John Calvin Commentary 2 Corinthians 11:23

"Are they ministers of Christ? (I speak as one beside himself) I more; in labors more abundantly, in prisons more abundantly, in stripes above measure, in deaths oft." — 2 Corinthians 11:23 (ASV)

Are they ministers of Christ? Now when he is addressing matters truly praiseworthy, he is no longer satisfied with being equal with them, but exalts himself above them. For their carnal glories he has previously scattered like smoke with a breath of wind, by contrasting them with those of a similar kind that he possessed; but since they had nothing of solid worth, he, on good grounds, separates himself from their company when he has occasion to glory earnestly. For to be a servant of Christ is much more honorable and illustrious than to be the first-born among all the first-born of Abraham’s posterity. Again, however, to guard against slander, he states beforehand that he speaks as a fool. “Imagine this,” he says, “to be foolish boasting: it is, nevertheless, true.”

In labors. By these things he proves that he is a more eminent servant of Christ, and then truly we have a reliable proof when deeds instead of words are brought forward. He uses the term labors here in the plural, and afterwards labor. I do not see what difference there is between the former and the latter, unless perhaps it is that he speaks here in a more general way, including those things that he afterwards enumerates in detail. In the same way, we may also understand the term deaths to mean any kind of perils that, in a way, threatened immediate death, instances of which he afterwards specifies. “I have given proof of myself in deaths often, in labors oftener still.” He had used the term deaths in the same sense in the first chapter (2 Corinthians 1:10).