Now the one who prepared us for this very purpose is God, who gave us the Spirit as a down payment.

For our momentary, light suffering is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison

revealing that you are a letter of Christ, delivered by us, written not with ink but by the Spirit of the living God, not on stone tablets but on tablets of human hearts.

because I know your eagerness to help. I keep boasting to the Macedonians about this eagerness of yours, that Achaia has been ready to give since last year, and your zeal to participate has stirred up most of them.

But I am sending these brothers so that our boasting about you may not be empty in this case, so that you may be ready just as I kept telling them.

Therefore I thought it necessary to urge these brothers to go to you in advance and to arrange ahead of time the generous contribution you had promised, so this may be ready as a generous gift and not as something you feel forced to do.