Making request, if by any means now at length I might have a prosperous journey by the will of God to come unto you.

For I long to see you, to convey to you some spiritual gift that will strengthen you;

For the righteousness of God is revealed in it from faith to faith, just as it is written, "But the one who is righteous by faith will live."

until they were filled (permeated, saturated) with every kind of unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice and mean-spiritedness. They are gossips [spreading rumors],

But do you think this, O man, when you judge and condemn those who practice such things, and yet do the same yourself, that you will escape God’s judgment and elude His verdict?

Or do you have no regard for the wealth of His kindness and tolerance and patience [in withholding His wrath]? Are you [actually] unaware or ignorant [of the fact] that God’s kindness leads you to repentance [that is, to change your inner self, your old way of thinking—seek His purpose for your life]?

But because of your callous stubbornness and unrepentant heart you are [deliberately] storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed.

Who will render to every man according to his deeds:

to those who by persistence in doing good seek [unseen but certain heavenly] glory, honor, and immortality, [He will give the gift of] eternal life.

But for those who are selfishly ambitious and self-seeking and disobedient to the truth but responsive to wickedness, [there will be] wrath and indignation.

There will be tribulation and anguish [torturing confinement] for every human soul who does [or permits] evil, to the Jew first and also to the Greek,

whereas glory, honour and peace will be given to every one who does what is good and right--to the Jew first and then to the Gentile.

For all who have sinned without the Law will also perish without [regard to] the Law, and all who have sinned under the Law will be judged and condemned by the Law.

For it is not those who merely hear the Law [as it is read aloud] who are just or righteous before God, but it is those who [actually] obey the Law who will be justified [pronounced free of the guilt of sin and declared acceptable to Him].

They show that the essential requirements of the Law are written in their hearts; and their conscience [their sense of right and wrong, their moral choices] bearing witness and their thoughts alternately accusing or perhaps defending them

on that day when, as my gospel proclaims, God will judge the secrets [all the hidden thoughts and concealed sins] of men through Christ Jesus.

But, perhaps, you bear the name of 'Jew,' and are relying upon Law, and boast of belonging to God, and understand his will,

And knowest his will, and approvest the things that are more excellent, being instructed out of the law;

train the foolish, teach the young, since you have knowledge and truth formulated in the Law??21 why, then, will you teach others and refuse to teach yourself? Will you preach against stealing, and yet steal yourself?

Will you warn men against adultery, and yet practice it yourself? Will you pretend to detest idols, and yet rob their temples?

Will you boast of the Law and yet dishonor God by breaking it?

Circumcision will help you only if you observe the Law; but if you are a lawbreaker, you might as well be uncircumcised.

So if the uncircumcised man keeps the requirements of the Law, will not his uncircumcision be regarded [by God] as circumcision?

Then he who is physically uncircumcised but keeps [the spirit of] the Law will judge you who, even though you have the written code and circumcision, break the Law.

No, a person is a Jew inwardly, and circumcision is a matter of the heart, brought about by the Spirit, not by a written law. That person's praise will come from God, not from people.

{What is the result} if some refused to believe? Their unbelief will not nullify the faithfulness of God, [will it]?

Absolutely not! Let God be proven true, and every human being shown up as a liar, just as it is written: "so that you will be justified in your words and will prevail when you are judged."

But if our unrighteousness commends the righteousness of God, what will we say? Is God unrighteous who inflicts wrath? I speak like men do.

May it never be! For otherwise, how will God judge the world?

Let us not do evil so that good may come (a statement which we are falsely said by some to have made), because such behaviour will have its right punishment.

For no person will be justified [freed of guilt and declared righteous] in His sight by [trying to do] the works of the Law. For through the Law we become conscious of sin [and the recognition of sin directs us toward repentance, but provides no remedy for sin].

Is God the God of the Jews only, and not also of the Gentiles? Surely of the Gentiles also: Seeing it is one God who will justify the circumcision by faith,

since indeed it is one [and the same] God who will justify the circumcised by faith [which began with Abraham] and the uncircumcised through [their newly acquired] faith.

What then will we say that Abraham, our forefather, has found according to the flesh?

Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin.

For the outcome of the law is wrath; but where there is no law it will not be broken.

For this reason it is by faith, in order that it may be in accordance with grace, so that the promise will be guaranteed to all the descendants, not only to those who are of the Law, but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all,

who against hope believed in hope, so that he became the father of many nations, according to what was said, "so will your descendants be."

but for our sake also—to whom righteousness will be credited, as those who believe in Him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead—

who has been delivered for our offences and has been raised for our justification, it will be reckoned.

through whom also we have had admission into this grace in which we stand, and rejoice in the hope of the glory which God will confer.

and hope will not disappoint us; because the love of God hath been shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which hath been given to us.

For scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die.

Therefore, by much more, [because we] have been declared righteous now by his blood, we will be saved through him from the wrath.

For if, [while we] were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, by much more, having been reconciled, we will be saved by his life.

For if by the trespass of the one (Adam), death reigned through the one (Adam), much more surely will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in [eternal] life through the One, Jesus Christ.

