Paul Greets the Corinthians
(1 Corinthians 1:1-3)
1Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus bythe will of God, and Timothyour brother,
To the church of God being in Corinth, with all the saints being in all Achaia.
2Grace to you and peace from God our Father andthe Lord Jesus Christ.
The God of All Comfort
3Blessedbe the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassions, and God of all comfort,4theOne comforting us in all our tribulation, for us to be able to comfort those in every tribulation through the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God,5because as the sufferings of the Christ abound toward us, so through Christ our comfort also abounds.
6But if we are constricted,it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are encouraged,it is for your comfort, operating inthe endurance of the same sufferings that we also suffer.7And our hope for youis sure, knowing that as you are partners ofour sufferings, so also ofour comfort.
8For we do not want you to be ignorant brothers, as to our affliction having happened in Asia, that we were weighed against excessively, beyondour power, so as for us to despair even to live.9Indeed we had in ourselves the sentence of death, in order that we should not be trusting in ourselves, but in God, theOne raising the dead,10who has delivered us from such a great death and will deliverus, in whom we have hope that also He will deliverus still,11of you also joining together for us by supplication, so that thanks may be given for us by many persons for the grace bestowed toward us through many.
Paul's Change of Plans
12For our boasting is this: the testimony of our conscience that we have conducted ourselves in the world, and more abundantly toward you, inthe purity and sincerity of God, and not in fleshly wisdom but inthe grace of God.13For we write no other things to you other than what you read or even understand. And I hope that you will understand tothe end,14as also you have understood us in part, so that we are your boasting, even as youare also ours, in the day of our Lord Jesus.
15And with this confidence I was planning to come to you previously, so that you might have a second blessing of grace,16and through you to pass through into Macedonia, and to come to you again from Macedonia, and to be set forward by you to Judea.
17Thus purposing, therefore then, did I use lightness? Or do I purpose what I purpose according to flesh, so that with me there should be “Yes, yes” and “No, no”?18But Godis faithful, that our word to you was not “Yes” and “No.”19For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, having been proclaimed among you by us—by me and Silvanusa and Timothy—was not “Yes” and “No,” but it has always been “Yes” in Him.20For as many asare the promises of God, in Himis the “Yes.” Therefore also in Him, the “Amen” by usis for glory to God.
21Now theOne establishing us with you unto Christ, and having anointed us,is God,22theOne also having sealed us and having given the pledge of the Spirit in our hearts.23But I call God as witness upon my soul, that sparing you, I have not yet come to Corinth.24Not that we lord it over your faith, but are fellow workers with you of joy; for in the faith you stand firm.
a19That is, Silas
