New Testament · Easy read · 1 Thessalonians
1 Thessalonians 2
1For you yourselves know, brothers, that our coming to you was not in vain,
2but after we had already suffered and been mistreated in Philippi, as you know, we had the boldness in our God to speak to you the good news of God amid much opposition.
3For our comfort does not come from error or impurity or by way of deceit;
4but just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the good news, so we speak, not as pleasing men, but God who examines our hearts.
5For we never came with flattering speech, as you know, nor with a pretext for greed — God is witness —
6nor did we seek glory from men, either from you or from others, even though as apostles of Messiah we might have asserted our authority.
7But we proved to be gentle among you, as a nursing mother tenderly cares for her own children.
8Having so fond an 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 had become very dear to us.
9For you recall, brothers, our labor and hardship, how working night and day so as not to be a burden to any of you, we proclaimed to you the good news of God.
10You are witnesses, and so is God, how devoutly and uprightly and blamelessly we behaved toward you believers;
11just as you know how we were exhorting and encouraging and imploring each one of you as a father would his own children,
12so that you would walk in a manner worthy of God who calls you into His own kingdom and glory.
13For this reason we also constantly thank God that when you received the word of God which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men, but for what it really is, the word of God, which also performs its work in you who believe.
14For you, brothers, became imitators of the ekklesias of God in Messiah Yeshua that are in Judea, for you also endured the same sufferings at the hands of your own countrymen, even as they did from the Jews,
15who both killed the Lord Yeshua and the prophets, and drove us out. They are not pleasing to God, but hostile to all men,
16hindering us from speaking to the nations so that they may be saved; with the result that they always fill up the measure of their sins. But wrath has come upon them to the utmost.
17But we, brothers, having been taken away from you for a short while — in person, not in heart — were all the more eager with great desire to see your face.
18For we wanted to come to you — I, Paul, more than once — and yet the adversary hindered us.
19For who is our hope or joy or crown of boasting? Is it not even you, in the presence of our Lord Yeshua at His coming?
20For you are our glory and joy.