and our hope for you is firmly grounded, knowing that as you are partners in our sufferings, so also you are in our comfort.

For out of much affliction and anguish of heart I wrote to you with many tears; not so that you would be made sorrowful, but that you might know the love which I have especially for you.

But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and through us reveals the fragrance of the knowledge of Him in every place.

You are our letter, written in our hearts, known and read by all people,

For God, who said, “Light shall shine out of darkness,” is the One who has shone in our hearts to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.

knowing that He who raised the Lord Jesus will also raise us with Jesus, and will present us with you.

The Temporal and Eternal

For we know that if our earthly tent which is our house is torn down, we have a building from God, a house not made by hands, eternal in the heavens.

Therefore, being always of good courage, and knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord—

Therefore, knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade people, but we are well known to God; and I hope that we are also well known in your consciences.

Therefore from now on we recognize no one by the flesh; even though we have known Christ by the flesh, yet now we know Him in this way no longer.

in purity, in knowledge, in patience, in kindness, in the Holy Spirit, in genuine love,

as unknown and yet well known, as dying and yet behold, we are alive; as punished and yet not put to death,

So although I wrote to you, it was not for the sake of the offender nor for the sake of the one offended, but that your earnestness in our behalf might be made known to you in the sight of God.

Great Generosity

Now, brothers and sisters, we make known to you the grace of God which has been given in the churches of Macedonia,

But just as you excel in everything, in faith, speaking, knowledge, and in all earnestness and in the love we inspired in you, see that you also excel in this gracious work.

For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sake He became poor, so that you through His poverty might become rich.

for I know your willingness, of which I boast about you to the Macedonians, namely, that Achaia has been prepared since last year, and your zeal has stirred up most of them.

We are destroying arguments and all arrogance raised against the knowledge of God, and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ,

But even if I am unskilled in speech, yet I am not so in knowledge; in fact, in every way we have made this evident to you in all things.

Why? Because I do not love you? God knows that I do!

The God and Father of the Lord Jesus, He who is blessed forever, knows that I am not lying.

I know a man in Christ, who fourteen years ago—whether in the body I do not know, or out of the body I do not know, God knows—such a man was caught up to the third heaven.

And I know how such a man—whether in the body or apart from the body I do not know, God knows—