Make room for us in your hearts; we have wronged no one, we have ruined no one, we have exploited no one.

Three times I was beaten with a rod. Once I received a stoning. Three times I suffered shipwreck. A night and a day I spent adrift in the open sea.

Now I will most gladly spend and be spent for your lives! If I love you more, am I to be loved less?

(To my disgrace I must say that we were too weak for that!) But whatever anyone else dares to boast about (I am speaking foolishly), I also dare to boast about the same thing.

I have become a fool. You yourselves forced me to do it, for I should have been commended by you. For I lack nothing in comparison to those “super-apostles,” even though I am nothing.

For if we are out of our minds, it is for God; if we are of sound mind, it is for you.

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

Now I appeal to God as my witness, that to spare you I did not come again to Corinth.

For if I make you sad, who would be left to make me glad but the one I caused to be sad?

For we rejoice whenever we are weak, but you are strong. And we pray for this: that you may become fully qualified.

I wish that you would be patient with me in a little foolishness, but indeed you are being patient with me!

Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is led into sin, and I do not burn with indignation?

And I hope that you will realize that we have not failed the test!

I had no relief in my spirit, because I did not find my brother Titus there. So I said good-bye to them and set out for Macedonia.

But since we have the same spirit of faith as that shown in what has been written, “I believed; therefore I spoke,” we also believe, therefore we also speak.

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.

I say again, let no one think that I am a fool. But if you do, then at least accept me as a fool, so that I too may boast a little.

For even if I wish to boast, I will not be a fool, for I would be telling the truth, but I refrain from this so that no one may regard me beyond what he sees in me or what he hears from me,

And what mutual agreement does the temple of God have with idols? For we are the temple of the living God, just as God said, “I will live in them and will walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people.”

Therefore we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making His plea through us. We plead with you on Christ’s behalf, “Be reconciled to God!”