Galatians 1

Greeting

¹Paul, an apostle — not from men or by man, but by Jesus Christ and God the Father who raised him from the dead —²³and all the brothers who are with me: To the churches of Galatia.⁴

⁵Grace to you and peace from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ,⁶⁷who gave himself for our sins to rescue us from this present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father.⁸⁹To him be the glory forever and ever. Amen.¹⁰

No Other Gospel

¹¹I am amazed that you are so quickly turning away from him who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel —¹²¹³not that there is another gospel, but there are some who are troubling you and want to distort the gospel of Christ.¹⁴¹⁵But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, a curse be on him!¹⁶¹⁷As we have said before, I now say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to what you received, a curse be on him!¹⁸

¹⁹For am I now trying to persuade people, or God? Or am I striving to please people? If I were still trying to please people, I would not be a servant of Christ.²⁰

The Origin of Paul’s Gospel

²¹For I want you to know, brothers and sisters, that the gospel preached by me is not of human origin.²²²³For I did not receive it from a human source and I was not taught it, but it came by a revelation of Jesus Christ.²⁴

²⁵For you have heard about my former way of life in Judaism: I intensely persecuted God’s church and tried to destroy it.²⁶²⁷I advanced in Judaism beyond many contemporaries among my people, because I was extremely zealous for the traditions of my ancestors.²⁸²⁹But when God, who from my mother’s womb set me apart and called me by his grace, was pleased³⁰³¹to reveal his Son in me, so that I could preach him among the Gentiles, I did not immediately consult with anyone.³²³³I did not go up to Jerusalem to those who had become apostles before me; instead I went to Arabia and came back to Damascus.³⁴

³⁵Then after three years I did go up to Jerusalem to get to know Cephas, and I stayed with him fifteen days.³⁶³⁷But I didn’t see any of the other apostles except James, the Lord’s brother.³⁸³⁹I declare in the sight of God: I am not lying in what I write to you.⁴⁰

⁴¹Afterward, I went to the regions of Syria and Cilicia.⁴²⁴³I remained personally unknown to the Judean churches that are in Christ.⁴⁴⁴⁵They simply kept hearing, “He who formerly persecuted us now preaches the faith he once tried to destroy.”⁴⁶⁴⁷And they glorified God because of me.⁴⁸