Please turn in your Bibles with me to this morning's text, which is Galatians 2

verses 15 to 21.

But when Cephas came to Antioch I opposed him to his face because he stood condemned.

For before certain men came from James he ate with the Gentiles, But when they came he drew back and separated himself, fearing the circumcision party.

And with him the rest of the Jews acted insincerely so that even Barnabas was carried away by their insincereity.

But when I saw that they were not straightforward about the truth of the Gospel, I said

to see if this before them all,, if you though a Jew live like a

Gentile and not like a Jew, how can you compel the Gentiles to live like Jews?

We ourselves who are Jews by birth and not Gentile sinners, yet who know that a

man is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Christ Jesus

in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law.

Because by works of the law shall no one be justified.

But if in our endeavor to be justified in Christ, we ourselves were found to be sinners.

Is Christ then an agent of sin? Certainly not. But if I build up again those things

which I tore down, then I prove myself a transgressor.

For I, through the law, died to the law, that I might live to God.

I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live but Christ, who lives in me.

And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith, and the son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not nullify

the grace of God, for if justification were through the law, then Christ died to no purpose.

You remember last week now that when Peter and Barnabas and the other Jews in Antioch cut off table fellowship from the Gentile Christians because they weren't keeping the dietary laws.

Paul rebuked Peter to his face and said that that amounts to compelling the

Gentile believers to become Jews or to keep the dietary laws in order to be

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