because I know your eagerness to help. ¹  I keep boasting to the Macedonians about this eagerness of yours, ²  that Achaia has been ready to give ³  since last year, and your zeal to participate ⁴  has stirred up most of them. ⁵ 

For out of great distress and anguish of heart I wrote to you with many tears, not to make you sad, but to let you know the love that I have especially for you. ¹ 

In other words, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting people’s trespasses against them, and he has given us ¹  the message of reconciliation.

Because of this I am writing these things while absent, so that when I arrive ¹  I may not have to deal harshly with you ²  by using my authority – the Lord gave it to me for building up, not for tearing down!