Titus 1

¹ Paul, a slave of God and apostle of Jesus Christ for the sake of the faith of God's chosen ones and the recognition of religious truth,

² in the hope of eternal life that God, who does not lie, promised before time began,

³ who indeed at the proper time revealed his word in the proclamation with which I was entrusted by the command of God our savior,

⁴ to Titus, my true child in our common faith: grace and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our savior.

⁵ For this reason I left you in Crete so that you might set right what remains to be done and appoint presbyters in every town, as I directed you,

⁶ on condition that a man be blameless, married only once, with believing children who are not accused of licentiousness or rebellious.

⁷ For a bishop as God's steward must be blameless, not arrogant, not irritable, not a drunkard, not aggressive, not greedy for sordid gain,

⁸ but hospitable, a lover of goodness, temperate, just, holy, and self-controlled,

⁹ holding fast to the true message as taught so that he will be able both to exhort with sound doctrine and to refute opponents.

¹⁰ For there are also many rebels, idle talkers and deceivers, especially the Jewish Christians.

¹¹ It is imperative to silence them, as they are upsetting whole families by teaching for sordid gain what they should not.

¹² One of them, a prophet of their own, once said, "Cretans have always been liars, vicious beasts, and lazy gluttons."

¹³ That testimony is true. Therefore, admonish them sharply, so that they may be sound in the faith,

¹⁴ instead of paying attention to Jewish myths and regulations of people who have repudiated the truth.

¹⁵ To the clean all things are clean, but to those who are defiled and unbelieving nothing is clean; in fact, both their minds and their consciences are tainted.

¹⁶ They claim to know God, but by their deeds they deny him. They are vile and disobedient and unqualified for any good deed.