<p>10:15 <i>So we are not boasting beyond our measure in other men's labours; but rather we hope that as your faith grows, our influence among you may be greatly increased- </i>The critics may have claimed that it was their labours which were responsible for the church at Corinth. Paul is paving the way to boast of all his labours for the Corinthians which we will read in chapters 11 and 12. Paul's hope was that his influence amongst the Corinthians would increase as they matured spiritually. But this desire for personal influence and loyalty (a card he played in his appeal for their donations to his Poor Fund in chapters 7-9) is a far cry from his earlier claim to not want any personal influence but just to see the influence of the Lord Jesus growing in his converts. See on :14. But the AV is again more literally faithful to the difficult Greek here: &quot;Having hope, when your faith is increased, that we shall be enlarged by you according to our rule abundantly&quot;. This could mean that their spiritual maturity would enable his line or territory of work to be expanded. For Paul felt he would not be given new areas to preach in if the Corinthians had not matured in the faith. He in this case would be arguing that their immaturity and revolt against him was holding up his spreading of the Gospel further, as if God would &quot;increase&quot; his sphere of work if the Corinthians matured; and:16 seems to confirm this. Again, whether or not God had specifically stated that is unrecorded, and we could read this as another desperate argument to by all means keep the Corinthians loyal to him.</p>