because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love which you cherish towards all God's people,

on account of the hope treasured up for you in Heaven. Of this hope you have already heard in the Message of the truth of the Good News.

For it has reached you, and remains with you, just as it has also spread through the whole world, yielding fruit there and increasing, as it has done among you from the day when first you heard it and came really to know the grace of God,

if, indeed, you are still firmly holding to faith as your foundation, without ever shifting from your hope that rests on the Good News that you have heard, which has been proclaimed in the whole creation under Heaven, and in which I Paul have been appointed to serve.