2 Corinthians 2
2
1I have decided not to make my next visit with you so painful. 2If I make you feel bad, who would be left to cheer me up, except the people I had made to feel bad? 3The reason I want to be happy is to make you happy. I wrote as I did because I didn't want to visit you and be made to feel bad, when you should make me feel happy. 4At the time I wrote, I was suffering terribly. My eyes were full of tears, and my heart was broken. But I didn't want to make you feel bad. I only wanted to let you know how much I cared for you.
Forgiveness
5I don't want to be hard on you. But if one of you has made someone feel bad, I am not really the one who has been made to feel bad. Some of you are the ones. 6Most of you have already pointed out the wrong that person did, and this is punishment enough for what was done.
7When people sin, you should forgive and comfort them, so they won't give up in despair. 8You should make them sure of your love for them.
9I also wrote because I wanted to test you and find out if you would follow my instructions. 10I will forgive anyone you forgive. Yes, for your sake and with Christ as my witness, I have forgiven whatever needed to be forgiven. 11I have done this to keep Satan from getting the better of us. We all know what goes on in his mind.
12 #
Ac 20.1. When I went to Troas to preach the good news about Christ, I found that the Lord had already prepared the way. 13But I was worried when I didn't find my friend Titus there. So I left the other followers and went on to Macedonia.
14I am grateful that God always makes it possible for Christ to lead us to victory. God also helps us spread the knowledge about Christ everywhere, and this knowledge is like the smell of perfume. 15-16In fact, God thinks of us as a perfume that brings Christ to everyone. For people who are being saved, this perfume has a sweet smell and leads them to a better life. But for people who are lost, it has a bad smell and leads them to a horrible death.
No one really has what it takes to do this work. 17A lot of people try to get rich from preaching God's message. But we are God's sincere messengers, and by the power of Christ we speak our message with God as our witness.
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Contemporary English Version, Second Edition (CEV®)
© 2006 American Bible Society. All rights reserved.
2 Corinthians 2
2
1So I decided that my next visit to you would not be another visit to make you sad. 2If I make you sad, then who will make me happy? Only you can make me happy—you, the ones I made sad. 3I wrote you a letter so that when I came to you I would not be made sad by those who should make me happy. I felt sure that all of you would share my joy. 4When I wrote to you before, I was very troubled and my heart was full of sadness. I wrote with many tears. I did not write to make you sad, but to let you know how much I love you.
Forgive the Person Who Did Wrong
5Someone in your group has caused sadness—not to me, but to all of you. I mean he has caused sadness to all in some way. (I don’t want to make it sound worse than it really is.) 6The punishment that most of your group gave him is enough for him. 7But now you should forgive him and encourage him. This will keep him from having too much sadness and giving up completely. 8So I beg you to show him that you love him. 9This is why I wrote to you. I wanted to test you and see if you obey in everything. 10If you forgive someone, then I also forgive them. And what I have forgiven—if I had anything to forgive—I forgave it for you, and Christ was with me. 11I did this so that Satan would not win anything from us. We know very well what his plans are.
God Gives Us Victory Over Troubles
12I went to Troas to tell people the Good News of Christ. The Lord gave me a good opportunity there. 13But I had no peace because I did not find my brother Titus. So I said goodbye and went to Macedonia.
14But thanks be to God, who always leads us in victory through Christ. God uses us to spread his knowledge everywhere like a sweet-smelling perfume. 15Our offering to God is to be the perfume of Christ that goes out to those who are being saved and to those who are being lost. 16To those who are being lost, this perfume smells like death, and it brings them death. But to those who are being saved, it has the sweet smell of life, and it brings them life. So who is good enough to do this work? 17Certainly not those who are out there selling God’s message for a profit! But we don’t do that. With Christ’s help we speak God’s truth honestly, knowing that we must answer to him.
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