Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

Stay the way you were called

¹⁷ This is the overriding rule: everyone should conduct their lives as the Lord appointed, as God has called them. This is what I lay down in all the churches. ¹⁸ If someone was circumcised when he was called, he shouldn’t try to remove the marks. If someone was uncircumcised when he was called, he shouldn’t get circumcised. ¹⁹ Circumcision is nothing; uncircumcision is nothing; what matters is keeping God’s commandments!

²⁰ Everyone should stay within the calling they had when they were called. ²¹ Were you a slave when you were called? Don’t worry about it (but if you get the chance of freedom, seize it!). ²² The one who is in the Lord and called as a slave is the Lord’s freedman, just as the one who is called as a free person is the Messiah’s slave. ²³ You were bought at a high price; don’t become the slaves of human beings. ²⁴ So, brothers and sisters, let each person remain before God in the state in which they were called.