Paul, by the will of God an apostle of Christ Jesus, and Timothy our brother, to the church of God that is at Corinth, with all God's people all over Greece:

who comforts me in every sorrow I have, so that I can comfort people who are in sorrow with the comfort with which I am comforted by God.

For just as my sufferings for Christ are running over the cup, so through Christ my comfort is running over too.

My hope for you is well founded; because I know that just as you, brothers, are sharers of my sufferings, so you will be sharers of my comfort too.

For I do not want you to be uninformed about the sorrow that I suffered in Asia, because I was so crushed beyond any power to endure that I was in dire despair of life itself.

He saved me from a death so horrible, and He will save me again! He it is on whom I have set my hope that He will still save me,

because you are helping me by your prayers for me, so that thanks to God will be given by many on my behalf for God's gracious gift to me in answer to the prayers of many.

For my boast is this, to which my conscience testifies, that before the world, but especially before you, I have acted from pure motives and in sincerity before God, not depending on worldly wisdom but on God's unmerited favor.

Now I did not resort to fickleness, did I, in planning that? Or, do I make my plans in accordance with worldly notions, to have my "Yes" mean "No," if I want it so?

For God's Son, Christ Jesus, who was preached among you by us, Silvanus, Timothy, and me, did not become a "Yes" that might mean "No."

so you must do the opposite, freely forgive and comfort him, to keep him from being overwhelmed by his excessive sadness.

So I beg you in your love to reinstate him entirely.

For this is why I wrote you, to see if you would stand the test, to see if you would be obedient in everything.

I had no rest of spirit, because I did not find my brother Titus there. So I said goodbye to them and left for Macedonia.

Now who is qualified for such a task? I am, for I am not a peddler of God's message, like the most of them, but like a man of sincerity, like a man that is sent from God and living in His presence, in union with Christ I speak His message.

Now if the old religious service which resulted in death, although its law was carved in letters of stone, was introduced with a splendor so great that the Israelites could not keep their eyes fixed on Moses' face because of the splendor that was fading from it,

For on account of its surpassing splendor, what was once so splendid has now no splendor at all.

So, as I have such a hope, I speak with the greatest boldness,

So, because I hold a place in this ministry and that because I have had God's mercy shown me, I never give up.

On the other hand, I have renounced all underhanded, disgraceful methods; I neither practice cunning nor do I tamper with God's message, but by clear and candid statements of truth I try to commend myself to every human conscience in God's sight.

If the meaning of the good news I preach is covered up at all, it is so only in the case of those who are on the way to destruction.

For God who said, "Let light shine out of darkness," is the One who has shone in my heart, to give me the light of the knowledge of God's glory, reflected on the face of Christ.

But I am keeping this jewel in an earthen jar, to prove that its surpassing power is God's, not mine.

always being exposed to death as Jesus was, so that in my body the life of Jesus may be clearly shown.

For all the time I continue to live I am being given up to death for Jesus' sake, so that in my mortal lower nature the life of Jesus may be clearly shown.

So it is death that works in me, but it is life that works in you.

Now since I have the same spirit of faith as he who said in the Scriptures, "I believed, and so I spoke," I too believe, and so I speak,

So I never give up; instead, although my outer nature is wasting away, my inner nature is constantly renewed from day to day.

For I who am still in my tent am sighing beneath my burdens, because I do not want it to be put off but to put on the other over it, so that my dying body may be absorbed in life.

So I am always cheerful and confident, although I know that as long as I am at home in the body I am away from home and the Lord

(for here I live by what I believe and not by what I see),

So whether I am at home or away from home, it is my constant ambition to please Him.

So, since I know what the fear of God can do, I am trying to win men. My inner self is perfectly known to God, and I hope, to your consciences too.

I am not trying to recommend myself to you again. I am giving you ground for speaking well of me, that you may have something to say to those who are constantly prating about external privileges and not concerned about the state of the heart.

For if I did go crazy, it was for God's glory; and if I am keeping my head cool, it is for your good.

