11
“Please Put Up with Me!”
1 O that you would put up with me as I now throw discretion aside with a bit of my own foolish talk!+ Yes, please put up with me!
2 I am jealous for you with a divine+ jealousy, you see. Indeed, I have committed you in a binding betrothal+ to one husband, the Messiah,+ promising to present you to him as a pure virgin.+
3 I am afraid, though, that just as the serpent deceived Eve with his clever scheming, your minds may somehow be soiled and turned away from your sincere and pure devotion to the Messiah.
4 And why shouldn’t I be afraid,+ given how whenever someone new comes along and proclaims a message about Jesus different+ from the one that we proclaimed, you put up with it so gladly? Given how happily you welcome a spirit different+ from the one you received, or a gospel at variance with the one you received from us?+
5 Yes, I believe I am lagging behind those oh-so-outstanding “apostles” of yours+ not in the least.+
6 And suppose that I really am an amateur in my speaking abilities—+still, such is certainly not true when it comes to my understanding,+ a fact, certainly, which we have displayed in all+ respects among all people+ through what we are in our relations with you.++
7 I didn’t charge you a+ thing when I proclaimed the gospel+ of God to you; myself I humbled,+ so that you could be exalted. Was it a sin+ for me to do this?+
8 It was+ other assemblies that I pillaged, by+ receiving rations from them so that I could you freely+ serve.+
9 And so when I was with you and fell into need,+ I didn’t impose a financial strain on any of you,+ because my needs were fully provided for by the brothers who arrived from Macedonia; myself I did not allow,+ and will not allow,+ to become a financial burden to you in any way.+
10 As surely as the truth of the Messiah is in me, I solemnly declare that no one in the whole province of Achaia will stop me from singing about this honorable decision of mine.+
11 Why? Because I don’t love you? God himself+ knows that I do+!
12 No,+ I do this, and will continue to do this, in order to undermine the fraudulent claims of those who are eager for a chance to make it appear, on the basis of the empty credentials about which they love to sing, that they are on the same level as us.+
13 Such people, you see, are false apostles, deceitful workers, disguising themselves as apostles of the Messiah.
14 And yet why should that surprise us?+ Even Satan, after all, disguises himself as an angel of light!
15 It is hardly a shock, then, if his servants, too, disguise themselves as servants of righteousness, whose doom will match their deeds.+
16 I will say it again:+ Let no one+ consider me a fool,+ although if it does come to that, then at least give me, just as you would a fool, a patient hearing,+ so that I myself,+ too, may do a little singing of my own praises.+
17 In what I’m about to say I will be talking not+ like the Lord, but like a fool, in this business+ of self-exalting chatter.+
18 Since so+ many love to lavish praises on themselves according to mere human standards,+ I, too,+ will give it a try myself!
19 Why not,+ seeing that you put up with fools so+ gladly, since+ you are so+ wise?
20 Why not, seeing how you are ready to put up with anyone who wants+ to treat you like slaves, or rob you of all you own,+ or get you in his clutches,+ or act high and mightily toward you, or strike you right+ in the face?
21 How shameful it is,+ I must admit, that we have been far too+ “weak” to resort to those sorts of things+! In whatever respect someone else would dare stir up such+ nerve as to speak exaltingly of himself+ (I am talking like a complete+ fool!), I too will do the same.
22 Are they Hebrews+? So am I. Are they Israelites+? So am I. Is it+ from Abraham that they trace their descent?+ Me too.
23 Are they servants of the Messiah+? (I must be absolutely+ out of my mind to be talking like this!) My own service outshines theirs+: I have worked much harder, been in prison far more often, been beaten far more severely, and have faced death time and again.
24 At the hand of the Jews I have received, on five different occasions,+ the forty lashes minus one.+
25 Three times I was beaten by the Romans+ with rods,+ on one occasion I was pelted with stones, on three occasions I found myself on a ship as it was destroyed at sea. One time I floated adrift, in the open sea,+ for a whole night and a day.
26 In my many travels+ I have met dangers of all kinds: Dangers from floods,+ dangers from bandits, dangers from my fellow Jews,+ dangers from Gentiles, dangers in the city, dangers in the wilderness, dangers at sea, dangers among false brothers.
27 I have worked hard and toiled, I have endured many sleepless nights, I have known thirst and intense hunger, I have often gone without anything to eat, I have been cold from not having enough clothes to keep me warm.+
28 And apart from what I leave unmentioned,+ there is the pressure that weighs heavily on me every day, namely, my anxious concern for all the assemblies.+
29 When someone is weak, am I not weak, too? When one person causes another to stumble in sin, do I not burn with anger?+
30 If self-exalting chatter+ is unavoidable,+ I will at least keep it to the things that highlight my weakness.+
31 The God and Father of the Lord Jesus, who is blessed forever into the ages, knows that I am not lying.
32 When I was in Damascus, the governor under King Aretas ordered+ the city of Damascus to be kept under watch in an attempt to arrest me.+
33 Yet I was lowered through an opening+ in the city+ wall in a rope-basket,+ through a window, and escaped his grasp.