<p>12:21 <i>I fear that when I come again my God may humble me before you- </i>Paul has in view that the Spirit may well lead him to severely judge them. But to be used in that way would be a very humbling experience for Paul. Any disciplining of others should likewise be a humbling for us, rather than any expression of pride or superiority (as in Gal. 6:1). The idea of being humbled is exactly that used by Paul regarding the Lord's death (Phil. 2:8 s.w.). Paul had earlier been humbled in Corinth, when he was left destitute and yet never asked the Corinthians for material help (2 Cor. 11:7). For Paul to meet the Corinthians and have to judge them as unspiritual would be humbling for Paul, as he had boasted about their strengths to others and inflated them in his own mind. To have to judge them for not being like that would be humbling for Paul.</p><p><i>And I may have to mourn over many of those who sinned earlier and have not repented of the impurity, sexual immorality and sensuality that they have practiced</i>- Paul had earlier urged them to mourn over those they had to discipline for sexual immorality (1 Cor. 5:2). All such discipline should be done in genuine mourning. The sexual issues raised with the Corinthians in 1 Corinthians are not raised by Paul in2 Corinthians until this point. He has been giving them exaggerated praise for separating from the immoral man of 1 Cor. 5, and trying to get them to donate to his Jerusalem Poor Fund. And he has written in very inflated terms about their devotion to him and the Lord in chapters 7-9. Through all that, he has not raised with them the obvious issue as to why they had not dealt with their issues of sexual immorality. Now he has apparently given up any hope of getting any donations out of them (see on :14) and is realizing the reality of things with them, he returns to these more obvious concerns. Paul knew they were impenitent of these sexual issues- and yet speaks so glowingly of them in chapter 7 and elsewhere. Yet again I have to make the point that he was so in love with them that he wrote on the cusp of emotion, and the inspired record has preserved his feelings and flow of consciousness- for our learning.</p>