Study Desk

revealing that you are a letter of Christ, delivered by us, written not with ink but by the Spirit of the living God, not on stone tablets but on tablets of human hearts.

Now we have such confidence in God through Christ.

Not that we are adequate in ourselves to consider anything as if it were coming from ourselves, but our adequacy is from God,

Therefore, since we have this ministry, just as God has shown us mercy, we do not become discouraged.

But we have rejected shameful hidden deeds, not behaving with deceptiveness or distorting the word of God, but by open proclamation of the truth we commend ourselves to everyone's conscience before God.

among whom the god of this age has blinded the minds of those who do not believe so they would not see the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God.

For God, who said "Let light shine out of darkness," is the one who shined in our hearts to give us the light of the glorious knowledge of God in the face of Christ.

But we have this treasure in clay jars, so that the extraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us.

For all these things are for your sake, so that the grace that is including more and more people may cause thanksgiving to increase to the glory of God.

For we know that if our earthly house, the tent we live in, is dismantled, we have a building from God, a house not built by human hands, that is eternal in the heavens.

Now the one who prepared us for this very purpose is God, who gave us the Spirit as a down payment.

Therefore, because we know the fear of the Lord, we try to persuade people, but we are well known to God, and I hope we are well known to your consciences too.

For if we are out of our minds, it is for God; if we are of sound mind, it is for you.

And all these things are from God who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and who has given us the ministry of reconciliation.

In other words, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting people's trespasses against them, and he has given us the message of reconciliation.

Therefore we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making His plea through us. We plead with you on Christ's behalf, "Be reconciled to God!"

God made the one who did not know sin to be sin for us, so that in him we would become the righteousness of God.

Now because we are fellow workers, we also urge you not to receive the grace of God in vain.

by truthful teaching, by the power of God, with weapons of righteousness both for the right hand and for the left,

And what mutual agreement does the temple of God have with idols? For we are the temple of the living God, just as God said, " I will live in them and will walk among them , and I will be their God , and they will be my people ."