"Let your loins be girded about, and the lamps be burning, and be ye yourselves like men waiting for their lord, when he shall return from the marriage feast; that when he cometh and knocketh, they may open to him immediately. Blessed are those servants whom the lord, when he cometh, shall find watching. Verily, I say to you, that he will gird himself and will make them recline at table, and he will come and serve them. And if he shall come in the second watch, or if in the third, and find them thus, blessed are those servants. But know this, that if the master of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would have watched, and would not have permitted his house to be dug through. Be ye also ready; for in the hour that ye think not, the Son of man cometh."

Then Peter said, "Lord, speakest Thou this parable to us, or even to all?" And the Lord said, "Who then is the faithful, the wise steward, whom the lord shall set over his household to give the allowance of food at the set time? Blessed is that servant whom his lord, when he cometh, shall find so doing. Of a truth I say to you, that he will set him over all his possessions. But if that servant say in his heart, 'My lord is delaying to come,' and begin to beat the men-servants and the maid-servants, and to eat and to drink and to be drunken; the lord of that servant shall come in a day when he doth not expect him, and in an hour when he knoweth not, and shall cut him asunder, and appoint his portion with the unbelievers. But that servant who knew his lord's will, and prepared not, nor did according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes; but he that kneweth not, yet did things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few. And every one to whom much was given, much will be required of him; and to whom they committed much, of him will they ask the more."