Letters to the Churches

From: Sha’ul, an emissary — I received my commission not from human beings or through human mediation but through Yeshua the Messiah and God the Father, who raised him from the dead — also from all the brothers with me

To: The Messianic communities in Galatia:

Grace and shalom to you from God our Father and from the Lord Yeshua the Messiah,

who gave himself for our sins, so that he might deliver us from the present evil world-system, in obedience to the will of God, our Father.

To him be the glory forever and ever! Amen.

I am astounded that you are so quick to remove yourselves from me, the one who called you by the Messiah’s grace, and turn to some other supposedly “Good News,”

which is not good news at all! What is really happening is that certain people are pestering you and trying to pervert the genuine Good News of the Messiah.

But even if we — or, for that matter, an angel from heaven! — were to announce to you some so-called “Good News” contrary to the Good News we did announce to you, let him be under a curse forever!

We said it before, and I say it again: if anyone announces “Good News” contrary to what you received, let him be under a curse forever!

Now does that sound as if I were trying to win human approval? No! I want God’s approval! Or that I’m trying to cater to people? If I were still doing that, I would not be a servant of the Messiah.

Furthermore, let me make clear to you, brothers, that the Good News as I proclaim it is not a human product;

because neither did I receive it from someone else nor was I taught it — it came through a direct revelation from Yeshua the Messiah.

For you have heard about my former way of life in [traditional] Judaism — how I did my best to persecute God’s Messianic Community and destroy it;

and how, since I was more of a zealot for the traditions handed down by my forefathers than most Jews my age, I advanced in [traditional] Judaism more rapidly than they did.

But when God, who picked me out before I was born and called me by his grace, chose

to reveal his Son to me, so that I might announce him to the Gentiles, I did not consult anyone;

and I did not go up to Yerushalayim to see those who were emissaries before me. Instead, I immediately went off to Arabia and afterwards returned to Dammesek.

Not until three years later did I go up to Yerushalayim to make Kefa’s acquaintance, and I stayed with him for two weeks,

but I did not see any of the other emissaries except Ya‘akov the Lord’s brother.

(Concerning these matters I am writing you about, I declare before God that I am not lying!)

Next I went to Syria and Cilicia;

but in Y’hudah, the Messianic congregations didn’t even know what I looked like —

they were only hearing the report, “The one who used to persecute us now preaches the Good News of the faith he was formerly out to destroy”;

and they praised God for me.

Then after fourteen years I again went up to Yerushalayim, this time with Bar-Nabba; and I took with me Titus.