3:1 Finally, my brothers and sisters,¹ rejoice in the Lord! To write this again is not a bother for me, and it is a safeguard for you.

3:2 Beware of the dogs,² beware of the evil workers, beware of those who mutilate the flesh!³ 3:3 For we are the circumcision, the ones who worship by the Spirit of God, exult in Christ Jesus, and do not rely on human credentials⁴ 3:4 —though mine too are significant. If someone thinks he has good reasons to put confidence in human credentials,⁵ I have more: 3:5 I was circumcised on the eighth day, from the people of Israel and the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews. I lived according to the law as a Pharisee. 3:6 In my zeal for God I persecuted the church. According to the righteousness stipulated in the law I was blameless. 3:7 But these assets I have come to regard as liabilities because of Christ. 3:8 More than that, I now regard all things as liabilities compared to the far greater value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things—indeed, I regard them as dung!⁶—that I might gain Christ, 3:9 and be found in him, not because of having my own righteousness derived from the law, but because of having the righteousness that comes by way of Christ’s faithfulness⁷—a righteousness from God that is based on Christ’s⁸ faithfulness.⁹ 3:10 My aim is to know him, to experience the power of his resurrection, to share in his sufferings,¹⁰ and to be like him in his death, 3:11 and so, somehow,¹¹ to attain to the resurrection from the dead.

3:12 Not that I have already attained this—that is, I have not already been perfected—but I strive to lay hold of that for which I also was laid hold of by Christ Jesus. 3:13 Brothers and sisters,¹² I do not consider myself to have attained this. Instead I am single-minded:¹³ forgetting the things behind and reaching out for the things ahead, 3:14 with this goal in mind,¹⁴ I strive toward the prize of the upward call of God¹⁵ in Christ Jesus. 3:15 Let those of us who are “perfect” embrace this point of view.¹⁶ If you think otherwise, God will reveal to you the error of your ways.¹⁷ 3:16 Nevertheless, let us live up to the standard that we have already attained.¹⁸

3:17 Be imitators of me,¹⁹ brothers and sisters,²⁰ and watch carefully those who are living this way, just as you have us as an example. 3:18 For many live (about whom I often told you, and now say even with tears) as enemies of the cross of Christ. 3:19 Their end will be destruction. Their god is the belly. They exult in their shame. They think about earthly things. 3:20 But our citizenship is in heaven—and we also await a savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, 3:21 who will transform these humble bodies of ours²¹ into the likeness of his glorious body by means of that power by which he is able to subject all things to himself.