What I say in this confident boasting, I say not as the Lord would [with His authority], but foolishly.

And our hope for you [our confident expectation of good for you] is firmly grounded [assured and unshaken], since we know that just as you share as partners in our sufferings, so also you share as partners in our comfort.

He rescued us from so great a threat of death, and will continue to rescue us. On Him we have set our hope. And He will again rescue us [from danger and draw us near],

And I wrote this same thing to you, so that when I came, I would not be filled with sorrow by those who ought to make me glad, for I trusted in you and felt confident that my joy would be shared by all of you.

Since we have such a [glorious] hope and confident expectation, we speak with great courage,

So then, being always filled with good courage and confident hope, and knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord—

we are [as I was saying] of good courage and confident hope, and prefer rather to be absent from the body and to be at home with the Lord.

otherwise, if any Macedonians come with me and find you unprepared, we—to say nothing of yourselves—will be humiliated for being so confident.

You are looking [only] at the outward appearance of things. If anyone is confident that he is Christ’s, he should reflect and consider this, that just as he is Christ’s, so too are we.

We do not go beyond our proper limit, boasting in the work of other men, but we have the hope that as your faith [in Christ and His divine power] continues to grow, our field among you may be greatly expanded [but still within the limits of our commission],