So from this moment on, I do not estimate anybody by the standard of outward appearances. Although I once did estimate Christ by this standard, I do not do so any longer.

For it was through Christ that God was reconciling the world to Himself instead of debiting men's offenses against them, and He has committed to me the message of this reconciliation.

So I am an envoy to represent Christ, because it is through me that God is making His appeal. As one representing Christ I beg you, be reconciled to God.

He made Him who personally knew nothing of sin to be a sin-offering for us, so that through union with Him we might come into right standing with God.

As God's fellow-worker I beg you too not to accept God's favor and throw it away.

To keep my ministry from being found fault with, I am trying not to put a single hindrance in anybody's way.

So, since we have such promises as these, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from everything that defiles our bodies and spirits, and in reverence to God carry on our consecration to completeness.

and not only by his coming but by the comfort he had gotten from you, because he kept on telling me how you were longing to see me, how sorry you were, and how loyal you were to me, so that I was gladder still.

For, although I did cause you sorrow by that letter, I do not now regret it; although I did regret it then. I see that the letter caused you sorrow only for a time.

I am glad of it now, not because you had such sorrow, but because your sorrow led you to repentance, for you took your sorrow in accordance with the will of God, so that you should not suffer any loss at all from me.

For see what this very sorrow, suffered in accordance with the will of God, has done for you! How earnest it has made you, how concerned to clear yourselves, how indignant, how alarmed, how much it made you long to see me, how loyal to me, how determined to punish the offender! At every point you have cleared yourselves in the matter.

So, although I did write to you, it was not for the offender's sake, nor for the offended party's sake, but in the sight of God for the sake of having your enthusiasm for me made perfectly clear to you. This is why I am so comforted.

In addition to my own comfort, I was made so glad that my cup ran over at the gladness Titus felt, because his spirit has been set at rest by you.

Indeed, if I have been doing some boasting of you to him, I have never been ashamed of it; but just as all I said to him was true, so now my boasting before Titus has been shown to be true.

Now I am going to tell you, brothers, of God's spiritual blessing which was given in the churches of Macedonia,

with earnest entreaty, they kept on begging me for the favor of sharing in this service that is being rendered to God's people.

They did not do as I expected but even more; they first by God's will gave themselves to the Lord, and then to me;

so that I insisted that Titus, as he had formerly commenced it, should bring to completion this gracious contribution among you too.

Yes, just as you are growing rich in everything else, in faith, expression, knowledge, perfect enthusiasm, and the love inspired in you by us, you must see to it that you grow rich in this gracious contribution too.

Now I will give you my opinion on this matter. For this is for your interest, because you were not only the first to do anything about it, but the first to want to do so; you started it a year ago.

Now finish doing it too, so that your readiness to finish it may be just like your readiness to start it, in accordance with what you have.

but through an equalizing of matters in the present crisis I do want your abundance to relieve their need, that some day their abundance may relieve your need, so that equality may exist --

because he has acceded to my request, or rather, because he is so enthusiastic for you, of his own accord he is off to visit you.

Not only that, but he has been selected by the churches to travel with me for this gracious contribution which is being raised by me, so that it may turn out for the glory of the Lord and a proof of my readiness to serve.

I am arranging it so that no one can blame me in the matter of this munificent fund that is being handled by me.

So you must furnish them, before all the churches, proof of your love and ground for my praising you so highly.

It is really superfluous for me to write to you about this service which is being rendered to God's people,

So I have thought it necessary to urge these brothers to visit you ahead of me and get your promised love-offering ready beforehand, so as to have it ready as a real love-offering, not as one grasped and grudgingly given.

And God is able to make your every spiritual blessing overflow for you, so that you will always have in every situation an entire sufficiency and so overflow for every good cause;

In every way you will grow richer and richer so as to give with perfect liberality, which will through me result in thanksgiving to God for it.

