1 Thessalonians 2 For you, brethren, yourselves know that entrance of ours among you, that it was not in vain.

Thomson⁽ⁱ⁾ ¹ For you, brethren, yourselves know that entrance of ours among you, that it was not in vain. ² Though we indeed had suffered before, and had been treated injuriously, as you know, at Philippi; we had the courage, by the help of our God, to declare to you the glad tidings of God with much earnestness. ³ For our exhortation did not proceed from error, nor from impurity; nor was it with deceit; ⁴ but as we had been approved by God to be entrusted with the glad tidings, so we speak, not as pleasing men, but God who trieth our hearts. ⁵ For never did we at any time use flattering words, as you know; nor a pretext for covetousness, God is witness; ⁶ nor were we seeking human glory either from you or from others. We might have appeared with weight as Christ's apostles; ⁷ but we were gentle among you. Our affectionate regard for you being such, as that with which a nursing mother would cherish her own children, ⁸ we were willing to impart to you not only the glad tidings of God, but even our own lives, because you were dear to us. ⁹ For you, brethren, remember our labour and our toil: for working day and night that we might not be burthensome to any of you, we proclaimed to you the glad tidings of God. ¹⁰ You are witnesses, and God is witness, how holy, how just, how irreproachable our behaviour was to you who believed ¹¹ how, as you know, we [exhorted] every one of you, as a father would his children, ¹² exhorting you, and comforting you, and testifying that you should walk worthy of God who inviteth you to his kingdom and glory. ¹³ On this account also we give thanks to God continually, because, when you received from us this message of God, you embraced it, not as a word of men, but, as it really is, a word of God, which operateth with powerful effect in you who believe. ¹⁴ For you, brethren, became imitators of the congregations of God which are in Judea in Christ Jesus. Because you suffered from your countrymen the same treatment as they did from the Jews ¹⁵ [from those indeed who slew the Lord Jesus, and their own prophets, and persecuted us, and who please not God, and are in opposition to all men, ¹⁶ hindering us from speaking to the nations that they may be saved; thus, filling up the measure of their sins continually: but the wrath is at last coming upon them,] ¹⁷ therefore we brethren, being torn from you for a short time in person, not in heart, did the more earnestly endeavour to see your face. Having therefore a longing desire, ¹⁸ we wished to come to you, [particularly I Paul] once and again, but Satan obstructed us. ¹⁹ For what is our hope, or will be our joy, or crown of rejoicing? Will it not be you in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at his coming? ²⁰ For you are our glory and our joy.