Now we have such confidence in God through Christ.

I rejoice because in everything I am fully confident in you.

What I am saying with this boastful confidence I do not say the way the Lord would. Instead it is, as it were, foolishness.

And with this confidence I intended to come to you first so that you would get a second opportunity to see us,

For if any of the Macedonians should come with me and find that you are not ready to give, we would be humiliated (not to mention you) by this confidence we had in you.

And we are sending with them our brother whom we have tested many times and found eager in many matters, but who now is much more eager than ever because of the great confidence he has in you.

I have great confidence in you; I take great pride on your behalf. I am filled with encouragement; I am overflowing with joy in the midst of all our suffering.

You are looking at outward appearances. If anyone is confident that he belongs to Christ, he should reflect on this again: Just as he himself belongs to Christ, so too do we.

now I ask that when I am present I may not have to be bold with the confidence that (I expect) I will dare to use against some who consider us to be behaving according to human standards.

And I wrote this very thing to you, so that when I came I would not have sadness from those who ought to make me rejoice, since I am confident in you all that my joy would be yours.

For our reason for confidence is this: the testimony of our conscience, that with pure motives and sincerity which are from God – not by human wisdom but by the grace of God – we conducted ourselves in the world, and all the more toward you.

Thus we are full of courage and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord.

Therefore we are always full of courage, and we know that as long as we are alive here on earth we are absent from the Lord –

Therefore, since we have such a hope, we behave with great boldness,

And our hope for you is steadfast because we know that as you share in our sufferings, so also you will share in our comfort.

He delivered us from so great a risk of death, and he will deliver us. We have set our hope on him that he will deliver us yet again,

Nor do we boast beyond certain limits in the work done by others, but we hope that as your faith continues to grow, our work may be greatly expanded among you according to our limits,