For as indeed by the disobedience of the one man the many have been constituted sinners, so also by the obedience of the one the many will be constituted righteous.

so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace will reign through righteousness, resulting in eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

What shall we say, then? Should we continue sinning so that more of God's unearned favor will [have to] be shown?

May it not happen! How will we who died to sin, still live in it?

For if we have become identified with [him] in the likeness of his death, certainly also we will be [identified with him in the likeness] of [his] resurrection,

Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him,

because we know [the self-evident truth] that Christ, having been raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has power over Him.

For sin will not be master over you, because you are not under law, but under grace.

Do you not know that when you continually offer yourselves to someone to do his will, you are the slaves of the one whom you obey, either [slaves] of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness (right standing with God)?

And having been set free from sin, you have become the slaves of righteousness [of conformity to God’s will and purpose].

I will speak grossly because of the infirmity of your flesh. As ye have given your members servants to uncleanness and to iniquity, from iniquity unto iniquity: even so now give your members servants unto righteousness, that ye may be sanctified.

Accordingly, she will be designated as an adulteress if she unites herself to another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from the law [regarding marriage], so that she is not an adulteress if she marries another man.

What will we say then? The law is sin? May it not happen! Yet I did not know sin except through law. For likewise I would not have known lust, if the law did not say, Thou shall not covet.

For that which I do, I do not own: for not what I will, this I do; but what I hate, this I practise.

But if what I do not will, this I practise, I consent to the law that it is right.

For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.

For I do not practise the good that I will; but the evil I do not will, that I do.

But if what I do not will, this I practise, it is no longer I that do it, but the sin that dwells in me.

I find then the law upon me who will to practise what is right, that with me evil is there.

but I find a different law in my bodily faculties, waging war with the law of my will, and taking me prisoner to that law of sin which is in my bodily faculties.

Wretched and miserable man that I am! Who will [rescue me and] set me free from this body of death [this corrupt, mortal existence]?

Thanks be to God [for my deliverance] through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, on the one hand I myself with my mind serve the law of God, but on the other, with my flesh [my human nature, my worldliness, my sinful capacity—I serve] the law of sin.

For this cause those who are in Christ Jesus will not be judged as sinners.

For the one whose mind is [controlled] by the flesh will suffer [spiritual] death; but the one whose mind is [controlled] by the Holy Spirit will enjoy [never ending] life and peace.

And if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead lives in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit, who lives in you.

for if you are living according to the [impulses of the] flesh, you are going to die. But if [you are living] by the [power of the Holy] Spirit you are habitually putting to death the sinful deeds of the body, you will [really] live forever.

And if we are children, we have a right to a part in the heritage; a part in the things of God, together with Christ; so that if we have a part in his pain, we will in the same way have a part in his glory.

For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which will be revealed toward us.

For the creation was subjected to vanity, not of its own will, but by reason of him who subjected it, in hope

that the creation itself will also be freed from its bondage to decay [and gain entrance] into the glorious freedom of the children of God.

And not only this, but we too, who have the first fruits of the Spirit [a joyful indication of the blessings to come], even we groan inwardly, as we wait eagerly for [the sign of] our adoption as sons—the redemption and transformation of our body [at the resurrection].

But if we have hope for that which we see not, then we will be able to go on waiting for it.

And he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God.

What then will we say to these things? If God is for us, who is against us?

He who did not spare [even] His own Son, but gave Him up for us all, how will He not also, along with Him, graciously give us all things?

Who will bring any charge against God’s elect (His chosen ones)? It is God who justifies us [declaring us blameless and putting us in a right relationship with Himself].

Who is the one who condemns us? Christ Jesus is the One who died [to pay our penalty], and more than that, who was raised [from the dead], and who is at the right hand of God interceding [with the Father] for us.

Who will separate us from the love of Christ? [Will] affliction or distress or persecution or hunger or lack of sufficient clothing or danger or the sword?

nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the [unlimited] love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

and they are not all the children of Abraham because they are his descendants [by blood], but [the promise was]: “Your descendants will be named through Isaac” [though Abraham had other sons].

For this is the word of promise, At this time will I come, and Sara shall have a son.

and even then, though they were not then born and had not done anything either good or evil, yet in order that God's electing purpose might not be frustrated, based, as it was, not on their actions but on the will of Him who called them, she was told,

not by works but by the one who calls--it was said to her, "The older will serve the younger,"

What will we say then? Is there injustice from God? May it not happen!

For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.

So then God’s choice is not dependent on human will, nor on human effort [the totality of human striving], but on God who shows mercy [to whomever He chooses—it is His sovereign gift].

Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth.

Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will?

On the contrary, who are you, O man, who answers [arrogantly] back to God and dares to defy Him? Will the thing which is formed say to him who formed it, “Why have you made me like this?”

As he saith also in Osee, I will call them my people, which were not my people; and her beloved, which was not beloved.

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

And Isaiah calls out concerning Israel: “Though the number of the sons of Israel be like the sand of the sea, it is only the remnant [a small believing minority] that will be saved [from God’s judgment];

For he will finish the work, and cut it short in righteousness: because a short work will the Lord make upon the earth.

What will we say then? That the Gentiles who did not pursue righteousness, attained righteousness, even the righteousness from faith.