1 Timothy 1

₁I am Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus. God, who saved us, and Jesus Christ, who will do what He has promised, called me to be an apostle of Christ Jesus. ₂I, Paul, write this letter to you, Timothy. You are like my own child, because I helped you believe in Christ. I pray that God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord will give their grace to you and that He will be good to you. I also pray that He will give his peace to you.

₃Before I went to the town of Macedonia, I asked you to stay in the city of Ephesus. Now I am asking you again to stay there. Some of the people there are teaching things about God which are not_true and you must tell them to stop. ₄They must not listen to stories which are not_true or think that all the names of the forefathers are important. These things make people fight with each other and it does not help them to believe that God has a plan to save the people who believe in Christ.

₅I say this to you because all believers must love God and they must love each other. All the believers must serve only God, they must know what is right and what is wrong and they must truly believe in Christ. ₆Some people have stopped doing this and now they talk about things that are worthless. ₇They want to teach other people what the laws of Moses say. They think they know everything but they do not understand what they are talking about or what they are teaching other people.

₈We know that the laws of Moses are good if we use them in the right way, as God wants us to use them. ₉We know that God did not make the laws for good people who do what the laws say. No, God made the laws for people who do not listen to the laws and who rebel_against the laws of God. He has given the laws to people who do not think about God and who sin and do not worship God or serve Him. God made the laws for people who live only for this world, for people who kill their parents and other people. ₁₀God made the laws for people who have sex with other people whom they are not married to, for men who have sex with other men, for people who catch other people and sell them to be slaves and for people who lie in court and do not tell the truth. God made the laws for people who do bad things and don't want to do the good things that the Bible teaches us. ₁₁These good things are part of the Good_News that comes from God our King. We must always praise God. He has given me the Good_News to tell you.

₁₂I thank Christ Jesus our Lord because He has given me the power to do my work. He has trusted me, and He has given me this work to tell the Good_News to people. ₁₃Before I became a believer, I said very bad things about Christ and I oppressed the people of his church and told them that they were wrong. But Christ was good to me, because I did those things when I did not believe in Him and I did not know that I was doing wrong. ₁₄Our Lord was very good to me. He gave me faith in Him and He made me love other people. This is what happens when you belong to Christ Jesus.

₁₅What I am going to say now is true, and everyone must believe it: Christ Jesus came to the world to save sinners. I am the biggest sinner of all. ₁₆But Jesus Christ was very good to me, the biggest sinner, and He showed me that He is very patient. Now other people can look at me. I am an example that shows that every person who believes in Him will have eternal_life. ₁₇I pray that people will always honour and praise God, who is always King and who lives forever. We can not see Him but only He is God. Amen.

₁₈Timothy, you are like my own child. I am telling you what you must do because long ago prophets said that this would be your work. You must remember what those prophets said, then you will be like a good soldier who keeps on fighting. ₁₉You must always believe in God and always do what you know is right. Some people did not do that: They knew what was right but they did not do it and then their faith was broken, like a boat that sailed onto the rocks and went down. ₂₀There are 2 men who are like these people. They are Hymenaeus and Alexander. I have given them to Satan so that they can learn not to say things that are wrong about God.