- 1
- Would that ye would bear with me [in] a little folly;
but indeed bear with me.
- 2
- For I am jealous as to you with a jealousy [which is] of God;
for I have espoused you unto one man, to present [you] a chaste virgin to Christ.
- 3
- But I fear lest by any means, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craft, [so] your thoughts should be corrupted from simplicity as to the Christ.
- 4
- For if indeed he that comes preaches another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or ye get a different Spirit, which ye have not got, or a different glad tidings, which ye have not received, ye might well bear with [it].
- 5
- For I reckon that in nothing I am behind those who are in surpassing degree apostles.
- 6
- But if [I am] a simple person in speech, yet not in knowledge, but in everything making [the truth] manifest in all things to you.
- 7
- Have I committed sin, abasing myself in order that *ye* might be exalted, because I gratuitously announced to you the glad tidings of God?
- 8
- I spoiled other assemblies, receiving hire for ministry towards you.
- 9
- And being present with you and lacking, I did not lazily burden any one, (for the brethren who came from Macedonia supplied what I lacked,) and in everything I kept myself from being a burden to you, and will keep myself.
- 10
- [The] truth of Christ is in me that this boasting shall not be stopped as to me in the regions of Achaia.
- 11
- Why?
because I do not love you? God knows.
- 12
- But what I do, I will also do, that I may cut off the opportunity of those wishing [for] an opportunity, that wherein they boast they may be found even as we.
- 13
- For such [are] false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into apostles of Christ.
- 14
- And [it is] not wonderful, for Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light.
- 15
- It is no great thing therefore if his ministers also transform themselves as ministers of righteousness;
whose end shall be according to their works.
- 16
- Again I say, Let not any one think me to be a fool;
but if otherwise, receive me then even as a fool, that *I* also may boast myself some little.
- 17
- What I speak I do not speak according to [the] Lord, but as in folly, in this confidence of boasting.
- 18
- Since many boast according to flesh, *I* also will boast.
- 19
- For ye bear fools readily, being wise.
- 20
- For ye bear if any one bring you into bondage, if any one devour [you], if any one get [your money], if any one exalt himself, if any one beat you on the face.
- 21
- I speak as to dishonour, as though *we* had been weak;
but wherein any one is daring, (I speak in folly,) *I* also am daring.
- 22
- Are they Hebrews?
*I* also. Are they Israelites? *I* also. Are they seed of Abraham? *I* also.
- 23
- Are they ministers of Christ?
(I speak as being beside myself) *I* above measure [so]; in labours exceedingly abundant, in stripes to excess, in prisons exceedingly abundant, in deaths oft.
- 24
- From the Jews five times have I received forty [stripes], save one.
- 25
- Thrice have I been scourged, once I have been stoned, three times I have suffered shipwreck, a night and day I passed in the deep:
- 26
- in journeyings often, in perils of rivers, in perils of robbers, in perils from [my own] race, in perils from [the] nations, in perils in [the] city, in perils in [the] desert, in perils on [the] sea, in perils among false brethren;
- 27
- in labour and toil, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness.
- 28
- Besides those things that are without, the crowd [of cares] pressing on me daily, the burden of all the assemblies.
- 29
- Who is weak, and I am not weak?
Who is stumbled, and I burn not?
- 30
- If it is needful to boast, I will boast in the things which concern my infirmity.
- 31
- The God and Father of the Lord Jesus knows — he who is blessed for ever — that I do not lie.
- 32
- In Damascus the ethnarch of Aretas the king kept the city of the Damascenes shut up, wishing to take me;
- 33
- and through a window in a basket I was let down by the wall, and escaped his hands.
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