Book of Common Prayer

¹⁰ The Lord made me very happy to know that you were thinking about me again. Yes, I know you were thinking of me before, but you had no way to help me.

¹¹ I do not mean that I needed it. I have learned to be satisfied with what I have. I am happy with whatever happens to me.

¹² I know how to live when I am poor, and I know how to live when I am rich. No matter how things are, I have learned how to live: when I have plenty of food, or when I am hungry; when I have more things than I need, and when I do not have enough.

¹³ I can do all things because Christ gives me strength.

¹⁴ But you were kind to help me when I was in trouble.

¹⁵ When I first told the good news after I left the country of Macedonia, you were the only church people who helped me. You sent me money to pay my expenses.

¹⁶ Even when I was in the city of Thessalonica, you sent money to help me more than once.

¹⁷ It is not that I want the gift. But I want you to have more and more blessing because you give.

¹⁸ I have all I need and more. Yes, I have plenty because Epaphroditus gave me what you sent me. Your gift was like a sweet-smelling offering to God. It was a sacrifice which God took and it pleased him.

¹⁹ My God will give you everything you need. He has wonderful riches in heaven because of Christ Jesus.

²⁰ Praise God our Father for ever. Yes, he will do it.

²⁰ `I do not ask this for these people only; I ask it also for the people who will believe in me when they hear what these people say.

²¹ I do this so that the people will all be one. That is the same way with us. You, my Father, belong to me and I belong to you. I ask that they also may be joined to us. Then the world will believe that you have sent me.

²² I have made them great the way you have made me great. That makes us one, as we are one.

²³ I belong to them and you belong to me, so that they all may be really one together. Then the world will know that you have sent me and that you have loved them just as you have loved me.

²⁴ `Father, I want the people that you have given me to be with me. Then they will see that you made me great, because you loved me before you made the world.

²⁵ Father, you are the one who is right. The world has not known you. But I have known you. These people know that you have sent me.

²⁶ I have told them who you are. I will tell them again and again. Then they will love each other as much as you have loved me. And I will live in them.'