Chapter 4

¹So since by the mercy of God I am engaged in this service, I never lose heart. ²I disown disgraceful, underhanded ways. I refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God’s message. It is by the open statement of the truth that I would commend myself to every human conscience in the sight of God. ³If the meaning of my preaching of the good news is veiled at all, it is so only in the case of those who are on the way to destruction. ⁴In their case, the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep the light of the good news of the glorious Christ, the likeness of God, from dawning upon them. ⁵For it is not myself but Christ Jesus that I am proclaiming as Lord; I am only a slave of yours for Jesus’ sake. ⁶For God who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in my heart, to give me the light of the knowledge of God’s glory, that is on the face of Christ.

⁷But I have this treasure in a mere ear then jar, to show that its amazing power belongs to God and not to me. ⁸I am hard pressed on every side, but never cut off: perplexed, but not driven to despair; ⁹routed, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed; ¹⁰never free from the danger of being put to death like Jesus, so that in my body the life of Jesus also may be seen. ¹¹For every day I live I am being given up to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus may be visible in my mortal nature. ¹²So it is death that operates in my case, but life that operates in yours. ¹³In the same spirit of faith as his who said, “I believed, and so I spoke,” I too believe, and so I speak, ¹⁴sure that he who raised the Lord Jesus from the dead will raise me also like Jesus, and bring me side by side with you into his presence. ¹⁵For it is all for your benefit, in order that as God’s favor reaches greater and greater numbers, it may result in more and more thanksgiving in praise of God.

¹⁶So I never lose heart. Though my outer nature is wasting away, my inner is being renewed every day. ¹⁷For this slight, momentary trouble is piling up for me an eternal blessedness beyond all comparison, ¹⁸because I keep my eyes not on what is seen but what is unseen. For what is seen is transitory, but what is unseen is eternal.