Romans.
Romans 1.
19 Because God-knowledge is plain to them!
God revealed it to them.
20 Invisible things like God’s timelessness, power, and divinity,
can be observed and understood in created things since the world’s creation.
For this reason people have no excuse.
28 Since they never tried to learn from God,
God handed them off to their untried minds, to do the unthinkable.
29 To fill themselves with every sort of wrong-headedness, dishonesty, evil gain.
Full of envy. Murder. Fighting. Deceit. Maliciousness. Gossip. 30 Slanderers. God-haters.
Full of themselves. Arrogant. Boastful. Inventors of new evils. Dismissive of their parents.
31 Don’t think. Don’t keep their promises. Void of compassion. Void of mercy.
32 Knowing God’s command—that people who do such things deserve death—
—yet not only do they do them, but approve of their doing.
Romans 2.
1 Meaning all you people who judge have no defense either:
Whenever you judge another, you condemn yourself: You judges do the same things!
2 We’ve always known God’s judgment is valid about those who do such things.
3 Consider that, you people who judge, yet do the same things:
Why will you get to escape God’s judgment?
4 Or is his abundant kindness, his holding back, his patience, for nothing?
God’s kindness gets you to repent. Didn’t you know this?
17 If you so-called Jews rely on the Law,
boast in God, 18 know his will, test for perfection because the Law instructs so,
19 believe you’re a leader for the blind, a light for those in darkness,
20 a discipline for fools, a teacher for kids, having the façade of knowledge and truth from the Law:
21 So, you who teach others: You don’t teach yourselves.
You who proclaim “Don’t steal”: You steal.
22 You who say, “Don’t adulter”: You adulter.
You who’re “made nauseous” by idols: You defile temples.
23 You who boast in the Law: Because you break the Law, you dishonor God,
24 for “God’s name is slandered by gentiles thanks to you” Ek 36.22 —just as it’s written.
Romans 3.
21 Now, God’s righteousness was revealed separate from through Law.
It was testified about by the Law and Prophets:
22 God’s righteousness comes to every believer through Christ Jesus.
No exceptions: 23 Everybody sinned, and fails to meet God’s standard.
24 We get declared righteous by his grace, through Christ Jesus’s redemption:
25 God propped him up as the means of making things right, by us trusting his blood.
As evidence of his righteousness, God dismisses all the sin-offerings which came before.
26 It’s God’s truce, to show evidence of his righteousness in this time.
He’s being righteous, and making those who trust Jesus righteous.
27 So what happens to our boasting of Law-following? Irrelevant.
Through which law?—of good works? No; through a law of faith:
28 We figure people are made righteous by faith.
It’s separate from Law-following.
29 Now is God only for Jews, not gentiles too? Yes, gentiles too, 30 since God is One.
He makes the circumcised right through faith; he makes the “foreskins” right through faith.
31 So does the Law get cancelled out because of faith?
Absolutely not. Instead, we support the Law.
Romans 4.
1 So what’ll we say we found in our biological forefather Abraham?
2 If Abraham was right with God due to works, he has something to emphasize.
(Just not in front of God.)
3 What’s the scripture say? Abraham believed God,
“and to God this was considered rightness.” Ge 15.6
4 To the employee, wages aren’t considered a favor. They’re owed.
5 To the non-employee who believes in the one who turns the godless into the righteous:
Their belief is considered rightness.
6 Just like David says—the awesomeness of people
whom God considers right with him despite our works:
7 “How awesome: Their lawlessness was forgiven. Their sins were covered.
8 How awesome: A man whose sin the Lord never considers.” Ps 32.1-2
Romans 5.
8 Because we were still sinners
God, to put us together with him in love, had Christ die for us.
12 This is why it’s like sin entered the world through one man, and through sin, death,
and therefore death comes to every human—hence everyone sinned.
13 Before the Law, there was sin in the world. Sin wasn’t yet considered sin; the Law didn’t exist.
14 But death reigned from Adam to Moses, over those who hadn’t erred in any way like Adam had.
Adam’s the pattern for what would happen next, 15 but the error isn’t at all like the grace.
If many people died by one man’s error, how great is God’s grace in his gracious gift of another one man: Christ Jesus!
16 The gift isn’t like Adam’s sin, for judging Adam: Condemnation.
The gracious gift, despite many errors: Rightness.
17 If death reigned because of Adam’s error, how great is the abundant grace and the gift of rightness we received!
They will reign in life through the one man, Christ Jesus.
Romans 6.
