1 Would that you could bear with me a little in my foolishness; and indeed you do bear with me.
2 For I am jealous over you with a godly jealousy; for I have betrothed you to one husband, to present you as a pure virgin to Christ.
3 But I am afraid that somehow, as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your minds may be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.
4 For if he who comes proclaims another Jesus whom we did not proclaim, or you receive a different spirit which you did not receive, or a different gospel which you did not accept, you would bear with it well enough.
5 For I consider that in nothing have I fallen short of the very chief apostles.
6 But even if I am unskilled in speech, yet I am not in knowledge; but in every way we have been made manifest among you in all things.
7 Or did I commit a sin in humbling myself so that you might be exalted, because I preached the gospel of God to you free of charge?
8 I robbed other churches, taking wages from them in order to serve you.
9 And when I was present with you and was in need, I was a burden to no one; for the brothers who came from Macedonia supplied my need; and in everything I kept myself, and will keep myself, from being a burden to you.
10 The truth of Christ is in me, that this boasting of mine shall not be stopped in the regions of Achaia.
11 Why? Because I do not love you? God knows.
12 But what I do, I will go on doing, so that I may cut off the opportunity from those who want an opportunity, so that in the matter they boast of they may be found to be just as we are.
13 For such men are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into apostles of Christ.
14 And this is no wonder, for Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light.
15 So it is no great thing if his ministers also transform themselves into ministers of righteousness; their end will be according to their works.
16 I say again, let no one think me a fool; but if you do, then receive me even as a fool, so that I too may boast a little.
17 What I am saying, I do not say according to the Lord, but as in foolishness, in this confident boasting.
18 Seeing that many boast according to the flesh, I too will boast.
19 For you gladly bear with the foolish, being wise yourselves.
20 For you put up with it if someone enslaves you, if someone devours you, if someone takes from you, if someone exalts himself, if someone strikes you on the face.
21 I speak as to our dishonor, as though we had been weak. But in whatever anyone is daring (I speak in foolishness), I am daring too.
22 Are they Hebrews? So am I. Are they Israelites? So am I. Are they the seed of Abraham? So am I.
23 Are they ministers of Christ? (I speak as one beside himself.) I am more: in labors more abundantly, in stripes beyond measure, in prisons more frequently, in deaths often.
24 From the Jews five times I received forty stripes less one.
25 Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I suffered shipwreck; a night and a day I have passed in the deep;
26 in journeys often, in perils of rivers, in perils of robbers, in perils from my own people, in perils from the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils at sea, in perils among false brothers;
27 in labor and hardship, in sleepless nights often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness.
28 Besides the things that come from outside, there is that which presses on me daily, the care of all the churches.
29 Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is made to stumble, and I do not burn?
30 If I must boast, I will boast of the things that concern my weakness.
31 The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed forever, knows that I do not lie.
32 In Damascus the ethnarch under Aretas the king was guarding the city of the Damascenes, wishing to seize me;
33 and through a window I was let down in a basket through the wall, and escaped his hands.