about his Son, who was physically descended from David,

and decisively declared Son of God in his holiness of spirit, by being raised from the dead??esus Christ our Lord,

As God is my witness, whom I serve in my spirit in spreading the good news of his Son, I never fail to mention you when I pray,

All who sin without having the Law will perish without regard to the Law, and all who sin under the Law will be judged by the Law.

What does this mean? Are we Jews at a disadvantage? Not at all. We have already charged Jews and Greeks all alike with being under the control of sin.

For no human being can be made upright in the sight of God by observing the Law. All that the Law can do is to make man conscious of sin.

For all men sin and come short of the glory of God,

Happy is the man whose sin the Lord will take no account of!"

If, when we were God's enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, it is far more certain that now that we are reconciled we shall be saved through sharing in his life!

It is just like the way in which through one man sin came into the world, and death followed sin, and so death spread to all men, because all men sinned.

It is true sin was in the world before the Law was given, and men are not charged with sin where there is no law.

Nor is there any comparison between the gift and the effects of that one man's sin. That sentence arose from the act of one man, and was for condemnation; but God's gift arose out of many offenses and results in acquittal.

Then law slipped in, and multiplied the offense. But greatly as sin multiplied, God's mercy has far surpassed it,

so that just as sin had reigned through death, mercy might reign through uprightness and bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Then what shall we conclude? Are we to continue to sin to increase the spread of mercy?

Certainly not! When we have died to sin, how can we live in it any longer?

for we know that our old self was crucified with him, to do away with our sinful body, so that we might not be enslaved to sin any longer,

for when a man is dead he is free from the claims of sin.

For when he died, he became once for all dead to sin; the life he now lives is a life in relation to God.

So you also must think of yourselves as dead to sin but alive to God, through union with Christ Jesus.

So sin must not reign over your mortal bodies, and make you obey their cravings,

and you must not offer the parts of your bodies to sin as the instruments of wrong, but offer yourselves to God as men brought back from death to life, and offer the parts of your bodies to him as instruments of uprightness.

For sin must no longer control you, for you live not under law but under mercy.

What follows, then? Are we to sin, because we live not under law but under mercy? Certainly not!

Do you not know that when you submit to being someone's slaves, and obeying him, you are the slaves of the one whom you obey, whether your slavery is to sin, and leads to death, or is to obedience, and leads to uprightness?

But, thank God! though you were once slaves of sin, you have become obedient from your hearts to the standard of teaching that you received,

and so you have been freed from sin, and made slaves of uprightness.

For when you were slaves of sin, you were free as far as uprightness was concerned.

But now that you have been freed from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you get is consecration, and the final result is eternal life.

For the wages sin pays is death, but the gift God gives is eternal life through union with Christ Jesus our Lord.

Then what shall we conclude? That the Law is sin? Certainly not! Yet, if it had not been for the Law, I should never have learned what sin was; I should not have known what it was to covet if the Law had not said, "You must not covet."

That command gave sin an opening, and it led me to all sorts of covetous ways, for sin is lifeless without law.

I was once alive and without law, but when the command came, sin awoke and then I died;

The command gave sin an opening and sin deceived me and killed me with it.

Did what was good, then, prove the death of me? Certainly not! It was sin that did so, so that it might be recognized as sin, because even through something that was good it effected my death, so that through the command it might appear how immeasurably sinful sin was.

We know that the Law is spiritual, but I am physical, sold into slavery to sin.

In reality, it is not I that do these things; it is sin, which has possession of me.

But if I do the things that I do not want to do, it is not I that am acting, it is sin, which has possession of me.

but all through my body I see another principle in conflict with the law of my reason, which makes me a prisoner to that law of sin that runs through my body.

Thank God! it is done through Jesus Christ our Lord! So mentally I am a slave to God's law, but physically to the law of sin.

For the life-giving law of the Spirit through Christ Jesus has freed you from the Law of sin and death.

For though it was impossible for the Law to do it, hampered as it was by our physical limitations, God, by sending his own Son in our sinful physical form, as a sin-offering, put his condemnation upon sin through his physical nature,

But if Christ is in your hearts, though your bodies are dead in consequence of sin, your spirits have life in consequence of uprightness.

It was in this hope that we were saved. But a hope that can be seen is not a hope, for who hopes for what he sees?

For those whom he had marked out from the first he predestined to be made like his Son, so that he should be the eldest of many brothers;

Will not he who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all, with that gift give us everything?

For this is what the promise said: "When I come back at this time next year, Sarah will have a son."

as the Scripture says, "See, I will put a stone on Zion to make people stumble, and a rock to trip over, But no one who has faith in it will be disappointed."

and then all Israel will be saved, just as the Scripture says, "The deliverer will come from Zion, He will drive all ungodliness away from Jacob,

So when I have finished this matter, and seen this contribution safely into their possession, I will start for Spain, and come to you on the way,

And God, who is the source of peace, will soon crush Satan under your feet. The blessing of our Lord Jesus be with you.