Paul and Barnabas go to Jerusalem
1After 14 years, Barnabas and I went to Jerusalem again and I took Titus with us. 2I went because God told me to go there. In Jerusalem I told the believers and explained to them how I preach the Good_News to the Gentiles. When I was alone with the important_leaders of the church, I also explained it to them because I wanted to make sure that I could go on with the message that I was preaching and that I had been preaching in the past.
3Titus was with me and he is a Greek, but the believers in Jerusalem did not say that he had to be circumcised. 4There were people in the congregation in Jerusalem who were not_really believers. They secretly came to listen to what I said. They wanted to accuse me because I say that Jesus Christ has made us free. They wanted us to become slaves to the laws of Moses again. 5But we did not listen to them, not even for one minute, and we did not agree to what they wanted because we wanted to make sure that you will keep on getting the full truth of the Good_News.
6The important_leaders of the congregation in Jerusalem did not change anything in my message. It does not_matter to me if they are important or not, because God does not think that one person is more important than another person. 7The important_leaders in Jerusalem realised that it was God who told me to preach the Good_News to the Gentiles, as He had told Peter to preach the Good_News to the Jews. 8Yes, God gave Peter the power to be an apostle to the Jews and the same God has given me the power to be an apostle to the Gentiles.
9James, Cephas and John, the leaders of the congregation in Jerusalem, realised that God has given me the grace to preach to the Gentiles. They accepted Barnabas and I and they took our hands and said we could all work together. Barnabas and I will preach to the Gentiles and they will preach to the Jews. 10There was one thing that they asked us to do. They asked us to help the poor people of the congregation in Jerusalem. And this was something that I have always really wanted to do.
Paul and Peter argue in Antioch
11Later Cephas came to the city of Antioch and he did something that God does not like. I went straight to him and I told him that he was wrong. 12Before some of the Jewish Christians from Jerusalem came to Antioch, Cephas always ate with the Christians who were not Jews. But when those people from James came to Antioch, then Cephas stopped eating with the Christians who were not Jews because he was afraid of the Jewish Christians. 13When Cephas did that, the other Jewish Christians did the same. They became hypocritical like he was. Barnabas also became hypocritical.
God makes us righteous because we believe
14When I saw that they were not doing what the truth of the Good_News tells us, I talked to Cephas, and everyone heard when I said: ‘Cephas, you are a Jew, but you live like the people who are not Jews. Now you are telling people who are not Jews that they must live like Jews. That is wrong.
15You and I were Jews from the time that we were born. We were not Gentile sinners. 16We know that God forgives people's sin and makes us righteous. He does it because we believe in Jesus Christ, not because we do what the laws say. You and I also started believing in Jesus Christ and God made us righteous. God did this because we believe in Christ, not because we do what the laws say. In the Old_Testament it is written:
“God makes people righteous,
but not because they do what the laws say.”
17You and I are Jews. We wanted God to make us righteous and to forgive our sins because we believe in Christ. Yes, we realised that we are sinners like Gentiles. Can we say now that it is Christ who makes us sin? No, we can never say that.’
18I know that God forgives people and makes them righteous because they believe in Christ. I can not preach a different message, because then I would not be doing what God wants. 19Christ died on the cross and I died with Him. That is why I am dead to the laws. I am free from the laws and I live to honour God. 20It is not I who live. It is Christ who lives in me. How do I live now? I believe in the Son of God, the Son who loves me and who has died so that I can live. 21There are some people who say that God forgives people and makes them righteous because they do what the laws say. That is not_true. If that were true, then it would not help us at all that Christ has died for us. No, I believe in the grace of God. I can never throw it away or forget it.
