(Tap footnote to read it. Old Testament quotations are underlined. "Love" with a caret ("^love") is agapé.1"agapé" The Greek words ἀγάπη (agapé, noun), and ἀγαπάω (agapaó; verb) are typically translated "love". However, unlike our English word "love" – which primarily speaks of affection and feelings – agapé centers on choice and behavior. It’s the "love" based on will, choice, behavior, and action; not feelings. (Feelings-based love is the Greek word φιλέω (phileó), which properly means "brotherly love/affection".) Thus, you could hate someone passionately and still treat him with "agapé". Agapé "love" is best understood as the pursuit of what is most beneficial to someone or something, regardless of the cost to yourself or the type of response received from the person or thing. It can also indicate a preference for someone or something over other things. )
Not Coming in Grief
- For I decided this within myself, not to come to you in grief again.
- For if I grieve you again, what man will be making me glad except the man being grieved by me?
- And I wrote this same thing so that having come, I wouldn’t have grief from men who ought to rejoice with me, *trusting in all of you that my joy is the joy of you all.
- For I wrote to you from much distress and anguish of heart, through many tears. Not so you might be grieved, but so you might know the ^love that I have so abundantly for you.
- But if someone has grieved anyone, he hasn’t grieved me (so I’m not putting a burden on1“I’m… …putting a burden on” is one word in Greek with that exact meaning, though it can also mean “to be burdensome”. It can mean to “overload” someone in a figurative sense, and thus can mean to be “severe”. you), but in part he grieves all of you.
- This punishment by the many2“This punishment by the many” is likely a reference to Church discipline which Jesus set forth in Matthew 18:15-20. In Paul’s previous letter to the Corinthians, He mentioned an immoral man who was sleeping with his father’s wife. Paul told the Corinthians to put him out of the church and shun him (as Jesus directed). This certainly was a “punishment by the many” and Paul says that’s sufficient, probably recognizing that God Himself will deal with the man. is sufficient for such a man.
- So on the contrary, it’s better for you to forgive and to comfort him; lest somehow such a man be swallowed by abundant grief.
- For this reason, I urge you to reaffirm your ^love to him.
- For I also wrote for this reason: so I might test you and know the result,3“test you and… …the result ” is one word in Greek. It properly refers to the process or result of a test/trial, and can include the evidence used to come to the result. whether you’re obedient in all things.
- And whomever you forgive for anything, I do also. And for whatever I have forgiven (if I have forgiven anything) it’s for your sake in the sight of the Anointed,
- so we aren’t taken advantage of by Satan, for we aren’t ignorant of his schemes.
- And having come to Troas for the gospel of the Anointed, a door has also been opened for me by the Lord.
- But I don’t *have rest in my spirit because of me not finding Titus my brother. But having bid them farewell, I departed into Macedonia.
- But grace be to God, the One always leading us in triumph4“leading… …in triumph” is one word in Greek. It properly refers a victor parading around to celebrate their victory and displaying the defeated enemy as part of the procession. in the Anointed, and the fragrance of the knowledge of Him manifesting through us in every place.
- For we are a sweet fragrance of the Anointed to God in the men being saved and in the men perishing,
- to whom an odor from death indeed leads into death, and to whom an odor from life leads into life. And who is fit for these things?
- For we aren’t like the many who are peddling the word of God. But as from purity, but as from God, we speak before God in the Anointed.
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