone, they will welcome you into eternal dwellings.

¹⁰ Whoever is faithful with very little will also be faithful with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much.

¹¹ So if you have not been faithful with worldly wealth, who will entrust you with true riches?

¹² And if you have not been faithful with the belongings of another, who will give you belongings of your own?

¹³ No servant can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.”

¹⁷ Instruct those who are rich in the present age not to be conceited and not to put their hope in the uncertainty of wealth, but in God, who richly provides all things for us to enjoy.

¹⁸ Instruct them to do good, to be rich in good works, and to be generous and ready to share,

¹⁹ treasuring up for themselves a firm foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of that which is truly life.

Amaziah asked the man of God, “What should I do about the hundred talents I have given to the army of Israel?” And the man of God replied, “The LORD is able to give you much more than this.”

¹⁷ You might say in your heart, “The power and strength of my hands have made this wealth for me.”

¹⁸ But remember that it is the LORD your God who gives you the power to gain wealth, in order to confirm His covenant that He swore to your fathers even to this day.

²⁴ If I have put my trust in gold or called pure gold my security,

²⁵ if I have rejoiced in my great wealth because my hand had gained so much,

²⁶ if I have beheld the sun in its radiance or the moon moving in splendor,

Dishonest wealth will dwindle, but what is earned through hard work will be multiplied.

⁴ Do not wear yourself out to get rich; be wise enough to restrain yourself.

⁵ When you glance at wealth, it disappears, for it makes wings for itself and flies like an eagle to the sky.

¹⁹ The one who works his land will have plenty of food, but whoever chases fantasies will have his fill of poverty.

²⁰ A faithful man will abound with blessings, but one eager to be rich will not go unpunished.

²¹ To show partiality is not good, yet a man will do wrong for a piece of bread.

²² A stingy man hastens after wealth and does not know that poverty awaits him.

²³ He who rebukes a man will later find more favor than one who flatters with his tongue.

²⁴ He who robs his father or mother, saying, “It is not wrong,” is a companion to the man who destroys.

¹⁶ Do not be amazed when a man grows rich, when the splendor of his house increases.

¹⁷ For when he dies, he will carry nothing away; his abundance will not follow him down.

¹⁸ Though in his lifetime he blesses his soul— and men praise you when you prosper—

¹⁹ he will join the generation of his fathers, who will never see the light of day.

²⁰ A man who has riches without understanding is like the beasts that perish.

And He said to them, “Watch out! Guard yourselves against every form of greed, for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.”

²⁴ No one can serve two masters: Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.

²⁵ Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes?

¹² Both riches and honor come from You, and You are the ruler over all. In Your hands are power and might to exalt and give strength to all.

¹³ Now therefore, our God, we give You thanks, and we praise Your glorious name.

¹⁴ But who am I, and who are my people, that we should be able to give as generously as this? For everything comes from You, and from Your own hand we have given to You.

¹⁵ For we are foreigners and strangers in Your presence, as were all our forefathers. Our days on earth are like a shadow, without hope.

¹⁶ O LORD our God, from Your hand comes all this abundance that we have provided to build You a house for Your holy Name, and all of it belongs to You.

On the first day of every week, each of you should set aside a portion of his income, saving it up, so that when I come no collections will be needed.

¹ Now the wife of one of the sons of the prophets cried out to Elisha, “Your servant, my husband, is dead, and you know that your servant feared the LORD. And now his creditor is coming to take my two children as his slaves!”

² “How can I help you?” asked Elisha. “Tell me, what do you have in the house?” She answered, “Your servant has nothing in the house but a jar of oil.”

³ “Go,” said Elisha, “borrow jars, even empty ones, from all your neighbors. Do not gather just a few.

⁴ Then go inside, shut the door behind you and your sons, and pour oil into all these jars, setting the full ones aside.”

She went and told the man of God, and he said, “Go, sell the oil, and pay your debt. Then you and your sons can live on the remainder.”

Gehazi, the servant of Elisha the man of God, said, “Look, my master has spared this Aramean, Naaman, while not accepting what he brought. As surely as the LORD lives, I will run after him and get something from him.”

But Elisha questioned him, “Did not my spirit go with you when the man got down from his chariot to meet you? Is this the time to accept money and clothing, olive groves and vineyards, sheep and oxen, menservants and maidservants?

But when the ruler heard this, he became very sad, because he was extremely wealthy.

When the young man heard this, he went away in sorrow, because he had great wealth.

