²³ That I will not take so much as a thread or the cord of a shoe of yours; so that you may not say, I have given wealth to Abram:

¹⁶ But he said, By the life of the Lord whose servant I am, I will take nothing from you. And he did his best to make him take it but he would not.

¹⁵ For the Jews who were in Shushan came together again on the fourteenth day of the month Adar and put to death three hundred men in Shushan; but they put not a hand on their goods.

¹⁶ And the other Jews in every division of the kingdom came together, fighting for their lives, and got salvation from their haters and put seventy-five thousand of them to death; but they did not put a hand on their goods.

⁸ But the man of God said to the king, Even if you gave me half of all you have, I would not go in with you, and I would not take food or a drink of water in this place;

²⁰ But Gehazi, the servant of Elisha, the man of God, said, Now my master has taken nothing from Naaman, this Aramaean, of what he would have given him: by the living Lord, I will go after him and get something from him.

⁹ And when I was present with you, and was in need, I let no man be responsible for me; for the brothers, when they came from Macedonia, gave me whatever was needed; and in everything I kept myself from being a trouble to you, and I will go on doing so.

¹⁰ As the true word of Christ is in me, I will let no man take from me this my cause of pride in the country of Achaia.

¹¹ Why? because I have no love for you? let God be judge.

¹² But what I do, that I will go on doing, so that I may give no chance to those who are looking for one; so that, in the cause of their pride, they may be seen to be the same as we are.

¹⁴ This is now the third time that I am ready to come to you; and I will not be a trouble to you: my desire is for you, not for your property: for it is not the children's business to make store for their fathers, but the fathers for the children.

⁵ Be free from the love of money and pleased with the things which you have; for he himself has said, I will be with you at all times.