Read the New Testament in 24 Weeks
10 I plead with you—yes, I, Paul—and I plead gently, as Christ himself would do. Yet some of you are saying, “Paul’s letters are bold enough when he is far away, but when he gets here he will be afraid to raise his voice!”
2 I hope I won’t need to show you when I come how harsh and rough I can be. I don’t want to carry out my present plans against some of you who seem to think my deeds and words are merely those of an ordinary man. 3 It is true that I am an ordinary, weak human being, but I don’t use human plans and methods to win my battles. 4 I use God’s mighty weapons, not those made by men, to knock down the devil’s strongholds. 5 These weapons can break down every proud argument against God and every wall that can be built to keep men from finding him. With these weapons I can capture rebels and bring them back to God and change them into men whose hearts’ desire is obedience to Christ. 6 I will use these weapons against every rebel who remains after I have first used them on you yourselves and you surrender to Christ.
7 The trouble with you is that you look at me and I seem weak and powerless, but you don’t look beneath the surface. Yet if anyone can claim the power and authority of Christ, I certainly can. 8 I may seem to be boasting more than I should about my authority over you—authority to help you, not to hurt you—but I shall make good every claim. 9 I say this so that you will not think I am just blustering when I scold you in my letters.
10 “Don’t bother about his letters,” some say. “He sounds big, but it’s all noise. When he gets here you will see that there is nothing great about him, and you have never heard a worse preacher!” 11 This time my personal presence is going to be just as rough on you as my letters are!
12 Oh, don’t worry, I wouldn’t dare say that I am as wonderful as these other men who tell you how good they are! Their trouble is that they are only comparing themselves with each other and measuring themselves against their own little ideas. What stupidity!
13 But we will not boast of authority we do not have. Our goal is to measure up to God’s plan for us, and this plan includes our working there with you. 14 We are not going too far when we claim authority over you, for we were the first to come to you with the Good News concerning Christ. 15 It is not as though we were trying to claim credit for the work someone else has done among you. Instead, we hope that your faith will grow and that, still within the limits set for us, our work among you will be greatly enlarged.
16 After that, we will be able to preach the Good News to other cities that are far beyond you, where no one else is working; then there will be no question about being in someone else’s field. 17 As the Scriptures say, “If anyone is going to boast, let him boast about what the Lord has done and not about himself.” 18 When someone boasts about himself and how well he has done, it doesn’t count for much. But when the Lord commends him, that’s different!
11 I hope you will be patient with me as I keep on talking like a fool. Do bear with me and let me say what is on my heart. 2 I am anxious for you with the deep concern of God himself—anxious that your love should be for Christ alone, just as a pure maiden saves her love for one man only, for the one who will be her husband. 3 But I am frightened, fearing that in some way you will be led away from your pure and simple devotion to our Lord, just as Eve was deceived by Satan in the Garden of Eden. 4 You seem so gullible: you believe whatever anyone tells you even if he is preaching about another Jesus than the one we preach, or a different spirit than the Holy Spirit you received, or shows you a different way to be saved. You swallow it all.
5 Yet I don’t feel that these marvelous “messengers from God,” as they call themselves, are any better than I am. 6 If I am a poor speaker, at least I know what I am talking about, as I think you realize by now, for we have proved it again and again.
7 Did I do wrong and cheapen myself and make you look down on me because I preached God’s Good News to you without charging you anything? 8-9 Instead I “robbed” other churches by taking what they sent me and using it up while I was with you so that I could serve you without cost. And when that was gone[a] and I was getting hungry, I still didn’t ask you for anything, for the Christians from Macedonia brought me another gift. I have never yet asked you for one cent, and I never will. 10 I promise this with every ounce of truth I possess—that I will tell everyone in Greece about it! 11 Why? Because I don’t love you? God knows I do. 12 But I will do it to cut out the ground from under the feet of those who boast that they are doing God’s work in just the same way we are.
13 God never sent those men at all; they are “phonies” who have fooled you into thinking they are Christ’s apostles. 14 Yet I am not surprised! Satan can change himself into an angel of light, 15 so it is no wonder his servants can do it too, and seem like godly ministers. In the end they will get every bit of punishment their wicked deeds deserve.
16 Again I plead, don’t think that I have lost my wits to talk like this; but even if you do, listen to me anyway—a witless man, a fool—while I also boast a little as they do. 17 Such bragging isn’t something the Lord commanded me to do, for I am acting like a brainless fool. 18 Yet those other men keep telling you how wonderful they are, so here I go: 19-20 (You think you are so wise—yet you listen gladly to those fools; you don’t mind at all when they make you their slaves and take everything you have, and take advantage of you, and put on airs, and slap you in the face. 21 I’m ashamed to say that I’m not strong and daring like that!
But whatever they can boast about—I’m talking like a fool again—I can boast about it, too.)
22 They brag that they are Hebrews, do they? Well, so am I. And they say that they are Israelites, God’s chosen people? So am I. And they are descendants of Abraham? Well, I am too.
23 They say they serve Christ? But I have served him far more! (Have I gone mad to boast like this?) I have worked harder, been put in jail more often, been whipped times without number, and faced death again and again and again. 24 Five different times the Jews gave me their terrible thirty-nine lashes. 25 Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked. Once I was in the open sea all night and the whole next day. 26 I have traveled many weary miles and have been often in great danger from flooded rivers and from robbers and from my own people, the Jews, as well as from the hands of the Gentiles. I have faced grave dangers from mobs in the cities and from death in the deserts and in the stormy seas and from men who claim to be brothers in Christ but are not. 27 I have lived with weariness and pain and sleepless nights. Often I have been hungry and thirsty and have gone without food; often I have shivered with cold, without enough clothing to keep me warm.
28 Then, besides all this, I have the constant worry of how the churches are getting along: 29 Who makes a mistake and I do not feel his sadness? Who falls without my longing to help him? Who is spiritually hurt without my fury rising against the one who hurt him?
30 But if I must brag, I would rather brag about the things that show how weak I am. 31 God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who is to be praised forever and ever, knows I tell the truth. 32 For instance, in Damascus the governor under King Aretas kept guards at the city gates to catch me; 33 but I was let down by rope and basket from a hole in the city wall, and so I got away! What popularity![b]
The Living Bible copyright © 1971 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.