Study Desk

We don't tell people about ourselves. But we tell people that Jesus Christ is Lord, and we tell them that we are your servants for Jesus.

We have this treasure from God, but we are only like clay jars that hold the treasure. This is to show that the amazing power we have is from God, not from us.

We have troubles all around us, but we are not defeated. We often don't know what to do, but we don't give up.

We are persecuted, but God does not leave us. We are hurt sometimes, but we are not destroyed.

So we constantly experience the death of Jesus in our own bodies, but this is so that the life of Jesus can also be seen in our bodies.

We are alive, but for Jesus we are always in danger of death, so that the life of Jesus can be seen in our bodies that die.

So death is working in us, but the result is that life is working in you.

That is why we never give up. Our physical body is becoming older and weaker, but our spirit inside us is made new every day.

We have small troubles for a while now, but these troubles are helping us gain an eternal glory. That eternal glory is much greater than our troubles.

We know that our body—the tent we live in here on earth—will be destroyed. But when that happens, God will have a home for us to live in. It will not be the kind of home people build here. It will be a home in heaven that will continue forever.

But now we are tired of this body. We want God to give us our heavenly home.

While we live in this tent, we have burdens and so we complain. I don't mean that we want to remove this tent, but we want to be clothed with our heavenly home. Then this body that dies will be covered with life.

We are not trying to prove ourselves to you again. But we are telling you about ourselves. We are giving you reasons to be proud of us. Then you will have an answer for those who are proud about what can be seen. They don't care about what is in a person's heart.

From this time on we don't think of anyone as the world thinks of people. It is true that in the past we thought of Christ as the world thinks. But we don't think that way now.

Christ had no sin, but God made him become sin so that in Christ we could be right with God.

But in every way we show that we are servants of God. We never give up, even though we face troubles, difficulties, and problems of every kind.

Some people honor us, but others shame us. Some people say good things about us, but others say bad things. Some people say we are liars, but we speak the truth.

To some people we are not known, but we are well known. We seem to be dying, but look! We continue to live. We are punished, but we are not killed.

We have much sadness, but we are always rejoicing. We are poor, but we are making many people rich in faith. We have nothing, but really we have everything.

But God encourages those who are troubled, and he certainly encouraged us by bringing Titus to us.