13. I pray that the God who gives hope will fill you with much joy and peace while you trust in him. Then your hope will overflow by the power of the Holy Spirit.
14. My brothers, I am sure that you are full of goodness. I know that you have all the knowledge you need and that you are able to teach each other.
15. But I have written to you very openly about some things that I wanted you to remember. I did this because God gave me this special gift:
16. to be a minister of Christ Jesus to the non-Jewish people. I served God by teaching his Good News, so that the non-Jewish people could be an offering that God would accept—an offering made holy by the Holy Spirit.
17. So I am proud of what I have done for God in Christ Jesus.
18. I will not talk about anything I did myself. I will talk only about what Christ has done through me in leading the non-Jewish people to obey God. They have obeyed God because of what I have said and done.
19. And they have obeyed God because of the power of miracles and the great things they saw, and the power of the Holy Spirit. I preached the Good News from Jerusalem all the way around to Illyricum. And so I have finished that part of my work.
20. I always want to preach the Good News in places where people have never heard of Christ. I do this because I do not want to build on the work that someone else has already started.
21. But it is written in the Scriptures:“Those who were not told about him will see,and those who have not heard about him will understand.” Isaiah 52:15
22. That is why many times I was stopped from coming to you.
23. Now I have finished my work here. Since for many years I have wanted to come to you,