So as your fellow elder and a witness of Christ’s sufferings and as one who shares in the glory that will be revealed, I urge the elders among you:

For if ¹  these things are really yours ²  and are continually increasing, ³  they will keep you from becoming ⁴  ineffective and unproductive in your pursuit of ⁵  knowing our Lord Jesus Christ more intimately. ⁶ 

For we did not follow cleverly concocted fables when we made known to you the power and return ¹  of our Lord Jesus Christ; ²  no, ³  we were ⁴  eyewitnesses of his ⁵  grandeur. ⁶ 

But grow in the grace and knowledge ¹  of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the honor both now and on ²  that eternal day. ³ 

Grace, mercy, and ¹  peace will be with us from God the Father and from ²  Jesus Christ the Son of the Father, in truth and love.

yet we know ¹  that no one ²  is justified by the works of the law ³  but by the faithfulness of Jesus Christ. ⁴  And ⁵  we have come to believe in Christ Jesus, so that we may be justified by the faithfulness of Christ ⁶  and not by the works of the law, because by the works of the law no one ⁷  will be justified.

So all the generations from Abraham to David are fourteen generations, and from David to the deportation to Babylon, fourteen generations, and from the deportation to Babylon to Christ, ¹  fourteen generations.

Now the birth of Jesus Christ happened this way. While his mother Mary was engaged to Joseph, but before they came together, ¹  she was found to be pregnant through the Holy Spirit.

Peter said to them, “Repent, and each one of you be baptized ¹  in the name of Jesus Christ ²  for ³  the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. ⁴ 

But Peter said, “I have no silver or gold, ¹  but what I do have I give you. In the name ²  of Jesus Christ ³  the Nazarene, stand up and ⁴  walk!”

She continued to do this for many days. But Paul became greatly annoyed, ¹  and turned ²  and said to the spirit, “I command you in the name of Jesus Christ ³  to come out of her!” And it came out of her at once. ⁴ 

For if, by the transgression of the one man, ¹  death reigned through the one, how much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one, Jesus Christ!

So, my brothers and sisters, ¹  you also died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you could be joined to another, to the one who was raised from the dead, to bear fruit to God. ² 

Thanks be ¹  to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, ²  I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but ³  with my flesh I serve ⁴  the law of sin.

You, however, are not in ¹  the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, this person does not belong to him.

to be a minister of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles. I serve ¹  the gospel of God ²  like a priest, so that the Gentiles may become an acceptable offering, ³  sanctified by the Holy Spirit.

Now I urge you, brothers and sisters, ¹  through our Lord Jesus Christ and through the love of the Spirit, to join fervently with me in prayer to God on my behalf.

to the church of God that is in Corinth, ¹  to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, and called to be saints, with all those in every place who call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, their Lord and ours. ² 

Some of you once lived this way. ¹  But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ ²  and by the Spirit of our God.

If others receive this right from you, are we not more deserving? But we have not made use of this right. Instead we endure everything so that we may not be a hindrance to the gospel of Christ.