While reading this book in the Bible, Second Corinthians, I let each chapter tell me what stands out. I’m sure this would change at a different time and different season. Just curious to see, and I’ll look back at this in the future.

Beginning, Selah

2 Corinthians 1:3-4 (NIV)
³ Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, ⁴ who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God.

2 Corinthians 2:14-16 (NIV)
¹⁴ But thanks be to God, who always leads us as captives in Christ’s triumphal procession and uses us to spread the aroma of the knowledge of him everywhere. ¹⁵ For we are to God the pleasing aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing. ¹⁶ To the one we are an aroma that brings death; to the other, an aroma that brings life. And who is equal to such a task?

2 Corinthians 3:16-17 (NIV)
¹⁶ But whenever anyone 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 freedom.

Quarter, Selah

2 Corinthians 4:6,17-18 (NIV)
⁶ For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ. ¹⁷ For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. ¹⁸ So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

2 Corinthians 5:10,15,18,19 (NIV)
¹⁰ For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive what is due us for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad. ¹⁵ And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again. ¹⁸ All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: ¹⁹ that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation.

Halftime, Selah

2 Corinthians 6:2 (NIV)
² For he says,
“In the time of my favor I heard you,
and in the day of salvation I helped you.” [Isaiah 49:8]
I tell you, now is the time of God’s favor, now is the day of salvation.

2 Corinthians 7:10 (NIV)
¹⁰ Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death.

2 Corinthians 8:11-12 (NIV)
¹¹ Now finish the work, so that your eager willingness to do it may be matched by your completion of it, according to your means. ¹² For if the willingness is there, the gift is acceptable according to what one has, not according to what one does not have.

2 Corinthians 9:8 (NIV)
⁸ And God is able to bless you abundantly, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work.

Quarter, Selah

2 Corinthians 10:3-5 (NIV)
³ For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. ⁴ The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. ⁵ We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.

2 Corinthians 11:13-14 (NIV)
¹³ For such people are false apostles, deceitful workers, masquerading as apostles of Christ. ¹⁴ And no wonder, for Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light.

2 Corinthians 12:9-10 (NIV)
⁹ But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. ¹⁰ That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

2 Corinthians 13:5,8,14 (NIV)
⁵ Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith; test yourselves. Do you not realize that Christ Jesus is in you—unless, of course, you fail the test? ⁸ For we cannot do anything against the truth, but only for the truth. ¹⁴ May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.

Final, Selah

1 Corinthians 6:11 (NLT)
¹¹ ..But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
1 Thessalonians 5:21 (NLT)
²¹ But test everything that is said. Hold on to what is good.
Romans 8:3 (NIV)
³ …God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh to be a sin offering…
James 4:8 (NIV)
⁸ Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands…
Psalm 147:11 (NIV)
the Lord delights in those who fear him,
who put their hope in his unfailing love.