4:1 For this reason, because we have this service, we were shown mercy and are not demoralized.

4:2 But we turn our backs on the shameful things people hide, and we no longer practice craftiness. We do not contaminate the Word of God but will declare the truth, commending ourselves to human conscience before God.

4:3 If our Gospel has been concealed, it is only concealed to those who are being destroyed.

4:4 The minds of unbelievers have been blinded by the god of this age so the light cannot illuminate them— the light of the Gospel of the majesty of the Anointed, who is the image of God.

4:5 For it is not ourselves we are proclaiming but Jesus the Anointed Master, whose slaves you are.

4:6 For God— the One who said “Let light shine out of darkness”— shone light into our hearts to illuminate knowledge of God’s majesty in the presence of Jesus the Anointed.

4:7 Now we have this treasure in containers of clay so that it is obvious that the power is of God and not of us.

4:8 We are oppressed in every way yet it is not more than we can take; we are trapped but not to the point of despair;

4:9 we are persecuted but not abandoned; we are rejected but not destroyed.

4:10 In our bodies we always carry the death of Jesus, yet we also thereby exhibit his life.

4:11 We who are alive are always facing death because of Jesus, so that his life will be exhibited in our mortal flesh.

4:12 In this way death is active in us but life is active in you.

4:13 Now since we have the same spirit of faith in accordance with what is written— “I believed, therefore I spoke”— then we who believe are also speaking.

4:14 We know that the One who raised the Master Jesus will also raise us together with him and present us together with you.

4:15 Everything is being done for your benefit, so that this favor which is increasing through most of you will overflow to honor God.

4:16 All this keeps us from getting demoralized. Even if outwardly we are rotting away, inwardly we are being rejuvenated every day.

4:17 The lightweight oppressions we experience at the moment are achieving for us a most excellent honor to carry in eternity.

4:18 We are not focused on what is seen but only on what is unseen, because the visible is temporary while the invisible is eternal.