1 COME, now, you rich men, wail and lament over the miseries that are coming upon you.

2 Your riches have rotted and your garments have become moth-eaten,

3 your gold and silver are rusted over and the rust on them will be an evidence against you and will eat your flesh like fire.

4 You have laid up treasures in the last days. See, the wages of the laborers who reaped your fields, fraudulently kept back by you, call aloud, and the cries of the harvesters have come into the ears of the Lord of armies.

5 You have lived luxuriously in the land and have given yourselves up to pleasure. You have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter.

6 You have condemned, you have murdered, the righteous; he does not resist you.

7 Therefore be patient, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the ground and is patient over it until he receives the early and the late rains.

8 You too must be patient. Keep your hearts steadfast, for the coming of the Lord is near.

9 Do not fret at one another, brethren, and then you will not be judged. The Judge is standing before your doors.

10 Take, brethren, the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord as an example of patience in suffering evil.

11 We call them blessed because they endured. You have heard of the patience of Job and have seen the end of the Lord's dealings with him, that the Lord is very tender and compassionate.

12 Above all things, my brethren, do not swear, either by heaven or by the earth or by any other oath. Let your yes be yes and your no be no, that you may not fall under condemnation.

13 Is any one of you suffering hardship? Let him pray. Is any one cheerful? Let him sing with the harp.

14 Is any one of you sick? Let him call in the elders of the church and let them pray over him and anoint him with olive oil in the name of the Lord.

15 The prayer of faith will save the sick and the Lord will raise him up, and if he has committed sins they will be forgiven him.

16 Confess your sins to one another and pray for one another in order to be healed. The effective prayer of a righteous man has great power.

17 Elijah was a man of the same weaknesses as ours, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain and it did not rain on the land for three years and six months.

18 Then he prayed again and heaven gave rain and the land brought forth its fruits.

19 My brethren, if one of you strays from the truth and any one brings him back,

20 I wish you to know that he who brings back a sinner from his wanderings will save his soul from death and will hide a host of sins.