PhilippiansChapter 3

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¹Finally, my brothers and sisters, be full of joy in the Lord. I don't mind writing the same things to you again. It will help keep you safe. ²Watch out for those dogs! Watch out for those people who do evil! Watch out for those who cut up the body! ³We are the ones who are truly circumcised. We worship by the Spirit of God. We take pride in Christ Jesus. We do not trust in what we can do in our own bodies.a ⁴Still, I could trust in those things if I wanted. Does anyone else think he has reasons to trust in such things? I have even more. ⁵I was circumcised on the eighth day. I am from the people of Israel and the tribe of Benjamin. I am a Hebrew, born of Hebrews. As for the law, I was a Pharisee. ⁶As for being eager, I attacked the church. As for doing what the law says is right, no one could find fault with me. ⁷But all those things that helped me, I now call loss because of Christ. ⁸More than that, I call everything a loss compared to knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. Knowing him is far better than anything. Because of him, I have lost everything. I think of those things as trash so that I can gain Christ. ⁹I want to be found in him. I don't want to have my own way of being right with God that comes from the law. I want the way of being right with God that comes through faith in Christ. It comes from God and is based on faith. ¹⁰I want to know Christ. I want to know the power that raised him from the dead. I want to share in his sufferings. I want to become like him in his death. ¹¹And so, somehow, I hope to reach the resurrection from the dead. ¹²I have not already gotten all this. I have not yet been made perfect. But I keep going. I want to take hold of the very thing Christ Jesus took hold of me for. ¹³Brothers and sisters, I don't think I have taken hold of it yet. But I do one thing. I forget what is behind me. I reach for what is ahead. ¹⁴I keep going toward the finish line. I want to win the prize. God has called me to it from heaven in Christ Jesus. ¹⁵All of us who are grown up in our faith should think this way. And if you think differently about something, God will show you about that too. ¹⁶Still, we must live by what we have already reached. ¹⁷Brothers and sisters, join together in following my example. Watch closely those who live the way we showed you. ¹⁸I have told you this many times before. Now I say it again with tears. Many people live as enemies of the cross of Christ. ¹⁹In the end they will be destroyed. Their stomach is their god. They are proud of things they should be ashamed of. They only think about things of this earth. ²⁰But we are citizens of heaven. We are eagerly waiting for a Savior to come from there. He is the Lord Jesus Christ. ²¹He has the power to put all things under his control. By that power he will change our weak bodies. He will make them like his glorious body.