Righteousness Through Faith in Christ

1Finally, my brothers, rejoice in the Lord! To write this to you again is no trouble for me, and it is safe for you.

2Watch out for the dogs, watch out for the evil workers, watch out for those who mutilate the flesh.

3For we are the circumcision, we who worship ¹⁴by the Spirit of God, who boast in Christ Jesus, and who put no confidence in the flesh,

4even though I myself might put confidence in the flesh. If anyone else presumes to have confidence in the flesh, I have more:

5circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee;

6as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless.

7But whatever was gain to me I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ.

8More than that, I count all things as loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish so that I may gain Christ

9and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but the righteousness that is through faith in Christ, which comes from God on the basis of faith.

10I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings, becoming like him in his death,

11in the hope of attaining the resurrection from the dead.

Pressing On Toward the Goal

12Not that I have already obtained it or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ ¹⁵Jesus has taken hold of me.

13Brothers, I do not consider myself to have taken hold of ¹⁶it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and reaching forward to what is ahead,

14I press on toward the goal to win the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

15Therefore all of us who are mature should adopt this mindset, and if you adopt a different mindset about anything, God will reveal that to you as well.

16Nevertheless, let us live up to the same standard that we have already ¹⁷attained; let us adopt the same mindset.

17Join together in imitating me, brothers, and pay close attention to those who walk according to the example you have in us.

18For I have often told you, and tell you now with tears, that many walk as enemies of the cross of Christ.

19Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and their glory is in their shame. Their minds are set on earthly things.

20But our citizenship is in heaven, and we eagerly await from there a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ,

21who will transform our lowly bodies to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him to subject all things to himself.