But the man was saddened by these words and went away in sorrow, because he had great wealth.

¹⁶ Then He told them a parable: “The ground of a certain rich man produced an abundance.

¹⁷ So he thought to himself, ‘What shall I do, since I have nowhere to store my crops?’

¹⁸ Then he said, ‘This is what I will do: I will tear down my barns and will build bigger ones, and there I will store up all my grain and my goods.

¹⁹ Then I will say to myself, “You have plenty of good things laid up for many years. Take it easy. Eat, drink, and be merry!”’

²⁰ But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life will be required of you. Then who will own what you have accumulated?’

² Some were saying, “We and our sons and daughters are numerous. We must get grain in order to eat and stay alive.”

³ Others were saying, “We are mortgaging our fields, our vineyards, and our homes to get grain during the famine.”

⁴ Still others were saying, “We have borrowed money to pay the king’s tax on our fields and vineyards.

⁵ We and our children are just like our countrymen and their children, yet we are subjecting our sons and daughters to slavery. Some of our daughters are already enslaved, but we are powerless to redeem them because our fields and vineyards belong to others.”

³ Moreover, because of my delight in the house of my God, I now give for it my personal treasures of gold and silver, over and above all that I have provided for this holy temple:

⁴ three thousand talents of gold (the gold of Ophir) and seven thousand talents of refined silver, to overlay the walls of the buildings,

He valued disgrace for Christ above the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking ahead to his reward.

But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord, half of my possessions I give to the poor, and if I have cheated anyone, I will repay it fourfold.”

But his sons did not walk in his ways; they turned aside toward dishonest gain, accepting bribes and perverting justice.

Why should I take my bread and water and the meat I have slaughtered for my shearers, and give them to these men whose origin I do not know?”

¹ Now a man named Ananias, together with his wife Sapphira, also sold a piece of property.

² With his wife’s full knowledge, he kept back some of the proceeds for himself, but brought a portion and laid it at the apostles’ feet.

³ Then Peter said, “Ananias, how is it that Satan has filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and withhold some of the proceeds from the land?

⁴ Did it not belong to you before it was sold? And after it was sold, was it not at your disposal? How could you conceive such a deed in your heart? You have not lied to men, but to God!”

¹⁸ When Simon saw that the Spirit was given through the laying on of the apostles’ hands, he offered them money.

¹⁹ “Give me this power as well,” he said, “so that everyone on whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit.”

²⁴ It began with a silversmith named Demetrius who made silver shrines of Artemis, bringing much business to the craftsmen.

²⁵ Demetrius assembled the craftsmen, along with the workmen in related trades. “Men,” he said, “you know that this business is our source of prosperity.

²⁶ And you can see and hear that not only in Ephesus, but in nearly the whole province of Asia, Paul has persuaded a great number of people to turn away. He says that man-made gods are no gods at all.

²⁷ There is danger not only that our business will fall into disrepute, but also that the temple of the great goddess Artemis will be discredited and her majesty deposed—she who is worshiped by all the province of Asia and the whole world.”

I have not coveted anyone’s silver or gold or clothing.

At the same time, he was hoping that Paul would offer him a bribe. So he sent for Paul frequently and talked with him.

Haman recounted to them his glorious wealth, his many sons, and all the ways the king had honored and promoted him over the other officials and servants.

And Abram had become extremely wealthy in livestock and silver and gold.

And Lot looked out and saw that the whole plain of the Jordan, all the way to Zoar, was well watered like the garden of the LORD, like the land of Egypt. (This was before the LORD destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah.)

¹⁴ Joseph collected all the money to be found in the land of Egypt and the land of Canaan in exchange for the grain they were buying, and he brought it into Pharaoh’s palace.

¹⁵ When the money from the lands of Egypt and Canaan was gone, all the Egyptians came to Joseph and said, “Give us food. Why should we die before your eyes? For our funds have run out!”

¹⁶ “Then bring me your livestock,” said Joseph. “Since the money is gone, I will sell you food in exchange for your livestock.”

¹⁷ So they brought their livestock to Joseph, and he gave them food in exchange for their horses, their flocks and herds, and their donkeys. Throughout that year he provided them with food in exchange for all their livestock.

¹⁸ When that year was over, they came to him the second year and said, “We cannot hide from our lord that our money is gone and all our livestock belongs to you. There is nothing left for our lord except our bodies and our land.

You sympathized with those in prison and joyfully accepted the confiscation of your property, knowing that you yourselves had a better and permanent possession.