Salutation
1 Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, according to the promise of life which is in Christ Jesus,
2 To Timothy, my beloved son:
Grace, mercy, and peace, from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.
Loyalty to the Gospel
3 I thank God, whom I serve with a pure conscience as my forefathers did, as I continually remember you in my prayers night and day, 4 greatly desiring to see you, remembering your tears, that I may be filled with joy, 5 remembering the genuine faith that first lived in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and that I am persuaded lives in you also.
6 Therefore I remind you to stir up the gift of God, which is in you by the laying on of my hands. 7 For God has not given us the spirit of fear, but of power, and love, and self-control. 8 So do not be ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me, His prisoner. But share in the sufferings of the gospel by the power of God, 9 who has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not by our works, but by His own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began, 10 but is now revealed by the appearing of our Savior, Jesus Christ, who has abolished death and has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel, 11 for which I was appointed a preacher, an apostle, and a teacher of the Gentiles. 12 For these things I suffer, but I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed to Him until that Day.
13 Follow the pattern of sound teaching which you have heard from me in the faith and love that is in Christ Jesus. 14 Guard the treasure that was committed to you through the Holy Spirit who lives in us.
15 You know that all those who are in Asia have turned away from me, including Phygelus and Hermogenes.
16 May the Lord grant mercy to the house of Onesiphorus, for he often refreshed me and was not ashamed of my chains. 17 But when he arrived in Rome, he searched me out very diligently and found me. 18 May the Lord grant that he may find mercy from the Lord on that Day. You know very well how many ways he ministered to me at Ephesus.