1Finally, my brethren, rejoice in the Lord; to write the same things to you, to me is not burdensome, and for you it is safe.
2Beware of the dogs, beware of the evil workmen, beware of the concision.
3For we are the circumcision, who worship by the Spirit of God, and glory in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh;
4though I myself have reason for confidence even in the flesh. If any other man thinketh that he hath reason for confidence in the flesh, I more;
5circumcised the eighth day, of the race of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of the Hebrews; as to the Law, a Pharisee;
6as to zeal, persecuting the church; as to the righteousness which is in the Law, blameless.
7But whatever things were gain to me, those for the sake of Christ I have counted but loss.
8Nay more, I count all things to be loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as refuse, that I may gain Christ,
9and be found in him, not having my own righteousness, which is of the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God upon faith;
10that I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, while becoming like him in his death,
11if by any means I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.
12Not that I have already obtained, or have been already perfected; but I press on, if I may also lay hold of that for which I was laid hold of by Christ.
13Brethren, I do not reckon myself to have laid hold of it; but one thing I do, forgetting the things that are behind, and stretching forth to the things that are before,
14I press toward the mark for the prize of the heavenly calling of God in Christ Jesus.
15Let us, therefore, as many as are perfect, be of this mind; and if ye have a different mind in anything, even this will God reveal to you.
16Nevertheless, whereto we have reached, in that let us walk.
17Brethren, be ye followers together of me, and mark those who walk as ye have us for an example.
18For many walk, of whom I told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ;
19whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, whose mind is on earthly things.
20For the country of which we are citizens is heaven, whence also we wait for a Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ,
21who will transform the body of our humiliation so that it shall be conformed to the body of his glory, according to the working of the power with which he is able to subdue all things to himself.