Because the service rendered by this sacred offering is not only fully supplying the needs of God's people, but it is also running over with many thanks to God for it.

and so in their prayers for you they will continue longing for you, because of God's surpassing favor shown you.

Now I appeal to you in person, by the gentleness and fairness of Christ, I, Paul, who am so "condescending when face to face with you, but so courageous toward you when far away!"

You look at me and measure me by outward appearances. If anyone is confident in himself that he belongs to Christ, let him have another thought about himself, that just as he belongs to Christ, so do I.

For if I do boast a little too much about my authority, which the Lord gave me for building you up and not for tearing you down, I shall never have to blush for doing so.

For they say, "His letters are impressive and forceful, but his physical personality is unimpressive, and his delivery is perfectly contemptible."

But I shall never go too far in my boasting; no, I shall stay within the limits of the sphere which God apportioned me, so as to reach even you.

I am not going too far in my boasting, and actually boasting of other men's labors, but I am cherishing the hope that your faith may so continue to grow that through you my work within my sphere may be so enlarged as to run over,

so that I can preach the good news in the regions beyond you, without boasting in another man's sphere of work already done by him.

Although I am untrained as an orator, yet I am not so in the field of knowledge. Surely, I have always made that perfectly clear to you.

and when I was with you and needed money, I never burdened a single one of you for a cent, for the brothers came from Macedonia and supplied what I needed. And so I kept myself, as I shall always do, from being a burden to you in any way.

So it is no surprise if his servants also masquerade as ministers for doing right, whose doom shall be in accordance with what they do.

Let me say again that no one must think that I am a fool, but if you do, please treat me like a fool and let me do a little boasting too, as other fools do.

For you who are so wise yourselves are glad to listen to fools!

I am ashamed to say that I was, as it were, so weak in the matter. And yet in whatever respect anyone else is daring to boast -- I am talking like a fool -- I too will dare to boast.

Are they Hebrews? So am I. Are they Israelites? So am I. Are they descendants of Abraham? So am I.

Are they ministers of Christ? So am I. I am talking like a man that has gone crazy -- as such I am superior! -- serving Him with labors greater by far, with far more imprisonments, with floggings vastly worse, and often at the point of death.

three times I have been beaten by the Romans, once I was pelted with stones; three times I have been shipwrecked, and once I have spent a day and a night adrift at sea.

I have served Him on frequent journeys, in dangers from rivers, dangers from robbers, dangers from my own people, dangers from the heathen, dangers in the city, dangers in the desert, dangers at sea, dangers from false brothers,

but through a hole in the wall I was lowered in a basket, and so escaped from his clutches.

However, if I want to boast, I will not play the fool, for it will be nothing but the truth that I will tell. But I refrain from doing so, to keep anybody, on account of the superiority of the revelations, from giving me a higher rating than my actions and teachings deserve.

So, to keep me from being over-elated, there was sent upon me a physical disease, sharp as a piercing stake, a messenger of Satan, to continue afflicting me, and so to keep me, I repeat, from being over-elated.

So I most happily boast about my weaknesses, so that the strength of Christ may overshadow me. That is why I take such pleasure in weaknesses, insults, distresses, persecution, and difficulties, which I endure for Christ's sake, for it is when I am consciously weak that I am really strong.

It is now the third time that I have been ready to come to see you, and I will never ask you for financial support, for it is not your money but you yourselves that I want; for children are not by duty bound to lay up money for their parents, but parents for their children.

So in my own case, I will most happily spend my money and myself for your sakes. If I love you much more than I love others, am I to be loved less by you?

But let it be granted, you say, that I never received from you financial support, yet, you say, by being a trickster I cheated you by my cunning.

I have already warned those who formerly committed shocking sins, and all the rest, and though so far away I warn them now, as I did on my second visit, that if I come back I will not spare them,

You yourselves must continue testing yourselves to see whether you are continuing in the faith. You must continue standing the test. Do you not know by a growing experience that Jesus Christ is in you? -- provided you stand the test.

All God's people wish to be remembered to you.