For when they had come to know God, they did not give Him glory as God nor render Him thanks, but they became absorbed in useless discussions, and their senseless minds were darkened.

You are therefore without excuse, O man, whoever you are who sit in judgement upon others. For when you pass judgement on your fellow man, you condemn yourself; for you who sit in judgement upon others are guilty of the same misdeeds;

And you who pronounce judgement upon those who do such things although your own conduct is the same as theirs--do you imagine that you yourself will escape unpunished when God judges?

The fact is that in the stubbornness of your impenitent heart you are treasuring up against yourself anger on the day of Anger--the day when the righteousness of God's judgements will stand revealed.

For when Gentiles who have no Law obey by natural instinct the commands of the Law, they, without having a Law, are a Law to themselves;

on the day when God will judge the secrets of men's lives by Jesus Christ, as declared in the Good News as I have taught it.

No, indeed; let us hold God to be true, though every man should prove to be false. As it stands written, "That Thou mayest be shown to be just in the sentence Thou pronouncest, and gain Thy cause when Thou contendest."

But if our unrighteousness sets God's righteousness in a clearer light, what shall we say? (Is God unrighteous--I speak in our everyday language-- when He inflicts punishment?

For prior to the Law sin was already in the world; only it is not entered in the account against us when no Law exists.

For when you were the bondservants of sin, you were under no sort of subjection to Righteousness.

Once, apart from Law, I was alive, but when the Commandment came, sin sprang into life, and I died;

I find therefore the law of my nature to be that when I desire to do what is right, evil is lying in ambush for me.

It is *in hope* that we have been saved. But an object of hope is such no longer when it is present to view; for when a man has a thing before his eyes, how can he be said to hope for it?

when I declare that I have deep grief and unceasing anguish of heart.

and this shall be My Covenant with them; when I have taken away their sins."

but just as you were formerly disobedient to Him, but now have received mercy at a time when they are disobedient,

so now they also have been disobedient at a time when you are receiving mercy; so that to them too there may now be mercy.

Do not be indolent when zeal is required. Be thoroughly warm-hearted, the Lord's own servants,

Carry out these injunctions because you know the critical period at which we are living, and that it is now high time, to rouse yourselves from sleep; for salvation is now nearer to us than when we first became believers.

I hope, as soon as ever I extend my travels into Spain, to see you on my way and be helped forward by you on my journey, when I have first enjoyed being with you for a time.

and I know that when I come to you it will be with a vast amount of blessing from Christ.