Beginnings
GenesisExodusLeviticusNumbersDeuteronomy
Judges
JoshuaJudgesRuth
Kingdoms
1 Samuel2 Samuel1 Kings2 Kings
Chronicles
1 Chronicles2 ChroniclesEzraNehemiahEsther
Poetry
JobPsalmsProverbsEcclesiastesSong of Solomon
Prophets
IsaiahJeremiahLamentationsEzekielDaniel
Minor Prophets
HoseaJoelAmosObadiahJonahMicah
NahumHabakkukZephaniahHaggaiZechariahMalachi
Messiah
MatthewMarkLukeJohnActs
Paul's Letters
Romans1 Corinthians2 CorinthiansGalatiansEphesiansPhilippiansColossians
1 Thessalonians2 Thessalonians1 Timothy2 TimothyTitusPhilemonHebrews
General Letters
James1 Peter2 Peter1 John
2 John3 JohnJude
Revelation
Revelation
Kept for this visit
Notes, starred verses and bookmarks kept while signed out last until this visit ends. Create a free account and everything you keep here moves into it, saved for good.
Create an account Sign in

Biblion Bible Commentary

Read the introduction to 2 Corinthians · About this commentary

The Grace of the Lord Jesus Christ

2 Corinthians 13:11-14

11 Finally, brothers, rejoice! Be perfected. Be comforted. Be of the same mind. Live in peace, and the God of love and peace will be with you. · WEB

Five short commands close a long quarrel, and one of them returns the word the letter opened with.

Finally, brothers, rejoice!

After thirteen chapters of accusation, irony, and grief, the first word of the closing is an imperative to be glad. Then four more, all brief: be perfected. Be comforted. Be of the same mind. Live in peace.

The second means to be mended or put in order — the same word used of repairing nets, and of what he prayed for two verses earlier 2 Corinthians 13:9. The third is the one the letter has earned: be comforted, from the verb that opened the whole thing and ran ten times through its first five verses 2 Corinthians 1:3–7. What God was called at the start is now asked of them as a condition.

The last two concern the eight failures he feared finding — strife, jealousy, factions, whisperings 2 Corinthians 12:20. Be of the same mind and live in peace answer that list directly, and they are the only instructions in the closing addressed to the congregation's internal life.

Then a promise attached rather than a command: and the God of love and peace will be with you. The title is assembled from the two things just asked for, which makes the presence the source of the obedience rather than its reward.

Greet one another with a holy kiss. The ordinary greeting of the time, and here a small physical act required between people who had been taking sides.

All the saints greet you. The congregation that thought itself the center of a dispute is reminded that a wider body is watching and sends goodwill — the same widening that put Achaia in the address 2 Corinthians 1:1 and the churches around the collection 2 Corinthians 8:19.

And the letter ends with the fullest blessing Paul wrote: the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, God's love, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.

Three gifts and three givers, and the order is not the expected one — Christ comes first, and grace with him, which is where the argument has been since a rich man became poor 2 Corinthians 8:9. Fellowship is the word used of the collection 2 Corinthians 8:4, so the last thing named is the thing the two money chapters were about.

And it closes with you all — including, after everything, the people who had been listening to his rivals.

settled What this mark means