¹⁴ I had boasted to him about you,^(A) and you have not embarrassed me. But just as everything we said to you was true, so our boasting about you to Titus^(B) has proved to be true as well.

⁴ Therefore, among God’s churches we boast^(A) about your perseverance and faith^(B) in all the persecutions and trials you are enduring.^(C)

²⁴ Therefore show these men the proof of your love and the reason for our pride in you,^(A) so that the churches can see it.

⁴ I have spoken to you with great frankness; I take great pride in you.^(A) I am greatly encouraged;^(B) in all our troubles my joy knows no bounds.^(C)

⁸ So even if I boast somewhat freely about the authority the Lord gave us^(A) for building you up rather than tearing you down,^(B) I will not be ashamed of it.

² For I know your eagerness to help,^(A) and I have been boasting^(B) about it to the Macedonians, telling them that since last year^(C) you in Achaia^(D) were ready to give; and your enthusiasm has stirred most of them to action. ³ But I am sending the brothers^(E) in order that our boasting about you in this matter should not prove hollow, but that you may be ready, as I said you would be.^{(F) 4} For if any Macedonians^(G) come with me and find you unprepared, we—not to say anything about you—would be ashamed of having been so confident.

⁶ But God, who comforts the downcast,^(A) comforted us by the coming of Titus,^(B)

¹⁸ But as surely as God is faithful,^(A) our message to you is not “Yes” and “No.” ¹⁹ For the Son of God,^(B) Jesus Christ, who was preached among you by us—by me and Silas^[a](C) and Timothy^(D)—was not “Yes” and “No,” but in him it has always^(E) been “Yes.” ²⁰ For no matter how many promises^(F) God has made, they are “Yes” in Christ. And so through him the “Amen”^(G) is spoken by us to the glory of God.^(H)