Philippians 2:15Plain English VersionThen you will be properly good, so that nobody can blame you for anything. You are God’s kids living among really bad people that always go wrong. So you have to live in a way that is properly good. Then everyone will see that you are properly good. You will be like bright stars in a dark sky. See the chapter |
Then you will know the right way to live, and you will do a lot of good things. And I ask Jesus Christ to help you so that you will always do good things, and never do bad things. Jesus is going to come back again, and I want you to be living in that good way. You will show people that God is good, and they will say that he is really great.
God is the one that helps people to be happy and quiet inside themselves. I want that for you, and I’m asking God himself to clean you properly inside, so that you will be his special people. I want God to help you be properly good in every way, with your body, and your spirit, and also that part inside you that thinks and that gives you your feelings. Yes, God can clean you and help you be properly good, so that at the time when our leader, Jesus Christ, comes back, God will not blame you for doing anything wrong.
A church leader has to be this sort of man, – He has to be a really good man, so that nobody can ever say that he does bad things. – He can only have one wife, and he can’t sleep with any other woman, like a husband sleeps with his wife. – He has to have good sense and do things properly. – He can’t be the sort of man that lets himself go and then does wild things. – He has to be friendly to other people, even if he doesn’t know them. – He has to be good at teaching people. –
Now I want to tell you what church leaders have to be like. They have to be really good people, so that nobody can say anything bad about them. A church leader can only have one wife, and he can’t sleep with any other woman, like a husband sleeps with his wife. His kids have to believe in God, and they have to do the right things and not get into trouble. His kids have to do what he says.
You live in the same place with people that don’t follow Jesus. So you have to make up your mind to always do things that are good. Sometimes people might tell lies and blame you and say you have done wrong. But if you always keep on doing whatever is right, they will see that you do good things. Later, after God comes to judge everybody, they will remember the good things you did, and they will respect him.
But you are the people God picked out for himself. Together you work for him, like the men that looked after his ceremonies. You are his own family. God called you away from doing bad things, so you can do good things. It is like you used to live in the dark so that nobody could see you do bad things there, but now he called you away from that to live in his good light. So let’s tell everyone that God is really great and really good.