We have said it before, and I repeat it now??f anyone is preaching to you good news that contradicts the good news you have already received, a curse upon him!

Is that appealing to men's weaknesses, or to God? Is that trying to suit men? If I were still doing that, I would be no slave of Christ.

they only heard people say, "The man who once persecuted us is now preaching the good news of the faith he tried to destroy,"

Those who were regarded as the leaders??hat they once were makes no difference to me; God takes no account of external differences??he leaders contributed nothing new to me.

but who know that a man is not made upright by doing what the Law commands, but by faith in Christ Jesus??ven we believed in Christ Jesus, so as to be made upright by faith in Christ and not by doing what the Law commands??or by doing what the Law commands no one can be made upright.

If through our efforts to be made upright through Christ, we have ourselves been proved as much "sinners" as the heathen, does that make Christ encourage sin? By no means.

I have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer I that live, but Christ that lives in me. The life I am now living in the body I am living by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.

Are you so senseless? Did you begin with the Spirit only to end now with the flesh?

That no one is accepted as upright by God for obeying the Law is evident because the upright will have life because of his faith,

To take an illustration, brothers, from daily life: even a human agreement, once ratified, no one annuls or alters.

Now the promises were made to Abraham and his line. It does not say, "and to your lines," in the plural, but in the singular, "and to your line," that is, Christ.

Is the Law then contrary to God's promises? By no means. For if a law had been given that could have brought life, uprightness would really have come through law.

But now that faith has come, we are no longer in the charge of the attendant.

There is no room for "Jew" and "Greek"; there is no room for "slave" and "freeman"; there is no room for "male" and "female"; for in union with Christ Jesus you are all one.

I mean this: As long as the heir is a minor, he is no better than a slave, although he is the owner of all the property,

So you are no longer a slave, but a son; and if a son, then an heir, made so by God.

but now that you know God, or rather have come to be known by him, how can you turn back to the old, crude notions, so poor and weak, and wish to become slaves to them again?

Take my position, I beg you, brothers, just as I once took yours! You took no advantage of me then;

though you know that it was because of an illness that I preached the good news to you that first time;

I wish I could be with you now, and use a different tone with you, for I do not know which way to turn about you.

For the Scripture says, "Rejoice, childless woman, who bear no children, Break into shouting, you who have no birth pains! For the desolate woman has more children than the married one!"

Now we, brothers, are like Isaac, children born in fulfilment of the promise.

I am confident in the Lord that you will not take a different view. The man who is unsettling you will have to pay the penalty for it, no matter who he is.

envy, drunkenness, carousing, and the like. I warn you as I did before that people who do such things will have no share in the Kingdom of God.

gentleness, self-control. There is no law against such things!

For neither circumcision nor the want of it is of any importance, but only a new creation.