Greeting
PAUL, an apostle of Jesus Christ through the will of God, and Timothy our brother: to the congregation of God which is in Corinth, together with all the holy people which are in all the province of Achaia:
2 Grace to you, and peace from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Encouragement in Suffering
3 ¶ Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ; the Father of mercies, and the God of all encouragement;
4 Who encourages us in all our tribulation: that we may be able to encourage those which are in any distress; through the encouragement, which we ourselves are encouraged by, of God.
5 For just as the sufferings of Christ abound in us; so our encouragement also abounds through Christ.
6 Now if we be afflicted: it is for your encouragement and salvation; which is worked, by enduring the same sufferings which we also suffer; or if we be encouraged: it is for your encouragement and salvation.
7 And our hope of you is steadfast; knowing, that just as you are partakers in the sufferings, so you will also be in the encouragement.
We Trusted in God
8 ¶ For we wish you not to be ignorant brothers, of our trouble which came to us in the province of Asia, that we were greatly burdened beyond our own power, so that we despaired even of life:
9 But we already have the sentence of death within ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves: but in God which raises the dead.
10 Who rescues us from so great a dying, and does deliver: In whom we put our hope, that he will deliver us yet still.
11 You also work together in helping us, by pleading in prayer for us: that the gift bestowed upon us for many people, may result in thanks being given for us, through many.
Our Singleness of Heart
12 ¶ For our boast is this: the witness of our conscience; that we conducted ourselves in the world in singleness of heart and godly sincerity (not with fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of God), and all the more abundantly towards you.
13 For we write nothing else to you, than what you read and understand; and hope you shall understand even to the end;
14 Just as you have understood us in part: that we are your reason for boasting, even as you are also ours in the day of the Lord Jesus.
Sparing the Congregation
15 ¶ And in this confidence, I wanted to come to you before, that you might have double the grace.
16 And to pass through you into Macedonia, and to come out again from Macedonia to you; and by you, to be helped on my way into Judea.
17 ¶ Therefore, when I was thus minded: was I fickle towards you? Or in the things that I decide, did I decide according to the flesh, that with me there should be yes yes, and no no?
18 But God is faithful, that our word toward you was not yes and no.
19 For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, who was preached among you through us, even through me, Silvanus and Timothy, was not yes and no, but in him was yes.
20 For all the promises of God in him are yes, and in him Amen, to the glory of God through us.
21 ¶ Now He which establishes us with you in Christ, and has anointed us, is God;
22 Who has also put His seal on us, and given us the Spirit in our hearts as a pledge.
23 Moreover, I call on God as witness upon my soul: that to spare you trouble, I came not as yet to Corinth.
24 Not because we have dominion over your faith; rather are fellow workers of your joy: for you stand by faith.