3 Finally, my brothers and sisters, rejoice in the Lord.

Breaking with the Past

To write the same things to you is not troublesome to me, and for you it is a source of steadfastness.

2 Beware of the dogs, beware of the evil workers, beware of those who mutilate the flesh!n,* 3 For it is we who are the circumcision, who worship in the Spirit of Godo and boast in Christ Jesus and have no confidence in the flesh*—4 even though I, too, have reason for confidence in the flesh.

If anyone else has reason to be confident in the flesh, I have more: 5 circumcised on the eighth day, a member of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew born of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee;* 6 as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless.

7 Yet whatever gains I had, these I have come to regard as loss because of Christ.* 8 More than that, I regard everything 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 I regard them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ* 9 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law but one that comes through faith in Christ,p the righteousness from God based on faith.* 10 I want to know Christq and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in his death, 11 if somehow I may attain the resurrection from the dead.*

Pressing toward the Goal

12 Not that I have already obtained this or have already reached the goal,r but I press on to lay hold of that for which Christs has laid hold of me.* 13 Brothers and sisters, I do not consider that I have laid holdt of it, but one thing I have laid hold of: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead,* 14 I press on toward the goal, toward the prize of the heavenlyu call of God in Christ Jesus.* 15 Let those of us, then, who are maturev think this way, and if you think differently about anything, this, too, God will reveal to you.* 16 Only let us hold fast to what we have attained.*

17 Brothers and sisters, join in imitating me, and observe those who live according to the example you have in us.* 18 For many live as enemies of the cross of Christ; I have often told you of them, and now I tell you even with tears.* 19 Their end is destruction, their god is the belly, and their glory is in their shame; their minds are set on earthly things.* 20 But our citizenshipw is in heaven, and it is from there that we are expecting a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. 21 He will transform the body of our humiliationx that it may be conformed to the body of his glory,y by the power that also enables him to make all things subject to himself.*