11 Therefore, since we know the fear of the Lord, we try to persuade people. We ourselves are perfectly known to God. I hope we are also really known to your consciences.
12 We are not recommending ourselves to you again but are giving you a reason to be proud of us, so that you can answer those who are proud of outward things rather than inward character.
13 So if we were crazy, it was for God; if we are sane, it is for you.
14 The love of Christ controls us, for we are convinced of this: that one person died for all people; therefore, all people have died.
15 He died for all people, so that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for the one who died and rose for them.
16 So then, from now on we do not think of anyone from a human point of view. Even if we did think of Christ from a human point of view, we don't think of him that way any more.
17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. Old things have disappeared, and—look!—all things have become new!
18 All of this comes from God, who has reconciled us to himself through Christ and has given us the ministry of reconciliation.
19 For in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself by not counting their sins against them, and he has committed to us the message of reconciliation.
20 Therefore, we are Christ's representatives, as though God were pleading through us. We plead on Christ's behalf: "Be reconciled to God!"
21 God made the one who did not know sin to be sin for us, so that we might become God's righteousness in him.