Study Desk

who used to throw a veil over his face to hide from the gaze of the children of Israel the passing away of what was but transitory.

But whenever the heart of the nation shall have returned to the Lord, the veil will be withdrawn.

Nay, we have renounced the secrecy which marks a feeling of shame. We practice no cunning tricks, nor do we adulterate God's Message. But by a full clear statement of the truth we strive to commend ourselves in the presence of God to every human conscience.

(For we do not proclaim ourselves, but we proclaim Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as your bondservants for the sake of Jesus.)

But we have this treasure in a fragile vase of clay, in order that the surpassing greatness of the power may be seen to belong to God, and not to originate in us.

But possessing the same Spirit of faith as he who wrote, "I believed, and therefore I have spoken," we also believe, and therefore we speak.

while we look not at things seen, but things unseen; for things seen are temporary, but things unseen are eternal.

For we know that if this poor tent, our earthly house, is taken down, we have in Heaven a building which God has provided, a house not built by human hands, but eternal.

Yes, we who are in this tent certainly do sigh under our burdens, for we do not wish to lay aside that with which we are now clothed, but to put on more, so that our mortality may be absorbed in Life.

We are not again commending ourselves to your favour, but are furnishing you with a ground of boasting on our behalf, so that you may have a reply ready for those with whom superficial appearances are everything and sincerity of heart counts for nothing.

and that He died for all in order that the living may no longer live to themselves, but to Him who died for them and rose again.

as sad, but we are always joyful; as poor, but we bestow wealth on many; as having nothing, and yet we securely possess all things.

But He who comforts the depressed--even God-- comforted us by the coming of Titus, and not by his coming only,

but also by the fact that he had felt comforted on your account, and by the report which he brought of your eager affection, of your grief, and of your jealousy on my behalf, so that I rejoiced more than ever.

Now I rejoice, not in your grief, but because the grief led to repentance; for you sorrowed with a godly sorrow, which prevented you from receiving injury from us in any respect.

For godly sorrow produces repentance leading to salvation, a repentance not to be regretted; but the sorrow of the world finally produces death.

Therefore, though I wrote to you, it was not to punish the offender, nor to secure justice for him who had suffered the wrong, but it was chiefly in order that your earnest feeling on our behalf might become manifest to yourselves in the sight of God.

For however I may have boasted to him about you, I have no reason to feel ashamed; but as we have in all respects spoken the truth to you, so also our boasting to Titus about you has turned out to be the truth.

But we desire to let you know, brethren, of the grace of God which has been bestowed on the Churches of Macedonia;

They not only did this, as we had expected, but first of all in obedience to God's will they gave their own selves to the Lord and to us.