That duty holds while they live “as strangers here” (ton tēs paroikias humōn chronon, the accusative of extension), however long that may be. The genitive, “as strangers,” in an attributive position to mark the inherent nature of the time in view, characterizes Christians as aliens residing in a strange land. The compound noun paroikias basically means “alongside the house,” having the position of an outsider and not a member of the household. It is used in Acts 13:17 of the sojourn of the Israelites