⁸ For God is my witness, how I long after you all in the tender mercies of Christ Jesus.

⁹ For God is my witness, whom I serve in my spirit in the gospel of his Son, how unceasingly I make mention of you, always in my prayers

⁴ longing to see thee, remembering thy tears, that I may be filled with joy;

¹ Wherefore, my brethren beloved and longed for, my joy and crown, so stand fast in the Lord, my beloved.

¹ I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience bearing witness with me in the Holy Spirit,

¹² Put on therefore, as God's elect, holy and beloved, a heart of compassion, kindness, lowliness, meekness, longsuffering;

⁵ For neither at any time were we found using words of flattery, as ye know, nor a cloak of covetousness, God is witness;

⁸ even so, being affectionately desirous of you, we were well pleased to impart unto you, not the gospel of God only, but also our own souls, because ye were become very dear to us.

¹² whom I have sent back to thee in his own person, that is, my very heart:

²⁰ Yea, brother, let me have joy of thee in the Lord: refresh my heart in Christ.

¹⁷ But whoso hath the world's goods, and beholdeth his brother in need, and shutteth up his compassion from him, how doth the love of God abide in him?

¹ For I would have you know how greatly I strive for you, and for them at Laodicea, and for as many as have not seen my face in the flesh;

²⁶ since he longed after you all, and was sore troubled, because ye had heard that he was sick:

¹⁵ Look down from heaven, and behold from the habitation of thy holiness and of thy glory: where are thy zeal and thy mighty acts? the yearning of thy heart and thy compassions are restrained toward me.

²⁰ Is Ephraim my dear son? is he a darling child? for as often as I speak against him, I do earnestly remember him still: therefore my heart yearneth for him; I will surely have mercy upon him, saith Jehovah.

⁷⁸ Because of the tender mercy of our God, Whereby the dayspring from on high shall visit us,

¹² Ye are not straitened in us, but ye are straitened in your own affections.

¹⁵ And his affection is more abundantly toward you, while he remembereth the obedience of you all, how with fear and trembling ye received him.

⁹ For we rejoice, when we are weak, and ye are strong: this we also pray for, even your perfecting.

²⁰ Now touching the things which I write unto you, behold, before God, I lie not.

¹⁹ My little children, of whom I am again in travail until Christ be formed in you--

¹ If there is therefore any exhortation in Christ, if any consolation of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any tender mercies and compassions,

¹¹ Wherefore my heart soundeth like a harp for Moab, and mine inward parts for Kir-heres.