12. We work hard with our own hands for our food. People curse us, but we bless them. They hurt us, and we accept it.
13. They say evil things against us, but we say only kind things to them. Even today, we are treated as though we are the garbage of the world—the dirt of the earth.
14. I am not trying to make you feel ashamed. I am writing this to give you a warning as if you were my own dear children.
15. For though you may have 10,000 teachers in Christ, you do not have many fathers. Through the Good News I became your father in Christ Jesus.
16. So I beg you, please be like me.
17. That is why I am sending Timothy to you. He is my son in the Lord. I love Timothy, and he is faithful. He will help you remember the way I live in Christ Jesus. This way of life is what I teach in all the churches everywhere.
18. Some of you have become proud, thinking that I will not come to you again.
19. But I will come very soon if the Lord wants me to. Then I will see what those who are proud can do, not what they say.
20. I want to see this because the kingdom of God is not talk but power.
21. Which do you want: that I come to you with punishment, or that I come with love and gentleness?