1 So what are we saying?—“Continue to sin, for there’s plenty of grace”?
2 Never gonna happen. We died to sin. How could we live in it?
3 Did you miss this?—We were baptized in Christ Jesus. We were baptized in his death.
4 Because of baptism in his death, we were buried with him.
So, just as Christ was raised from the dead,
thanks to the Father’s glory, we likewise can walk around in newness of life.
12 So never let sin rule in your mortal body. Don’t listen to its desires.
13 Don’t set up your body parts as sin’s tools of immorality.
Set yourselves up, instead, for God. Like life from death;
your body parts as God’s tools of morality.
14 Sin isn’t to rule over you:
You’re not under Law, but under grace.
15 So what? Can we sin, since we’re not under Law but under grace?
Absolutely not.
16 Don’t you realize whenever you offer yourselves as attentive slaves,
you’re the slaves of whatever you pay attention to?
Either that’s sin, which’ll kill you; or obedience, which’ll make you right.
17 Praise God: You were slaves to sin,
yet you wholeheartedly paid attention to whatever kind of teaching you were given.
18 Freed from sin, you were enslaved by rightness.
19 Because your flesh is weak, I’ll say it in a human way.
It’s as if you once handed over your skillsets to nasty careers:
You became experts at breaking law after law.
So now, hand over your skillsets to right-minded jobs,
and become experts at holiness.
20 When you worked for sin, you quit rightness— 21 but what fruit did that get you?
Beause nowadays, you find that embarrassing, since the end-point of it is death.
22 Now, having quit sin, employed by God, the fruit you have is holiness,
and the end-point of it is life in the age to come.
23 Sin’s earnings: Death.
God’s gift, in our master Christ Jesus: Life in the age to come.
Romans 7.
1 You really don’t know, Christians—for I speak to those who know the Law,
how the Law rules as far as the time a person lives.
2 For by Law, a woman under a man has been bound to a living man.
When the man died, she’s been nullified from the man’s law.
3 Subsequently she’ll be labeled unfaithful to a living man when she was with another man.
When the man died, she’s free from the Law, and she’s not become unfaithful with another man.
4 Thus, my fellow Christians, you also were put to death to Law through Christ’s body,
so you became freed up for another—to the one reaised from the dead, that we might produce fruit for God.
5 For when we were carnal, the misery of sins, according to Law,
was producing a lot of deathly “fruit” through our sinful body parts.
6 Now we’ve been nullified by the Law, dead to that which holds us,
so as to serve us in the Spirit’s newness, not the letter’s oldness.
14 We’ve known the Law is spiritual—and I am fleshly, sold into sin’s slavery.
15 I do things I don’t understand. I don’t want to do them. I hate what I do.
16 Since I don’t want to do them, I agree: The Law is good.
17 Now, it’s no longer I who do these things, but the sin which inhabits me.
18 I know nothing living in me, namely in my flesh, is good.
The will, but not the ability, exists in me to do good.
19 I don’t do the good I want. I do the evil I don’t want.
20 If I don’t want to do them, it’s not so much me doing them, as the sin which inhabits me.
21 That’s why I sought the Law, which wants me to do good: Evil is always around.
22 I rejoice in God’s Law, despite my inner humanity—
23 I see another law in my body parts, fighting the Law in my mind,
taking me captive to the law of sin, which exists in my body parts.
24 I am such a miserable human.
What will rescue me from this death-plagued body?
25 God’s grace, through Christ Jesus our Lord!
That’s why my mind’s now enslaved to God’s Law… while my body, to sin’s law.
Romans 8.
1 That’s why there’s no judgment anymore for those in Christ Jesus:
2 The law of the Spirit of Life, in Christ Jesus, released you from the law of sin and death.
3 God, sending his own Son in the form of sinful humanity, judged that sin in the flesh,
doing what the Law, hindered by the flesh, couldn’t.
4 Thus the Law’s rightness can be fulfilled
in we who aren’t walking by flesh, but by Spirit.
5 Carnal people think carnal things. Spirit-led people, Spirit-led things.
6 A flesh-led mind produces death. A Spirit-led mind, life and peace.
7 For a flesh-led mind is God’s enemy. It doesn’t submit to God’s law. It can’t.
8 Those who live by flesh can’t please God.
9 You don’t live by flesh, but by the Spirit, since God’s Spirit lives in you.
If anyone doesn’t have Christ’s Spirit, they aren’t in Christ.
10 If Christ’s in you, even though your body dies due to sin,
your spirit lives—thanks to righteousness.
