I know what it is to be humbled, and I know what it is to have in excess. In any and every situation I have learned both to be filled, and to be hungry, both to have in excess, and to be in need.
And when I was present with you, and in need, I was not a burden to anyone, for what was lacking to me the brothers who came from Makedonia supplied. And in every way I kept myself – and shall keep – from being a burden to you.
“He found him in a wilderness, And in a wasted, howling desert. He encompassed him, He made him understand, He watched over him as the apple of His eye.
And I, Sha’ul, myself appeal to you, through the meekness and gentleness of Messiah – I who am indeed lowly when face to face with you, but bold toward you when absent!
‘For after my turning back, I repented. And after I was instructed, I struck myself on the thigh. I was ashamed, even humiliated, for I bore the reproach of my youth.’
And He said to them, “Therefore every scholar of Scripture taught in the reign of the heavens is like a householder who brings out of his treasure matters, renewed, and old.”