1 FOR ye yourselves, brethren, know our entrance in to you, that it was not in vain.
2 But though we had suffered before, and were infamously treated, as ye know, at Philippi, we were bold in our God to preach unto you the gospel of God amidst a great conflict.
3 And our exhortation originated not from delusion, or impurity, or from guile;
4 but as we have been approved of God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak, not as pleasing men, but God, who trieth our hearts.
5 For neither at any time used we insinuating language, as ye know, nor a pretext for covetousness; God is witness:
6 not seeking glory from men, neither from you, nor from others, though we might have been burdensome, as apostles of Christ.
7 But we were gentle in the midst of you, as a nurse cherisheth her own infants.
8 So, tenderly affected towards you, we could with pleasure have imparted to you not the gospel of God only, but our own lives also, because ye were beloved by us.
9 For ye remember, brethren, our labour and toil: for night and day working hard, that we might be no burden to any of you, we preached unto you the gospel of God.
10 Ye are witnesses, and God also, how holily, and justly, and faultlessly we conducted ourselves among you that believe:
11 as ye know how [we treated] every one of you, as a father doth his children, exhorting you, and admonishing, and conjuring you,
12 that ye should walk worthy of God, as calling you into his kingdom and glory.
13 For this cause do we also give thanks to God unceasingly, because when ye received the word reported by us from God, ye received it not as the word of man, but, as it is in truth, the word of God, which worketh also effectually in you that believe.
14 For ye, brethren, became imitators of the churches of God which are in Judea, in Christ Jesus: for ye suffered the same things also yourselves from your own countrymen, as they too have of the Jews;
15 who both murdered the Lord Jesus and their own prophets, and have persecuted us, and please not God, and are in opposition to all mankind;
16 forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles, that they might be saved, to fill up the measure of their iniquities always: but wrath is coming upon them to the extremity.
17 But we, brethren, bereaved of you for a short moment, in person, not in heart, have more abundantly longed to see your face with great desire.
18 Therefore we wished to have come unto you, even I Paul, once and again; but Satan prevented us.
19 For what is our hope, or joy, or crown of rejoicing? Are not even ye in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at his coming?
20 For ye are our glory and joy.