2. To the church of God in Corinth, to those people who have been made holy in Christ Jesus. You were called to be God’s holy people with all people everywhere who trust in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ—their Lord and ours:
3. Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
4. I always thank my God for you because of the grace that God has given you in Christ Jesus.
5. In Jesus you have been blessed in every way, in all your speaking and in all your knowledge.
6. The truth about Christ has been proved in you.
7. So you have every gift from God while you wait for our Lord Jesus Christ to come again.
8. Jesus will keep you strong until the end. He will keep you strong, so that there will be no wrong in you on the day our Lord Jesus Christ comes again.
9. God is faithful. He is the One who has called you to share life with his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
10. I beg you, brothers, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. I beg that all of you agree with each other, so that you will not be divided into groups. I beg that you be completely joined together by having the same kind of thinking and the same purpose.
11. My brothers, some people from Chloe’s family have told me that there are arguments among you.
12. This is what I mean: One of you says, “I follow Paul”; another says, “I follow Apollos”; another says, “I follow Peter”; and another says, “I follow Christ.”
13. Christ cannot be divided into different groups! Did Paul die on the cross for you? No! Were you baptized in the name of Paul? No!
14. I am thankful that I did not baptize any of you except Crispus and Gaius.
15. I am thankful, because now no one can say that you were baptized in my name.
16. (I also baptized the family of Stephanas. But I do not remember that I myself baptized any others.)
17. Christ did not give me the work of baptizing people. He gave me the work of preaching the Good News, and he sent me to preach the Good News without using words of worldly wisdom. If I used worldly wisdom to tell the Good News, the cross of Christ would lose its power.