What shall we say, then? Is the law sin? Certainly not! Indeed, I would not have known what sin was except through the law. For I would not have known what coveting really was if the law had not said, "You shall not covet."

For this is what the promise said: "About this time I will return and Sarah shall have a son."

"And it will happen that in the very place where it was said to them, 'You are not my people,' they will be called 'sons of the living God.'"

And as Isaiah said: "Unless the Lord of hosts had left us children, we would have become like Sodom, and we would have been made like Gomorrah."