1 Thessalonians 2:1-20
2 To be sure, YOU yourselves know, brothers, how our visit+ to YOU has not been without results,+
2 but how, after we had first suffered+ and been insolently treated+ (just as YOU know) in Phi·lipʹpi,+ we mustered up boldness* by means of our God to speak+ to YOU the good news of God with a great deal of struggling.
3 For the exhortation we give does not arise from error or from uncleanness+ or with deceit,
4 but, just as we have been proved by God as fit to be entrusted+ with the good news, so we speak, as pleasing,+ not men, but God, who makes proof of our hearts.+
5 In fact, at no time have we turned up either with flattering speech,+ (just as YOU know) or with a false front*+ for covetousness,+ God is witness!
6 Neither have we been seeking glory from men,+ no, either from YOU or from others, though we could be an expensive burden*+ as apostles of Christ.
7 To the contrary, we became gentle* in the midst of YOU, as when a nursing mother cherishes+ her own children.
8 So, having a tender affection for YOU,+ we were well pleased to impart to YOU, not only the good news of God, but also our own souls,*+ because YOU became beloved+ to us.
9 Certainly YOU bear in mind, brothers, our labor and toil. It was with working+ night and day, so as not to put an expensive burden upon any one of YOU,+ that we preached the good news of God to YOU.
10 YOU are witnesses, God is also, how loyal and righteous and unblamable+ we proved to be to YOU believers.
11 In harmony with that YOU well know how, as a father+ does his children, we kept exhorting+ each one of YOU, and consoling and bearing witness to YOU,
12 to the end that YOU should go on walking+ worthily of God who is calling+ YOU to his kingdom+ and glory.
13 Indeed, that is why we also thank God incessantly,+ because when YOU received God’s word,+ which YOU heard from us, YOU accepted it, not as the word of men,+ but, just as it truthfully is, as the word of God, which* is also at work in YOU believers.+
14 For YOU became imitators,* brothers, of the congregations of God that are in Ju·deʹa in union with Christ Jesus, because YOU also began suffering+ at the hands of YOUR own countrymen the same things as they also [are suffering] at the hands of the Jews,
15 who killed even the Lord Jesus+ and the prophets+ and persecuted us.+ Furthermore, they are not pleasing God, but are against [the interests of] all men,
16 as they try to hinder*+ us from speaking to people of the nations that these might be saved,+ with the result that they always fill up the measure+ of their sins. But his* wrath has at length* come upon them.+
17 As for ourselves, brothers, when we were bereaved* of YOU for but a short time,* in person, not in heart, we endeavored far more than is usual to see YOUR faces with great desire.+
18 For this reason we wanted to come to YOU, yes, I Paul, both once and a second time, but Satan cut across our path.
19 For what is our hope or joy or crown+ of exultation—why, is it not in fact YOU?—before our Lord Jesus at his presence?*+
20 YOU certainly are our glory and joy.
Footnotes
^ Lit., “we were made outspoken.”
^ “False front.” Lit., “pretense.”
^ “Be an expensive burden.” Or, “wield authority; insist on our importance.”
^ “Gentle,” AVgSyh,p; אBC*D*Vgc, “babes.”
^ Or, “lives.”
^ Or, “who.”
^ Or, “portrayers.”
^ Or, “as they keep on forbidding.”
^ “The,” אAB; DVg, “God’s.”
^ Or, “to the end.”
^ Lit., “having been orphaned off.”
^ Or, “for a season of an hour.” Lit., “toward an appointed time of an hour.”
^ See App 5B.
