What does 2 Corinthians 11:25 mean?

Responding to deceivers trying to corrupt the believers in Corinth, Paul is sarcastically "boasting" about how his service to Christ is superior to that of the false apostles. Even in jest, Paul's crowing takes the form of describing how deeply he has suffered for Christ. He's not listing the victorious triumphs his readers were likely expecting to hear about.

He now adds several more examples: He was beaten with rods three times. This was a Roman punishment administered in public. As a Roman citizen, Paul sometimes avoided being beaten in this way. Citizens were supposed to be given a trial first. Here, though, Paul shows that he did not always escape it.

Paul was also stoned for preaching the gospel of Jesus. Acts 14:19–20 records that he was stoned by a crowd in Lystra that was riled up by Jewish religious leaders from Antioch and Iconium. They dragged Paul's unconscious body from the city and left him for dead. He soon got up and went back into the city.

Next, Paul writes that he was shipwrecked three times, once spending a night and a day drifting on the open sea before, apparently, being found and rescued. Paul is often described as journeying by sea in his missionary travels, though these three shipwrecks all took place before the one dramatically described in Acts 27.

The shipwrecks were not the result of persecution, of course, but Paul did suffer through them as part of his work for the cause of Christ. Traveling by sea was dangerous, but necessary in order to reach all the territories to which he was called by Christ.