Paul loves the believers at Corinth

7 So, my friends, God has promised these things to us. So we must keep ourselves clean from everything that makes our bodies or our spirits unclean. We must respect and obey God. Then we will become more and more like him.

² Be friends with us. We have done nothing wrong to any of you. We have not hurt anyone. We have not cheated anyone. ³ I am not saying this to make you feel ashamed. As I have told you before, you are our special friends. We will continue to love you, whether we live together or we die together.

⁴ I know you and I trust you. I am proud of you. You have helped me to be strong. So, even when we have many troubles, I am still very happy.

⁵ When we arrived in Macedonia, our bodies did not rest at all.^[a] We had many kinds of trouble. All round us, people quarrelled with us. Inside us, we were afraid. ⁶ But when people feel upset, God helps them to be strong. And God made us happy when Titus arrived. ⁷ God comforted us not only because Titus came to us. He comforted us also by what Titus told us about you. He said that you had helped him to be strong. He told us that you want to see me. He told us that you are very sad about what happened. He told us also that you are ready to help me. Because of what Titus told us about you, I was very happy.

⁸ But even if I made you sad by my letter, I am not sorry about that. At one time, I was sorry that I had written it. I saw that my letter had made you sad. But you were sad only for a short time. ⁹ So now I am happy, but not because my letter made you sad. No, I am happy because it made you turn away from wrong things. You became sad as God wanted you to be sad. So, when the letter made you sad, we did not really hurt you. ¹⁰ People need to become sad in the way that God wants. When they are sad like that, it causes them to turn away from wrong things. Then God saves them from their sins. They will never be sorry about that! But when people become sad in the way that the world wants, it does not help them. They do not turn to God and they die in their spirits.

¹¹ You became sad in the way that God wanted. And see what good results that has brought! It has made you work hard to do good things. You want to show people that you do what is right. You are angry against sin. You want to obey God. You want to make things right again. You want to please God. You want to punish anyone who does wrong things. In all these ways, you have shown that you are right. You have done everything that was necessary in this matter.

¹² So why did I write that letter to you? It was not because of the person who did the wrong thing. Nor was it to help the person that he hurt. No. I wrote the letter to show you something about yourselves. I wanted God to show you that you do really love us and you respect us. ¹³ That is how God has comforted us.

It was not only us that God comforted. When Titus came, we were very happy to see how happy he was too. He was happy because all of you had taken care of him. ¹⁴ I had told Titus that I was very proud of you. When he came to you, you showed that I was right about you. We have always spoken only true things to you. And when we said good things about you to Titus, you showed that those things were also true. ¹⁵ Now, when Titus thinks about you, he loves you even more. He remembers that you were ready to obey him. You respected his authority and you received him into your homes.

¹⁶ So now I am very happy because I trust you to do what is right.