I wrote to you in sore trouble and distress of heart and with many tears, not to give you pain, but to let you see how intense a love I have for you.

And his affection for you is all the greater, as he remembers the deference that you all showed him, and recalls how you received him with anxious care.

How, tired though they were by many a trouble, their overflowing happiness, and even their deep poverty, resulted in a flood of generosity.

And, remembering how you excel in everything--in faith, in teaching, in knowledge, in unfailing earnestness, and in the affection that we have awakened in you--I ask you to excel also in this expression of your love.

For you do not forget the loving-kindness of our Lord Jesus Christ--how that for your sakes, although he was rich, he became poor, so that you also might become rich through his poverty.