Study Desk

I am afraid that when I come to you again, my God will make me ashamed before you. I may be saddened by many of those who have sinned because they have not changed their hearts or turned from their sexual sins and the shameful things they have done.

And these believers praised God because of me.

I went because God showed me I should go. I met with the believers there, and in private I told their leaders the Good News that I preach to the non-Jewish people. I did not want my past work and the work I am now doing to be wasted.

We talked about this problem because some false believers had come into our group secretly. They came in like spies to overturn the freedom we have in Christ Jesus. They wanted to make us slaves.

When Peter came to Antioch, I challenged him to his face, because he was wrong.

Yet we know that a person is made right with God not by following the law, but by trusting in Jesus Christ. So we, too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus, that we might be made right with God because we trusted in Christ. It is not because we followed the law, because no one can be made right with God by following the law.

Tell me this one thing: How did you receive the Holy Spirit? Did you receive the Spirit by following the law? No, you received the Spirit because you heard the Good News and believed it.

Does God give you the Spirit and work miracles among you because you follow the law? No, he does these things because you heard the Good News and believed it.

But those who depend on following the law to make them right are under a curse, because the Scriptures say, "Anyone will be cursed who does not always obey what is written in the Book of the Law."

Now it is clear that no one can be made right with God by the law, because the Scriptures say, "Those who are right with God will live by faith."

The law is not based on faith. It says, "A person who obeys these things will live because of them."

If the law could give us Abraham's blessing, then the promise would not be necessary. But that is not possible, because God freely gave his blessings to Abraham through the promise he had made.

You belong to Christ, so you are Abraham's descendants. You will inherit all of God's blessings because of the promise God made to Abraham.

So now you are not a slave; you are God's child, and God will give you the blessing he promised, because you are his child.

You remember that it was because of an illness that I came to you the first time, preaching the Good News.

Now am I your enemy because I tell you the truth?

I wish I could be with you now and could change the way I am talking to you, because I do not know what to think about you.

Abraham's son from the slave woman was born in the normal human way. But the son from the free woman was born because of the promise God made to Abraham.

My brothers and sisters, you are God's children because of his promise, as Isaac was then.

We have freedom now, because Christ made us free. So stand strong. Do not change and go back into the slavery of the law.