| New Living Translation | NET Bible |
| 1When I first came to you, dear brothers and sisters, I didn’t use lofty words and impressive wisdom to tell you God’s secret plan. | 1When I came to you, brothers and sisters, I did not come with superior eloquence or wisdom as I proclaimed the testimony of God. |
| 2For I decided that while I was with you I would forget everything except Jesus Christ, the one who was crucified. | 2For I decided to be concerned about nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and him crucified. |
| 3I came to you in weakness—timid and trembling. | 3And I was with you in weakness and in fear and with much trembling. |
| 4And my message and my preaching were very plain. Rather than using clever and persuasive speeches, I relied only on the power of the Holy Spirit. | 4My conversation and my preaching were not with persuasive words of wisdom, but with a demonstration of the Spirit and of power, |
| 5I did this so you would trust not in human wisdom but in the power of God. | 5so that your faith would not be based on human wisdom but on the power of God. |
| 6Yet when I am among mature believers, I do speak with words of wisdom, but not the kind of wisdom that belongs to this world or to the rulers of this world, who are soon forgotten. | 6Now we do speak wisdom among the mature, but not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are perishing. |
| 7No, the wisdom we speak of is the mystery of God —his plan that was previously hidden, even though he made it for our ultimate glory before the world began. | 7Instead we speak the wisdom of God, hidden in a mystery, that God determined before the ages for our glory. |
| 8But the rulers of this world have not understood it; if they had, they would not have crucified our glorious Lord. | 8None of the rulers of this age understood it. If they had known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. |
| 9That is what the Scriptures mean when they say, “No eye has seen, no ear has heard, and no mind has imagined what God has prepared for those who love him.” | 9But just as it is written, "Things that no eye has seen, or ear heard, or mind imagined, are the things God has prepared for those who love him." |
| 10But it was to us that God revealed these things by his Spirit. For his Spirit searches out everything and shows us God’s deep secrets. | 10God has revealed these to us by the Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. |
| 11No one can know a person’s thoughts except that person’s own spirit, and no one can know God’s thoughts except God’s own Spirit. | 11For who among men knows the things of a man except the man's spirit within him? So too, no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. |
| 12And we have received God’s Spirit (not the world’s spirit), so we can know the wonderful things God has freely given us. | 12Now we have not received the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may know the things that are freely given to us by God. |
| 13When we tell you these things, we do not use words that come from human wisdom. Instead, we speak words given to us by the Spirit, using the Spirit’s words to explain spiritual truths. | 13And we speak about these things, not with words taught us by human wisdom, but with those taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual things to spiritual people. |
| 14But people who aren’t spiritual can’t receive these truths from God’s Spirit. It all sounds foolish to them and they can’t understand it, for only those who are spiritual can understand what the Spirit means. | 14The unbeliever does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him. And he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned. |
| 15Those who are spiritual can evaluate all things, but they themselves cannot be evaluated by others. | 15The one who is spiritual discerns all things, yet he himself is understood by no one. |
| 16For, “Who can know the LORD’s thoughts? Who knows enough to teach him?” But we understand these things, for we have the mind of Christ. | 16For who has known the mind of the Lord, so as to advise him? But we have the mind of Christ. |
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