Open English Translation GAL Chapter 5

5 The messiah has freed us so we can have freedom, so stand firm and don’t get entangled again in the burden of slavery.

2 What’s more, I Paul would add that even if you all got circumcised, then the messiah wouldn’t be of any benefit. 3 I’ll say it again clearly, every man who’s circumcised has put themselves in debt to obeying all of the law. 4 You were released from the messiah when you moved to trusting in the law in order to be right with God—you fell away from grace at that point. 5 Because we who are in the spirit are eagerly waiting for the righteousness that we are expecting to receive by faith. 6 Because in the messiah Yeshua, it’s not circumcision that achieves anything, nor uncircumcision, but faith worked out through love.

7 You were all running the race so well—who held you back from believing the truth? 8 It wasn’t the one who called you all. 9 [ref]A little bit of yeast can make a whole loaf of bread rise. 10 I am trusting in the master that you won’t be thinking anything different from the truth. The one who will bear the judgement is the one who has been confusing you, anyone who that was.

11 But, brothers and sisters, if I was still preaching the Jewish rules, why would I still be being persecuted. If I was still preaching that, then mentioning about dying on a stake wouldn’t even be offensive. 12 I wish that the ones upsetting you all by suggesting cutting off bits, would cut it all off.

13 Brothers and sisters, you were called into freedom. That doesn’t mean that you should use the freedom to do whatever your minds desire, but rather to be serving each other in love. 14 [ref]Because the entire law can be fulfilled by obeying one rule: Love your neighbour like yourself. 15 But if you’re all snapping at and bullying each other, watch out or else you’ll destroy each other’s faith.

16 I’ll tell you: allow yourselves to be led by the spirit and then your earthly desires won’t triumph. 17 [ref]Because our earthly desires oppose the spirit, and the spirit opposes our earthly desires—they oppose each other so that’s why you end up doing things that you didn’t really want to do. 18 But if you are being led by the spirit then you’re not trying to earn your way to God by obeying all of Moses’ rules.

19 The actions that come from our earthly desires include: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, 20 idolatry, sorcery, hostility, strife, jealousies, rages, selfish ambitions, arguing, divisions, 21 envy, drunkenness, carousing, and other similar things which I’ve mentioned previously. And as I also said previously, the people that do these things won’t be inheriting God’s kingdom.

22 But the end result of having God’s spirit is to show love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith, 23 gentleness, and self-control—there’s no law of Moses against any of these! 24 And for the followers of the messiah Yeshua, earthly desires need to be executed on a stake along with their passions and lusts. 25 If we’re being led by God’s spirit in our living, then we should also be aligning our values by the spirit. 26 We have to take care not to become conceited, not to provoke each other, and not to envy each other.