Are they servants of Christ? I am a better one—I am talking like a madman—with far greater labors, far more imprisonments, with countless beatings, and often near death.
but as servants of God we commend ourselves in every way: by great endurance, in afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger;
Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I was adrift at sea;
as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold, we live; as punished, and yet not killed;
who has made us sufficient to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.
Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again.
But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me.
For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me.
Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church,
For I will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name.”
yet for love's sake I prefer to appeal to you—I, Paul, an old man and now a prisoner also for Christ Jesus—
for which I am suffering, bound with chains as a criminal. But the word of God is not bound!
Why are we in danger every hour? I protest, brothers, by my pride in you, which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, I die every day! What do I gain if, humanly speaking, I fought with beasts at Ephesus? If the dead are not raised, “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.”
What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each.
For you had compassion on those in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one.
May the Lord grant mercy to the household of Onesiphorus, for he often refreshed me and was not ashamed of my chains,
Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me his prisoner, but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God,
If you put these things before the brothers, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, being trained in the words of the faith and of the good doctrine that you have followed.
and we sent Timothy, our brother and God's coworker in the gospel of Christ, to establish and exhort you in your faith,
Even if I am to be poured out as a drink offering upon the sacrificial offering of your faith, I am glad and rejoice with you all.
so that it has become known throughout the whole imperial guard and to all the rest that my imprisonment is for Christ.
for which I am an ambassador in chains, that I may declare it boldly, as I ought to speak.
I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called,
For this reason I, Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus on behalf of you Gentiles—
I have been a fool! You forced me to it, for I ought to have been commended by you. For I was not at all inferior to these super-apostles, even though I am nothing. The signs of a true apostle were performed among you with utmost patience, with signs and wonders and mighty works.
Indeed, I consider that I am not in the least inferior to these super-apostles.
Look at what is before your eyes. If anyone is confident that he is Christ's, let him remind himself that just as he is Christ's, so also are we.
For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh.
As it is written, “For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.”
He lived there two whole years at his own expense, and welcomed all who came to him,
And when we came into Rome, Paul was allowed to stay by himself, with the soldier who guarded him.
And when it was decided that we should sail for Italy, they delivered Paul and some other prisoners to a centurion of the Augustan Cohort named Julius.
And as they stayed there many days, Festus laid Paul's case before the king, saying, “There is a man left prisoner by Felix,
At the same time he hoped that money would be given him by Paul. So he sent for him often and conversed with him. When two years had elapsed, Felix was succeeded by Porcius Festus. And desiring to do the Jews a favor, Felix left Paul in prison.
And coming to us, he took Paul's belt and bound his own feet and hands and said, “Thus says the Holy Spirit, ‘This is how the Jews at Jerusalem will bind the man who owns this belt and deliver him into the hands of the Gentiles.’”
except that the Holy Spirit testifies to me in every city that imprisonment and afflictions await me.
And when they had inflicted many blows upon them, they threw them into prison, ordering the jailer to keep them safely. Having received this order, he put them into the inner prison and fastened their feet in the stocks.
But Jews came from Antioch and Iconium, and having persuaded the crowds, they stoned Paul and dragged him out of the city, supposing that he was dead.
This is how one should regard us, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God.
Unless otherwise indicated, all content is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License. All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. Copyright ©2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Contact me: openbibleinfo (at) gmail.com.