Galatians
Chapter 2
1 Fourteen years later, I went back to Jerusalem with Barnabas, and I also brought Titus with me.
2 I went up because God showed me to do so, and I explained to them the good news I share with non-Jews, but only to those with high status, to avoid my efforts being useless.
3 Titus, who was with me and is Greek, was not forced to be circumcised.
4 This is because some fake friends were secretly brought in to check on the freedom we have in Jesus Christ, to try and make us slaves again.
5 We did not submit to them, not even for a moment, so that the truth of the good news would remain with you.
6 But those who seemed important—whatever they were, it doesn’t matter to me; God does not show favoritism—did not add anything to my message.
7 But on the other hand, when they realized that I was trusted with the message for the non-Jewish people, just as Peter was for the Jewish people;
8 For the same power that worked in Peter to serve the Jews worked powerfully in me to serve the non-Jews.
9 When James, Cephas, and John, who appeared to be leaders, saw the grace given to me, they offered me and Barnabas a welcoming handshake; agreeing that we’d go to the non-Jews and they to the Jews.
10 They only asked us to remember the poor, which I was also eager to do.
11 When Peter came to Antioch, I confronted him directly because he was wrong.
12 Before some people came from James, Peter ate with non-Jews. But when they arrived, he pulled back and kept away because he was afraid of the group that insisted on circumcision.
13 The other Jews also pretended like him; even Barnabas was led to join them in their pretense.
14 When I saw they were not living right according to the gospel’s truth, I told Peter in front of everyone, “If you, a Jew, live like the Gentiles and not like the Jews, why do you force the Gentiles to follow Jewish ways?”
15 We who are born Jewish, and not Gentile sinners,
16 Understanding that a person is not made right by following the law, but by believing in Jesus Christ, we too have put our faith in Jesus Christ so we can be made right by trusting in Christ, not by following the law, because no one will be made right by following the law.
17 But if we try to be accepted by Christ and are still found as sinners, does that mean Christ supports sin? Definitely not.
18 If I rebuild what I destroyed, I show that I was wrong.
19 Through the law, I am as if dead to it, so that I might live for God.
20 I am crucified with Christ: yet I live. It’s not just me, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in my body, I live by trusting in God’s Son, who loved me and gave himself for me.
21 I do not waste God’s kindness: if following the law could make us right with God, then Christ died for no reason.