91 For it is superfluous for me to write to you about this ministry to the saints ; 2 for I know your readiness , of which I boast about you to the Macedonians , namely, that Achaia has been prepared since last year , and your zeal has stirred up most of them. 3 But I have sent the brethren , in order that our boasting about you may not be made empty in this case , so that, as I was saying , you may be prepared ; 4 otherwise if any Macedonians come with me and find you unprepared , we-not to speak of you-will be put to shame by this confidence . 5 So I thought it necessary to urge the brethren that they would go on ahead to you and arrange beforehand your previously promised bountiful gift , so that the same would be ready as a bountiful gift and not affected by covetousness .

6 Now this I say, he who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly , and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully . 7 Each one must do just as he has purposed in his heart , not grudgingly e or under compulsion , for God loves a cheerful giver . 8 And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that always having all sufficiency in everything , you may have an abundance for every good deed ; 9 as it is written , " HE SCATTERED ABROAD, HE GAVE TO THE POOR , HIS RIGHTEOUSNESS ENDURES FOREVER ." 10 Now He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness ; 11 you will be enriched in everything for all liberality , which through us is producing thanksgiving to God . 12 For the ministry of this service is not only fully supplying the needs of the saints , but is also overflowing through many thanksgivings to God . 13 Because of the proof given by this ministry , they will glorify God for your obedience to your confession of the gospel of Christ and for the liberality of your contribution to them and to all , 14 while they also , by prayer on your behalf , yearn for you because of the surpassing grace of God in you. 15 Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift !

Ministers of the New Covenant

31 Are we beginning to commend ourselves again ? Or do we need , as some , letters of commendation to you or from you? 2 You are our letter , written in our hearts , known and read by all men ; 3 being manifested that you are a letter of Christ , cared for by us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God , not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts . 4 Such confidence we have through Christ toward God . 5 Not that we are adequate in ourselves to consider anything as coming from ourselves , but our adequacy is from God ,

6 who also made us adequate as servants of a new covenant , not of the letter but of the Spirit ; for the letter kills , but the Spirit gives life . 7 But if the ministry of death , in letters engraved on stones , came with glory , so that the sons of Israel could not look intently at the face of Moses because of the glory of his face , fading as it was, 8 how will the ministry of the Spirit fail to be even more with glory ? 9 For if the ministry of condemnation has glory , much more does the ministry of righteousness abound in glory . 10 For indeed what had glory , in this case has no glory because of the glory that surpasses it. 11 For if that which fades away was with glory , much more that which remains is in glory .

12 Therefore having such a hope , we use great boldness in our speech , 13 and are not like Moses , who used to put a veil over his face so that the sons of Israel would not look intently at the end of what was fading away . 14 But their minds were hardened ; for until this very day at the reading of the old covenant the same veil remains unlifted , because it is removed in Christ . 15 But to this day whenever e Moses is read , a veil lies over their heart ; 16 but whenever e a person turns to the Lord , the veil is taken away . 17 Now the Lord is the Spirit , and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty . 18 But we all , with unveiled face , beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord , are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory , just as from the Lord , the Spirit .