For I do yearn to see you, that I may impart to you some spiritual gift for your strengthening ??12 or, in other words, that I may be encouraged by meeting you, I by your faith and you by mine.

they have exchanged the glory of the immortal God for the semblance of the likeness of mortal man, of birds, of quadrupeds, and of reptiles.

and in the same way the males have abandoned the natural use of women and flamed out in lust for one another, men perpetrating shameless acts with their own sex and getting in their own persons the due recompense of their perversity.

Very well; and do you imagine you will escape God's doom, O man, you who judge those who practise such vices and do the same yourself?

on the day when God judges the secret things of men, as my gospel holds, by Jesus Christ.

he is a Jew who is one inwardly, and circumcision is a matter of the heart, spiritual not literal ??praised by God, not by man.

Never! Let God be true to his word, though every man be perfidious ??as it is written, That thou mayest be vindicated in thy pleadings, and triumph in thy trial.

it was to demonstrate his justice at the present epoch, showing that God is just himself and that he justifies man on the score of faith in Jesus.

We hold a man is justified by faith apart from deeds of the Law altogether.

but a man who instead of 'working' believes in Him who justifies the ungodly, has his faith counted as righteousness.

Just as David himself describes the bliss of the man who has righteousness counted to him by God apart from what he does ??7 Blessed are they whose breaches of the Law are forgiven, whose sins are covered!

Blessed is the man whose sin the Lord will not count to him.

In what way? When he was a circumcised man or an uncircumcised man? Not when he was circumcised, but when he was uncircumcised.

He only got circumcision as a sign or seal of the righteousness which belonged to his faith as an uncircumcised man. The object of this was to make him the father of all who believe as uncircumcised persons and thus have righteousness counted to them,

as well as a father of those circumcised persons who not only share circumcision but walk in the steps of the faith which our father Abraham had as an uncircumcised man.

Why, a man will hardly die for the just ??though one might bring oneself to die, if need be, for a good man.

Thus, then, sin came into the world by one man, and death came in by sin; and so death spread to all men, inasmuch as all men sinned.

but the gift is very different from the trespass. For while the rest of men died by the trespass of one man, the grace of God and the free gift which comes by the grace of the one man Jesus Christ overflowed far more richly upon the rest of men.

Nor is the free gift like the effect of the one man's sin; for while the sentence ensuing on a single sin resulted in doom, the free gift ensuing on many trespasses issues in acquittal.

For if the trespass of one man allowed death to reign through that one man, much more shall those who receive the overflowing grace and free gift of righteousness reign in life through One, through Jesus Christ.

Well then, as one man's trespass issued in doom for all, so one man's act of redress issues in acquittal and life for all.

Just as one man's disobedience made all the rest sinners, so one man's obedience will make all the rest righteous.

(for once dead, a man is absolved from the claims of sin).

you must not let sin have your members for the service of vice, you must dedicate yourselves to God as men who have been brought from death to life, dedicating your members to God for the service of righteousness.

Surely you know, my brothers ??for I am speaking to men who know what law means ??that the law has hold over a person only during his lifetime!

Accordingly, she will be termed an adulteress if she becomes another man's while her husband is alive; but if her husband dies, she is freed from the law of 'the husband,' so that she is no adulteress if she becomes another man's.

The interests of the flesh mean death, the interests of the Spirit mean life and peace.

the hope being that creation as well as man would one day be freed from its thraldom to decay and gain the glorious freedom of the children of God.

It is not, of course, as if God's word had failed! Far from it! 'Israel' does not mean everyone who belongs to Israel;

And further, when Rebecca became pregnant by our father Isaac, though one man was the father of both children,

and though the children were still unborn and had done nothing either good or bad (to confirm the divine purpose in election which depends upon the call of God, not on anything man does),

But who are you, my man, to speak back to God? Is something a man has moulded to ask him who has moulded it, "Why did you make me like this?"

As indeed he says in Hosea, Those who were no people of mine, I will call 'my People,' and her 'beloved' who was not beloved;

on the very spot where they were told, 'You are no people of mine,' there shall they be called 'sons of the living God.'

And why? Simply because Israel has relied not on faith but on what they could do. They have stumbled over the stone that makes men stumble ??33 as it is written, Here I lay a stone in Sion that will make men stumble, even a rock to trip them up; but he who believes in Him will never be disappointed.

for with his heart man believes and is justified, with his mouth he confesses and is saved.

And how can men preach unless they are sent? ??as it is written, How pleasant is the coming of men with glad, good news!

Yet what is the divine answer? I have left myself seven thousand men who have not knelt to Baal.

Well, if their lapse has enriched the world, if their defection is the gain of the Gentiles, what will it mean when they all come in?

For if their exclusion means that the world is reconciled to God, what will their admission mean? Why, it will be life from the dead!

For God has consigned all men to disobedience, that he may have mercy upon all.

be at peace with all men, if possible, so far as that depends on you.

Never revenge yourselves, beloved, but let the Wrath of God have its way; for it is written, Vengeance is mine, I will exact a requital ??the Lord has said it. No,

Magistrates are no terror to an honest man, though they are to a bad man. If you want to avoid being alarmed at the government-authorities, lead an honest life and you will be commended for it;

Pay them all their respective dues, tribute to one, taxes to another, respect to this man, honour to that.

Be in debt to no man ??apart from the debt of love one to another. He who loves his fellow-man has fulfilled the law.

Welcome a man of weak faith, but not for the purpose of passing judgment on his scruples.

While one man has enough confidence to eat any food, the man of weak faith only eats vegetables.

Then again, this man rates one day above another, while that man rates all days alike. Well, everyone must be convinced in his own mind;

the man who values a particular day does so to the Lord. The eater eats to the Lord, since he thanks God for his food; the non-eater abstains to the Lord, and he too thanks God.

I know, I am certain in the Lord Jesus, that nothing is in itself unclean; only, anything is unclean for a man who considers it unclean.

If your brother is being injured because you eat a certain food, then you are no longer living by the rule of love. Do not let that food of yours ruin the man for whom Christ died.

he who serves Christ on these lines, is acceptable to God and esteemed by men.

You must not break down God's work for the mere sake of food! Everything may be clean, but it is wrong for a man to prove a stumbling-block by what he eats;

Certainly keep your own conviction on the matter, as between yourself and God; he is a fortunate man who has no misgivings about what he allows himself to eat.

Christ, I mean, became a servant to the circumcised in order to prove God's honesty by fulfilling His promises to the fathers,

Salute Andronicus and Junias, fellow-countrymen and fellow-prisoners of mine; they are men of note among the apostles, and they have been in Christ longer than I have.