5. I do not think that I am the least bit inferior to those very special so-called “apostles” of yours!
6. Perhaps I am an amateur in speaking, but certainly not in knowledge; we have made this clear to you at all times and in all conditions.
7. I did not charge you a thing when I preached the Good News of God to you; I humbled myself in order to make you important. Was that wrong of me?
8. While I was working among you, I was paid by other churches. I was robbing them, so to speak, in order to help you.
9. And during the time I was with you I did not bother you for help when I needed money; the brothers and sisters who came from Macedonia brought me everything I needed. As in the past, so in the future: I will never be a burden to you!
10. By Christ's truth in me, I promise that this boast of mine will not be silenced anywhere in all Achaia.
11. Do I say this because I don't love you? God knows I love you!
12. I will go on doing what I am doing now, in order to keep those other “apostles” from having any reason for boasting and saying that they work in the same way that we do.