¹⁴^*Our brothers and sisters, the same things happened to you that happened to the churches of God in Judea, to the people there who belong to Christ Jesus. You suffered the same persecutions from your own people that they suffered from the Jews, ¹⁵^*who killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets, and persecuted us. How displeasing they are to God! How hostile they are to everyone! ¹⁶They even tried to stop us from preaching to the Gentiles the message that would bring them salvation. In this way they have brought to completion all the sins they have always committed. And now God’s anger has at last come down on them!

Paul’s Desire to Visit Them Again

¹⁷As for us, brothers and sisters, when we were separated from you for a little while—not in our thoughts, of course, but only in body—how we missed you and how hard we tried to see you again! ¹⁸We wanted to return to you. I myself tried to go back more than once, but Satan would not let us. ¹⁹After all, it is you—you, no less than others!—who are our hope, our joy, and our reason for boasting of our victory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes. ²⁰Indeed, you are our pride and our joy!

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Cross references

*2.14: Ac 17:5
*2.15: Ac 9:23, 29; 13:25, 50; 14:2, 5, 19; 17:5, 13; 18:12