1 THEREFORE, having this service through God's mercy, we are not downhearted,

2 but we have renounced shameful secret things, not living in craftiness nor adulterating God's message, but by the openness of truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God.

3 If our good news is veiled, it is veiled to those who are going to ruin,

4 in whom the god of this world has blinded the thinking of the unbelieving so that the light of the glorious good news of Christ, who is the image of God, may not shine in.

5 For we are not proclaiming ourselves but Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake.

6 Because it is the God who said, "Light shall shine out of darkness," who has shone in our hearts bringing the light of the glorious knowledge of God in the face of Christ.

7 But we have this treasure in earthen jars, that the surpassing power may be God's and not ours \'97

8 in every way distressed, but not reduced to straits, perplexed, but not in despair,

9 persecuted, but not forsaken, cast down, but not destroyed,

10 always bearing about in our bodies the death of Jesus that the life also of Jesus may be manifest in our bodies.

11 For we, though living, are always delivered up to death for Jesus' sake, that also the life of Jesus may be manifested in our mortal flesh.

12 So death works in us, but life in you.

13 Having the same spirit of faith, as it is written, "I believed, therefore I spoke," we too believe and therefore speak,

14 knowing that he who raised up Jesus will also raise us up with Jesus and place us in his presence with you.

15 For all things are for your sake, that grace abounding through many may overflow in thanksgiving to the glory of God.

16 Therefore we are not downhearted, but even if our outward man is wasting away, yet our inward man is renewed day by day.

17 For our momentary and light distress is working out for us a far surpassing and eternal weight of glory

18 while we contemplate not the things that are seen, but the things unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things unseen are eternal.