Heartfelt thanks be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ--the Father who is full of compassion and the God who gives all comfort.

He comforts us in our every affliction so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any kind of affliction by means of the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.

For just as we have more than our share of suffering for the Christ, so also through the Christ we have more than our share of comfort.

But if, on the one hand, we are enduring affliction, it is for your comfort and salvation; and if, on the other hand, we are receiving comfort, it is for your comfort which is produced within you through your patient fortitude under the same sufferings as those which we also are enduring.

And our hope for you is stedfast; for we know that as you are partners with us in the sufferings, so you are also partners in the comfort.

For as for our troubles which came upon us in the province of Asia, we would have you know, brethren, that we were exceedingly weighed down, and felt overwhelmed, so that we renounced all hope even of life.

Nay, we had, as we still have, the sentence of death within our own selves, in order that our confidence may repose, not on ourselves, but on God who raised the dead to life.

He it is who rescued us from so imminent a death, and will do so again; and we have a firm hope in Him that He will also rescue us in all the future,

while you on your part lend us your aid in entreaty for us, so that from many lips thanksgivings may rise on our behalf for the boon granted to us at the intercession of many.

For the reason for our boasting is this--the testimony of our own conscience that it was in holiness and with pure motives before God, and in reliance not on worldly wisdom but on the gracious help of God, that we have conducted ourselves in the world, and above all in our relations with you.

For we are writing to you nothing different from what we have written before, or from what indeed you already recognize as truth and will, I trust, recognize as such to the very end;

just as some few of you have recognized us as your reason for boasting, even as you will be ours, on the day of Jesus our Lord.

As certainly as God is faithful, our language to you is not now "Yes" and now "No."

For Jesus Christ the Son of God--He who was proclaimed among you by us, that is by Silas and Timothy and myself--did not show Himself a waverer between "Yes" and "No." But it was and always is "Yes" with Him.

But He who is making us as well as you stedfast through union with the Anointed One, and has anointed us, is God,

and He has also set His seal upon us, and has put His Spirit into our hearts as a pledge and foretaste of future blessing.

But as for me, as my soul shall answer for it, I appeal to God as my witness, that it was to spare you pain that I gave up my visit to Corinth.

But, so far as I am concerned, I have resolved not to have a painful visit the next time I come to see you.

For if I of all men give you pain, who then is there to gladden my heart, but the very persons to whom I give pain?

And I write this to you in order that when I come I may not receive pain from those who ought to give me joy, confident as I am as to all of you that my joy is the joy of you all.

For with many tears I write to you, and in deep suffering and depression of spirit, not in order to grieve you, but in the hope of showing you how brimful my heart is with love for you.

Now if any one has caused sorrow, it has been caused not so much to me, as in some degree--for I have no wish to exaggerate--to all of you.

In the case of such a person the punishment which was inflicted by the majority of you is enough.

for fear Satan should gain an advantage over us. For we are not ignorant of his devices.

For we are a fragrance of Christ grateful to God in those whom He is saving and in those who are perishing;

to the last-named an odor of death predictive of death, and to the others an odor of life predictive of life. And for such service as this who is competent?

We are; for, unlike most teachers, we are not fraudulent hucksters of God's Message; but with transparent motives, as commissioned by God, in God's presence and in communion with Christ, so we speak.

Do you say that this is self-recommendation once more? Or do we need, as some do, letters of recommendation to you or from you?

Our letter of recommendation is yourselves--a letter written on our hearts and everywhere known and read.

For all can see that you are a letter of Christ entrusted to our care, and written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the ever-living God--and not on tablets of stone, but on human hearts as tablets.

Such is the confidence which we have through Christ in the presence of God;

It is He also who has made us competent to serve Him in connexion with a new Covenant, which is not a written code but a Spirit; for the written code inflicts death, but the Spirit gives Life.

For if the service which pronounces doom had glory, far more glorious still is the service which tells of righteousness.

For if that which was to be abolished came with glory, much more is that which is permanent arrayed in glory.

Nay, their minds were made dull; for to this very day during the reading of the book of the ancient Covenant, the same veil remains unlifted, because it is only in Christ that it is to be abolished.

Yes, to this day, whenever Moses is read, a veil lies upon their hearts.

Now by "the Lord" is meant the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, freedom is enjoyed.