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Galatians 1.6-2.21

I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you by the grace of Christ to follow a different gospel, which is not really another one. To be sure, there are certain people who are troubling you and want to distort the gospel about Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should proclaim to you a gospel contrary to what we proclaimed to you, let that person be condemned! What we have told you in the past I am now telling you again: If anyone proclaims to you a gospel contrary to what you received, let that person be condemned! Am I now trying to win the approval of people or of God? Or am I trying to please people? If I were still trying to please people, I would not be Christ's servant.

For I want you to know, brothers, that the gospel that was proclaimed by me is not of human origin. For I did not receive it from a man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ. For you have heard about my earlier life in Judaism—how I kept violently persecuting God's church and was trying to destroy it. I advanced in Judaism beyond many of my contemporaries, because I was far more zealous for the traditions of my ancestors.

But when God, who set me apart before I was born and who called me by his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son to me so that I might proclaim him among the Gentiles, I did not confer with another human being at any time, nor did I go up to Jerusalem to see those who were apostles before me. Instead, I went away to Arabia and then came back to Damascus.

Then three years later I went up to Jerusalem to become acquainted with Cephas, and I stayed with him for fifteen days. But I did not see any other apostle except James, the Lord's brother. (I declare before God that what I am writing to you is not a lie.) Then I went to the regions of Syria and Cilicia. But I was unknown by sight to the churches of Christ in Judea. The only thing they kept hearing was this: “The man who used to persecute us is now proclaiming the faith he once tried to destroy!” So they kept glorifying God for what had happened to me.

Then fourteen years later I again went up to Jerusalem with Barnabas, taking Titus with me. I went in response to a revelation, and in a private meeting with the reputed leaders I set before them the gospel I proclaim among the Gentiles. I did this because I was afraid that I was running or had run for nothing. But not even Titus, who was with me, was forced to be circumcised, even though he was a Greek. However, false brothers were secretly brought in. They slipped in to spy on the freedom we have in Christ Jesus so that they might enslave us. But we did not give in to them for a moment, so that the truth of the gospel might always remain with you.

Now those who were reputed to be important added nothing to my message. (What sort of people they were makes no difference to me, since God pays no attention to outward appearances.) In fact, they saw that I had been entrusted with the gospel for the uncircumcised, just as Peter had been entrusted with the gospel for the circumcised. For the one who worked through Peter by making him an apostle to the circumcised also worked through me by sending me to the Gentiles. So when James, Cephas, and John (who were reputed to be leaders) recognized the grace that had been given me, they gave Barnabas and me the right hand of fellowship, agreeing that we should go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised. The only thing they asked us to do was to remember the destitute, the very thing I was eager to do.

But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he was clearly wrong. For until some men came from James, he was in the habit of eating with the Gentiles, but after they came he drew back and would not associate himself with them, being afraid of the circumcision party. The other Jews also joined him in this hypocrisy, to the extent that even Barnabas was caught up in their hypocrisy. But when I saw that they were not acting consistently with the truth of the gospel, I told Cephas in front of everyone, “Though you are a Jew, you live like a Gentile and not like a Jew. So how can you insist that the Gentiles must live like Jews?”

We ourselves are Jews by birth, and not Gentile sinners, yet we know that a person is not justified by the works of the law but by the faithfulness of Jesus Christ. We, too, have believed in Christ Jesus so that we might be justified by the faith of Christ and not by the works of the law, for no human being will be justified by the works of the law.

Now if we, while trying to be justified in Christ, have been found to be sinners, does that mean that Christ is a minister of sin? Of course not! For if I rebuild something that I tore down, I demonstrate that I am a wrongdoer. For through the law I died to the law so that I might live for God. I have been crucified with Christ. I no longer live, but Christ lives in me, and the life that I now live in the flesh I live by the faithfulness of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness comes through the law, then Christ died for nothing.

Scripture taken from the Holy Bible: International Standard Version^®. Copyright © 2001 by The ISV Foundation, 2200 N. Grand Ave., Santa Ana, CA 92705-7016. Used by permission of Davidson Press, Inc. All rights reserved internationally.