Book of Common Prayer

11 I want to say something a little bit foolish. But please listen to me!

² I love you as God loves you. I see you as a woman who has not been married and I am giving you to be the wife of a husband. That husband is Christ.

³ But the snake fooled Eve by his trick. And I am afraid that your minds will be drawn away from a clean, pure love of Christ.

⁴ You listen to a new man when he comes to tell you about a different Jesus, which is not the one we told you about. And when you receive a spirit and a message which are not the ones you had first, then you listen too much.

⁵ But I really do not think that the chief apostles are any better than I am!

⁶ Maybe I am not a good talker, but I surely know what I am talking about! Yes, we made this plain to you in every way in all things.

⁷ Perhaps it was wrong for me to bring myself down in order to raise you up. Do you think that? Was it wrong for me to tell you the good news without pay?

⁸ I took pay from other churches. I made them poor so that I might help you.

⁹ When I was with you and needed money, I did not make any of you pay me. When the brothers came from Macedonia, they gave me what I needed. So I was not, and I will not be, any trouble to you.

¹⁰ Surely, the true word of Christ is in me. I will never stop being proud of this anywhere in Achaia [Greece].

¹¹ Why is this? Is it because I do not love you? God knows that I love you.

¹² And I will keep on doing what I am doing now. Some teachers are praising themselves. They say they are like us. By doing this I prove they are not like us.

¹³ Men like that are not true apostles. They work to fool people. They try to make themselves look like apostles of Christ.

¹⁴ I am not surprised. Satan tries to make himself look like an angel of light.

¹⁵ So it is not strange if his workers also try to make themselves look like God's workers who do right. They will come to an end like the work they do! think that I am foolish. But if you do, then please listen to me as if I were foolish. I also want to do a little talking about myself.

¹⁶ I am not talking like the Lord when I say this. It seems foolish to say so much about myself.

¹⁷ Many people talk about themselves in the world. So I will too.

¹⁸ Since you are wise, you still agree to listen to foolish people.

¹⁹ You listen to a man even if he makes slaves of you, even if he spends all your money, even if he catches you in a trap, even if he is proud of himself, even if he slaps you in the face.

²⁰ I am ashamed, but I must say that we were too weak to be like that! Anything that others want to be proud of, I can talk about too. And yet it is really foolish to do so.

²¹ Are they Hebrew people? So am I. Are they Israel's people? So am I. Is Abraham their father? He is mine too.

19 Jesus came to the city of Jericho and was passing through it.

² A man named Zacchaeus was there. He was the head tax collector, and he was a rich man.

³ He wanted to see who Jesus was but he could not see him because he was a short man and there were many people around him.

⁴ So he ran ahead and climbed into a tree to see Jesus, for he was coming that way.

⁵ When Jesus came to the tree, he looked up. He said, `Zacchaeus, come down right now. I must stay at your house today.'

⁶ So Zacchaeus came down right then. He was glad to have Jesus come in his house.

⁷ When all the people saw this, they did not like it. They said, `He has gone to visit a bad man.'

⁸ Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, `Look, Lord, I will give to the poor people half of all I have. And if I have cheated anyone, I will give him back four times as much as I took.'

⁹ Jesus said to him, `The head of this house has been saved today! He also is a son of Abraham.

¹⁰ The Son of Man came to look for and to save those who are lost.'