not a drinker, not violent, not greedy for money, but gentle, not quarrelsome, not covetous;
Not greedy of filthy lucre - Not contentious or avaricious. Greek, Not desirous of base gain. The desire of this is condemned everywhere in the New Testament; but it is especially the duty of a minister of the gospel to be free from it. He has a right to a support (see the notes on 1 Corinthians 9:0); but there is nothing that more certainly paralyzes the usefulness of a minister of the gospel than the love of money. There is an instinctive feeling in the human bosom that such a man ought to be actuated by a nobler and a purer principle. As avarice, moreover, is the great sin of the world - the sin that sways more hearts, and does more to hinder the progress of the gospel, than all others combined - it is important in the highest degree that the minister of religion should be an example of what men “should” be, and that he, by his whole life, should set his face against that which is the main obstruction to the progress of that gospel which he is appointed to preach.