<p>6:17 <i>From now on, let no one cause me further trouble</i>- The reason for this is that Paul is connected with the sufferings of Christ. Those who trouble him are doing so to the crucified Christ and will suffer accordingly.</p><p><i>For I bear- </i>This connects with the theme developed earlier in the chapter; the same word is used about bearing the burdens of legalistic obedience (:2,5- see notes there). The same word is also significantly used in Acts 15:10 about being unable to bear the burdens of the Law. Paul's parting shot is therefore that he does not bear the burden of needing to be obedient to the Law, a heavy yoke which nobody was able to bear. Instead He bears the cross of Jesus and is co-crucified with Him. And this is the whole contrast; bearing the burdens of needing to perform and be obedient to laws- or bearing the cross of Jesus through identification with Him.</p><p><i>Branded on my body the marks of Jesus</i>- All through his life and witness, Paul was aware of how he had rebelled against his Lord. He wrote that he bore in his body the marks of the Lord Jesus. He seems to be alluding to the practice of branding runaway slaves who had been caught with the letter F in their forehead, for <i>fugitivus</i>. His whole thinking was dominated by this awareness that like Jonah he had sought to run, and yet had by grace been received into his Master&rsquo;s service. Paul could conclude by saying that he bore in his body perhaps an idiom for his life, cp. the &lsquo;broken body&rsquo; of the Lord we remember the <i>stigmata</i> of the Lord Jesus. He was so clearly a slave belonging to the Lord Jesus that it was as if one could see the marks of the nails in his body. Hence all the connections Paul makes in his letters between the suffering servant / slave prophecies, and his own experience. Paul has come over throughout his letter as self-assured, confident he is in the right and others are in the wrong, clearly and persuasively arguing for faith in Christ's cross as the only way to salvation. But he closes in a very appropriate way; by again asserting that indeed his life is totally tied up in the living and dying of his Lord, but within that same statement, admitting that he had and did in a way seek to avoid it.</p>