God's Spirit shows Christians how to live
13 My Christian friends, God has chosen you to serve him as free people. But you are still weak and human. So you are not free to do anything that you might want to do. Instead, you must serve one another, because you love each other. 14 One rule brings together all the rules in God's Law. That one rule says, ‘Love other people as much as you love yourself.’ 15 So do not live like wild animals. Wild animals fight and they eat each other. If you attack each other like that, be very careful! You may destroy one another completely.
16 So this is what I say: Let God's Spirit show you how to live in a good way. Then you will not do the wrong things that your weak human nature may want to do. 17 The things that your human nature wants to do are completely different from the things that God's Spirit wants. The things that God's Spirit wants are completely different from the things that our human nature wants. Our own thoughts fight against what God's Spirit wants us to do. As a result, you are not free to do the things that you really want to do. 18 But if God's Spirit leads you, then the rules of God's Law do not control you.
19 Everyone knows the kinds of bad things that human nature wants to do. People have sex with people that they are not married to. They do things that are bad and disgusting. 20 They worship idols. They do magic to hurt other people. They become enemies and they fight one another. They are jealous of other people. They become very angry. They want to please themselves and to be important. They cause trouble. They divide people into separate groups. 21 They want things that belong to other people. They are drunks. They have wild parties. And they like to do many other bad things like these. So I warn you again, as I have already warned you before. People who continue to do these bad things will not receive the blessings of the kingdom of God.
22 But God's Spirit causes us to live in a different way. We love other people. We are happy and we have peace in our minds. We are patient, kind and good. People can trust us to do what is right. 23 We respect other people and we control ourselves properly. God's Spirit helps us to live in that way. There is no law that says these things are wrong.
24 We belong to Christ. As a result, we no longer obey our weak human nature. We do not do the bad things that our thoughts want us to do. It is as if we have killed those thoughts on the cross. 25 Now it is God's Spirit that gives us life. So we must let God's Spirit lead us in the way that we live. 26 We must not become proud. We must not be jealous of each other, so that we cause trouble to one another.