11 If the Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead indwells you,
he who raised Christ from the dead, his Spirit in you,
will also keep your mortal bodies alive by indwelling you.
12 So, Christians, we aren’t obligated to the flesh, nor carnal life.
13 If you live a carnal life, you’re going to die.
If you kill off the body’s works by the Spirit, you’ll live.
18 I figure the present-day sufferings aren’t worthy of worry,
compared with the glory about to be revealed to us:
19 The eager anticipation of creation, the revelation of God’s children, awaits!
20 Creation was unwillingly inflicted with meaningless things,
but throughout the infliction, with the hope 21 creation itself will be freed—
from the slavery of decay, into the freedom of the glory of God’s children.
22 We know all creation has been groaning and suffering together till now.
23 Not just that: We ourselves, the firstborn of the Spirit, groan as we await adoption—
the redemption of our bodies. 24 We’re saved with this hope.
Visible hope isn’t hope. If people can see it, who hopes anymore?
25 If we don’t see it, we hope. We wait with enduring patience.
26 Likewise the Spirit supports us in our weak spots.
What should we pray for? We don’t always know.
Then the Spirit steps in for us, with inarticulate noises.
27 The One who searches our hearts knows what the Spirit’s thoughts are:
As God desires, he steps in for his saints.
28 We know that for those who love God, for those who’re invited by his proclamation,
everything works together into a good outcome:
29 Those whom God foreknew,
whom he already decided would share the image, the likeness, of his Son
—him being the firstborn of many sisters and brothers—
30 those whom God already decided, he also invited.
Those invited, he also justified. Those justified, he also glorified.
31 So what’ll we say about this? If God’s for us, what’s left against us?
32 God didn’t even hold back his own son: For every one of us, he gave him up.
What more won’t he grace us with?
33 What’ll accuse God’s chosen people, since God made us right? 34 What’ll condemn us—
when Christ Jesus died, was raised (even better!), and is at God’s right hand, defending us?
35 What’ll cut us off from Messiah’s love? Suffering?
Limitations? Persecution? Starvation? Nakedness? Danger? A knife?
36 Like it’s written: “All day long, we’re put to death because of you;
we’re thought of as butchered sheep.” Ps 44.22
37 But despite all these things, through the One who loves us, we’ve entirely won.
38 I’ve been convinced neither death, life, angels, leaders,
the past, the future, powers, 39 height, depth,
nor any other creation can divide us from God’s love,
which is in Christ Jesus our Master.
Romans 10.
6 Rightness by faith says this:
“Don’t say in your heart, ‘Who’s going to heaven?’” Dt 30.12 (in this case, to bring Christ back)
7 “or, ‘Who’s going into the deep?’” Dt 30.13 (in this case, to raise Christ from the dead).
8 Instead what it says is, “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your mind.” Dt 30.14
This is the word of faith, which we proclaim:
9 When you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,”
and trust with your mind God raised him from the dead, you’ll be saved.
10 You trust him—leading to justification—with the mind.
You confess him—leading to salvation—with the mouth.
11 The scripture says, “All who trust him won’t be ashamed.” Is 28.16
12 No distinction between Jew and Greek: He’s Lord of all.
He has riches for all who call upon him.
13 “All who call the Lord’s name will be saved.” Jl 2.32
Romans 11.
1 So I say, “Didn’t God throw out his people?”
Absolutely not. I’m Israeli, of Abraham’s seed, tribe of Benjamin.
2 God didn’t throw out his people, whom he foreknew.
Or didn’t you know what the scripture says of Elijah?
How he met with God against Israel: 3 “Master, they killed your prophets!
They razed your altars! I alone am left, and they seek my soul!” 1Ki 19.10, 14
4 But what was the divine reply to him?
“I left myself 7,000 men who didn’t bend the knee to Baal.” 1Ki 19.18
5 So at the present time, a remnant likewise became chosen by grace.
6 If by grace, it can’t be by works, since grace can’t be made grace.
Romans 12.
1 So with God’s compassion, I encourage you Christians to submit your bodies.
Be live sacrifices, holy, acceptable to God; logically, this is your worship.
2 Don’t follow this age’s scheme. Instead, be transformed—your mind renovated—
and find out for yourselves what God’s will is—what’s good, pleasing, and complete.
Romans 16.
7 Greet my relatives and my fellow prisoners Andronicus and Junia,
who are remarkable among the apostles, who came to Christ before me.
20 The God of peace will crush Satan under your feet quickly!
May our Master Jesus’s grace be with you.