I have sent him to you for this very purpose, so that you may know how we are, and that he may comfort and encourage and strengthen your hearts.

But I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you soon, so that I may also be encouraged by learning news about you.

Therefore, I hope [that it is His will] to send him immediately, just as soon as I see how my case turns out;

However, I thought it necessary to send back to you Epaphroditus, [who has been] my brother and companion and fellow soldier, who was also sent as your messenger to take care of my needs.

So I have sent him all the more eagerly so that when you see him again you may rejoice and I may be less concerned about you.

for even in Thessalonica you sent a gift more than once for my needs.

But I have received everything in full and more; I am amply supplied, having received from Epaphroditus the gifts you sent me. They are the fragrant aroma of an offering, an acceptable sacrifice which God welcomes and in which He delights.

Remember me to every saint in Christ Jesus. The brothers who are with me greet you.

I have sent him to you for this very purpose, that you may know how we are doing and that he may encourage your hearts;

and so we sent Timothy, our brother and God’s servant in [spreading] the good news of Christ, to strengthen and encourage you [exhorting, comforting, and establishing you] in regard to your faith,

For this reason, when I could no longer endure the suspense, I sent someone to find out about your faith [how you were holding up under pressure], for fear that somehow the tempter had tempted you and our work [among you] would prove to be ineffective.

Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you through and through [that is, separate you from profane and vulgar things, make you pure and whole and undamaged—consecrated to Him—set apart for His purpose]; and may your spirit and soul and body be kept complete and [be found] blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

for sexually immoral persons, for homosexuals, for kidnappers and slave traders, for liars, for perjurers—and for whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine,

If anyone teaches a different doctrine and does not agree with the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and with the doctrine and teaching which is in agreement with godliness (personal integrity, upright behavior),

Keep and follow the pattern of sound teaching (doctrine) which you have heard from me, in the faith and love which are in Christ Jesus.

For the time will come when people will not tolerate sound doctrine and accurate instruction [that challenges them with God’s truth]; but wanting to have their ears tickled [with something pleasing], they will accumulate for themselves [many] teachers [one after another, chosen] to satisfy their own desires and to support the errors they hold,

But Tychicus I have sent to Ephesus.

He must hold firmly to the trustworthy word [of God] as it was taught to him, so that he will be able both to give accurate instruction in sound [reliable, error-free] doctrine and to refute those who contradict [it by explaining their error].

This description is true. So rebuke them sharply so that they will be sound in the faith and free from doctrinal error,

But as for you, teach the things which are in agreement with sound doctrine [which produces men and women of good character whose lifestyle identifies them as true Christians].

Older men are to be temperate, dignified, sensible, sound in faith, in love, in steadfastness [Christlike in character].

sound and beyond reproach in instruction, so that the opponent [of the faith] will be shamed, having nothing bad to say about us.

When I send Artemas or [perhaps] Tychicus to you, make every effort to come to me at Nicopolis, for I have decided to spend the winter there.

Are not all the angels ministering spirits sent out [by God] to serve (accompany, protect) those who will inherit salvation? [Of course they are!]

Give our greetings to all of your [spiritual] leaders and to all of the saints (God’s people). Those [Christians] from Italy send you their greetings.

In the same way, was Rahab the prostitute not justified by works too, when she received the [Hebrew] spies as guests and protected them, and sent them away [to escape] by a different route?

Does a spring send out from the same opening both fresh and bitter water?

It was revealed to them that their services [their prophecies regarding grace] were not [meant] for themselves and their time, but for you, in these things [the death, resurrection, and glorification of Jesus Christ] which have now been told to you by those who preached the gospel to you by the [power of the] Holy Spirit [who was] sent from heaven. Into these things even the angels long to look.

or to governors as sent by him to bring punishment to those who do wrong, and to praise and encourage those who do right.

The end and culmination of all things is near. Therefore, be sound-minded and self-controlled for the purpose of prayer [staying balanced and focused on the things of God so that your communication will be clear, reasonable, specific and pleasing to Him.]

By this the love of God was displayed in us, in that God has sent His [One and] only begotten Son [the One who is truly unique, the only One of His kind] into the world so that we might live through Him.

In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation [that is, the atoning sacrifice, and the satisfying offering] for our sins [fulfilling God’s requirement for justice against sin and placating His wrath].

We [who were with Him in person] have seen and testify [as eye-witnesses] that the Father has sent the Son to be the Savior of the world.

Peace be to you. The friends [here] greet you. Greet the friends [personally] by name.

This is the revelation of Jesus Christ [His unveiling of the divine mysteries], which God [the Father] gave to Him to show to His bond-servants (believers) the things which must soon take place [in their entirety]; and He sent and communicated it by His angel (divine messenger) to His bond-servant John,

saying, “Write on a scroll what you see [in this revelation], and send it to the seven churches—to Ephesus and to Smyrna and to Pergamum and to Thyatira and to Sardis and to Philadelphia and to Laodicea.”

His feet were like burnished [white-hot] bronze, refined in a furnace, and His voice was [powerful] like the sound of many waters.

And there between the throne (with the four living creatures) and among the elders I saw a Lamb (Christ) standing, [bearing scars and wounds] as though it had been slain, with seven horns (complete power) and with seven eyes (complete knowledge), which are the seven Spirits of God who have been sent [on duty] into all the earth.

Then the seven angels who had the seven trumpets prepared themselves to sound them [initiating the judgments].

Then I looked, and I heard a solitary eagle flying in midheaven [for all to see], saying with a loud voice, “Woe, woe, woe [great wrath is coming] to those who dwell on the earth, because of the remaining blasts of the trumpets which the three angels are about to sound [announcing ever greater judgments]!”

And I heard a voice from heaven, like the sound of great waters and like the rumbling of mighty thunder; and the voice that I heard [seemed like music and] was like the sound of harpists playing on their harps.

And the sound of harpists and musicians and flutists and trumpeters will never again be heard in you, and no skilled artisan of any craft will ever again be found in you, and the sound of the millstone [grinding grain] will never again be heard in you [for commerce will no longer flourish, and normal life will cease].

because His judgments are true and righteous. He has judged [convicted and pronounced sentence on] the great prostitute (idolatress) who was corrupting and ruining and poisoning the earth with her adultery (idolatry), and He has imposed the penalty for the blood of His bond-servants on her.”

and will come out to deceive and mislead the nations which are in the four corners of the earth—[including] Gog and Magog—to gather them together for the war; their number is like the sand of the seashore.

Then he said to me, “These words are faithful and true.” And the Lord, the God of the spirits of the prophets, has sent His angel [as a representative] to show His bond-servants the things that must soon take place.

“I, Jesus, have sent My angel to testify to you and to give you assurance of these things for the churches. I am the Root (the Source, the Life) and the Offspring of David, the radiant and bright Morning Star.”