for in a severe test of affliction, their abundance of joy and their extreme poverty have overflowed in the wealth of their liberality.

I write these things while I am absent, in order that when I come I may not have to be severe in my use of the authority which the Lord gave me for building you up, and not for tearing you down.

These indeed have an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion and self-abasement and severe treatment of the body, but they are of no value against fleshly indulgence.

How much severer punishment do you think a man will deserve who has trampled under foot the Son of God, and has regarded as an unclean thing the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has insulted the Spirit of grace?

And when he had spent everything, there arose a severe famine in that country, and he began to be in want.