So here is my opinion on this matter: It is to your advantage, since you ¹  made a good start last year both in your giving and your desire to give,

I have become a fool. You yourselves forced me to do it, for I should have been commended by you. For I lack nothing in comparison ¹  to those “super-apostles,” even though I am nothing.

Is the law therefore opposed to the promises of God? ¹  Absolutely not! For if a law had been given that was able to give life, then righteousness would certainly have come by the law. ² 

My confident hope ¹  is that I will in no way be ashamed ²  but that with complete boldness, even now as always, Christ will be exalted in my body, whether I live or die. ³ 

So then, my dear friends, just as you have always obeyed, not only in my presence but even more in my absence, continue working out your salvation with awe and reverence, ¹ 

Not that I have already attained this – that is, I have not already been perfected – but I strive to lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus also laid hold of me. ¹ 

For this reason we also, from the day we heard about you, ¹  have not ceased praying for you and asking God ²  to fill ³  you with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding,

Now I rejoice in my sufferings for you, and I fill up in my physical body – for the sake of his body, the church – what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ.

For from you the message of the Lord ¹  has echoed forth not just in Macedonia and Achaia, but in every place reports of your faith in God have spread, ²  so that we do not need to say anything.

because they hinder us from speaking to the Gentiles so that they may be saved. Thus they constantly fill up their measure of sins, ¹  but wrath ²  has come upon them completely. ³ 

For we tell you this by the word of the Lord, ¹  that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will surely not go ahead of those who have fallen asleep.

For it was fitting for him, for whom and through whom all things exist, ¹  in bringing many sons to glory, to make the pioneer ²  of their salvation perfect through sufferings.

But ¹  showing its fault, ²  God ³  says to them, ⁴  “Look, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will complete a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah.

For we all stumble ¹  in many ways. If someone does not stumble ²  in what he says, ³  he is a perfect individual, ⁴  able to control the entire body as well.

But in the days ¹  when the seventh angel is about to blow his trumpet, the mystery of God is completed, ²  just as he has ³  proclaimed to his servants ⁴  the prophets.”

For God has put into their minds ¹  to carry out his purpose ²  by making ³  a decision ⁴  to give their royal power ⁵  to the beast until the words of God are fulfilled. ⁶ 

Then God said, “Let us make ¹  humankind ²  in our image, after our likeness, ³  so they may rule ⁴  over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the cattle, and over all the earth, ⁵  and over all the creatures that move ⁶  on the earth.”

I have chosen him ¹  so that he may command his children and his household after him to keep ²  the way of the Lord by doing ³  what is right and just. Then the Lord will give ⁴  to Abraham what he promised ⁵  him.”

‘My father made me swear an oath. He said, ¹  “I am about to die. Bury me ²  in my tomb that I dug for myself there in the land of Canaan.” Now let me go and bury my father; then I will return.’”

“‘When ¹  the days of her purification are completed for a son or for a daughter, she must bring a one year old lamb ²  for a burnt offering ³  and a young pigeon or turtledove for a sin offering ⁴  to the entrance of the Meeting Tent, to the priest.