1 I would that you were bearing with me a little in foolishness; but indeed bear with me.
2 For I am jealous [over] you with godly jealousy. For I have espoused you to one Man, to present [you as] a pure virgin to Christ.
3 But I fear lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve in his craftiness, so your thoughts should be corrupted from the simplicity due to Christ.
4 For if, indeed, the [one] coming proclaims another Jesus, whom we have not proclaimed, or [if] you receive another spirit, which you did not receive, or another gospel, which you never accepted, you might well endure [these.
5 For I judge [myself] to have come behind the highest apostles [in] nothing.
6 But even if [I am] unskilled in speech, yet not in knowledge; but in every way [I] have been clearly revealed to you in all things.
7 Or did I commit sin in humbling myself that you might be exalted, because I preached the gospel of God to you without charge?
8 I stripped other churches, taking wages for the serving of you.
9 And being present with you, and in need, I was not a burden to anyone. For the brothers from Macedonia made up completely my need. And in every way I have kept myself from being burdensome [to you], and I will keep myself.
10 The truth of Christ is in me that this boasting shall not be silenced in me in the regions of Achaia.
11 Why? Because I do not love you? God knows.
12 But what I do, that I will do, so that I may cut off occasion from those who desire occasion; so that in the thing in which they boast, they may be found even as we.
13 For such ones [are] false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ.
14 Did not even Satan marvelously transform himself into an angel of light?
15 Therefore [it is] no great thing if his ministers also transform themselves as ministers of righteousness, whose end shall be according to their works.
16 Again I say, Let no one think me foolish. If otherwise, yet receive me as foolish, so that I may also boast a little.
17 What I speak, I do not speak according to the Lord, but as in foolishness, in this boldness of boasting.
18 Since many glory according to the flesh, I also will boast.
19 For you gladly bear with fools, being wise.
20 For you endure if anyone enslaves you, if anyone devours, if anyone takes [from you], if anyone exalts himself, if anyone strikes you in the face.
21 I speak according to dishonor, as though we have been weak. But in whatever anyone dares (I speak foolishly), I also dare.
22 Are they Hebrews? I also! Are they Israelites? I also! Are they the seed of Abraham? I also!
23 Are they ministers of Christ? (I speak as beside myself,) I [am] more! [I have been] in labors more abundantly, in stripes above measure, in prisons more, in deaths many times.
24 Five times from the Jews I received forty [stripes] minus one.
25 Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked. I have spent a night and a day in the deep.
26 I have been in travels often; in dangers from waters; in dangers from robbers; in dangers from [my] race; in dangers from [the] heathen; in dangers in [the] city; in dangers in [ the] wilderness; in dangers on [the sea; in dangers among false brothers.
27 [I have been] in hardship and toil; often in watchings; in hunger and thirst; often in fastings; in cold and nakedness;
28 besides the things outside conspiring against me daily, the care of all the churches.
29 Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is caused to stumble, and I do not burn?
30 If it is right to boast, I will boast [of] the things of my weakness.
31 The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed forever, knows that I do not lie.
32 In Damascus the governor under Aretas the king guarded the city of [the] Damascenes, desiring to lay hold of me.
33 And I was let down in a basket through a window through the wall, and escaped their hands.