[1] We are workers together with God. So we beg you: Don’t let the grace ˻(kindness)˼ that you received from God be for nothing.
[2] God says, “I heard you at the right time, and I gave you help on the day of salvation.” I tell you that the “right time” is now. The “day of salvation” is now.
[3] We don’t want people to find anything wrong with our work. So we do nothing that will be a problem to other people.
[4] But in every way we show that we are servants of God: in accepting many hard things, in troubles, in difficulties, and in great problems.
[5] We are beaten and thrown into prison. People become upset and fight us. We work hard, and sometimes we get no sleep or food.
[6] ˻We show that we are servants of God˼ by our understanding, by our patience, by our kindness, and by living pure. ˻We show this˼ by the Holy Spirit, by true love,
[7] by speaking the truth, and by God’s power. We use our right living to defend ourselves against everything.
[8] Some people honor us, but other people shame us. Some people say good things about us, but other people say bad things. Some people say we are liars, but we speak the truth.
[9] To some people we are not known ˻(not important)˼, but we are well known. We seem to be dying, but look! We continue to live. We are punished, but we are not killed.
[10] We have much sadness, but we are always rejoicing. We are poor, but we are making many people rich ˻in faith˼. We have nothing, but really we have everything.
[11] We have spoken freely to you people in Corinth. We have opened our hearts to you.
[12] Our feelings of love for you have not stopped. It is you that have stopped your feelings of love for us.
[13] I speak to you like you are my children. Do the same as we have done—open your hearts also.
[14] You are not the same as those people who don’t believe. So don’t join yourselves to them. Good and bad don’t belong together. Light and darkness cannot have fellowship ˻(sharing)˼.
[15] How can Christ and Belial ˻(the devil)˼ have any agreement? What can a believer have together with a non-believer?
[16] God’s temple cannot have any agreement with idols. And we are the temple of the living God. Like God said: “I will live with them and walk with them, I will be their God, and they will be my people.”
[17] ”So come away from those people and separate yourselves from them, says the Lord. Touch nothing that is not clean, and I will accept you.”
[18] ”I will be your father, and you will be my sons and daughters, says the Lord All-Powerful.”