'God' in the Bible

For if he was held to be righteous on the ground of his actions, he has something to boast of; but not in the presence of God.

For what says the Scripture? "And Abraham believed God, and this was placed to his credit as righteousness."

In this way David also tells of the blessedness of the man to whose credit God places righteousness, apart from his actions.

All depends on faith, and for this reason--that acceptance with God might be an act of pure grace,

so that the promise should be made sure to all Abraham's true descendants; not merely to those who are righteous through the Law, but to those who are righteous through a faith like that of Abraham. Thus in the sight of God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and makes reference to things that do not exist, as though they did, Abraham is the forefather of all of us. As it is written, "I have appointed you to be the forefather of many nations."

Nor did he in unbelief stagger at God's promise, but became mighty in faith, giving glory to God,

Standing then acquitted as the result of faith, let us enjoy peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,

through whom also, as the result of faith, we have obtained an introduction into that state of favour with God in which we stand, and we exult in hope of some day sharing in God's glory.

But God gives proof of His love to us in Christ's dying for us while we were still sinners.

For if while we were hostile to God we were reconciled to Him through the death of His Son, it is still more certain that now that we are reconciled, we shall obtain salvation through Christ's life.

And not only so, but we also exult in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now obtained that reconciliation.

Death has no longer any power over Him. For by the death which He died He became, once for all, dead in relation to sin; but by the life which He now lives He is alive in relation to God.

In the same way you also must regard yourselves as dead in relation to sin, but as alive in relation to God, because you are in Christ Jesus.

and no longer lend your faculties as unrighteous weapons for Sin to use. On the contrary surrender your very selves to God as living men who have risen from the dead, and surrender your several faculties to God, to be used as weapons to maintain the right.

But thanks be to God that though you were once in thraldom to Sin, you have now yielded a hearty obedience to that system of truth in which you have been instructed.

But now that you have been set free from the tyranny of Sin, and have become the bondservants of God, you have your reward in being made holy, and you have the Life of the Ages as the final result.

So, my brethren, to you also the Law died through the incarnation of Christ, that you might be wedded to Another, namely to Him who rose from the dead in order that we might yield fruit to God.

For in my inmost self all my sympathy is with the Law of God;

Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!)

For what was impossible to the Law--powerless as it was because it acted through frail humanity--God effected. Sending His own Son in a body like that of sinful human nature and as a sacrifice for sin, He pronounced sentence upon sin in human nature;

Abandonment to earthly things is a state of enmity to God. Such a mind does not submit to God's Law, and indeed cannot do so.

And those whose hearts are absorbed in earthly things cannot please God.

You, however, are not devoted to earthly, but to spiritual things, if the Spirit of God is really dwelling in you; whereas if any man has not the Spirit of Christ, such a one does not belong to Him.

The Spirit Himself bears witness, along with our own spirits, to the fact that we are children of God;

and if children, then heirs too--heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ; if indeed we are sharers in Christ's sufferings, in order that we may also be sharers in His glory.

For all creation, gazing eagerly as if with outstretched neck, is waiting and longing to see the manifestation of the sons of God.

Yet there was always the hope that at last the Creation itself would also be set free from the thraldom of decay so as to enjoy the liberty that will attend the glory of the children of God.

Now we know that for those who love God all things are working together for good--for those, I mean, whom with deliberate purpose He has called.

What then shall we say to this? If God is on our side, who is there to appear against us?

Who shall impeach those whom God has chosen? God declares them free from guilt.

Who is there to condemn them? Christ Jesus died, or rather has risen to life again. He is also at the right hand of God, and is interceding for us.

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

To them the Patriarchs belong, and from them in respect of His human lineage came the Christ, who is exalted above all, God blessed throughout the Ages. Amen.

What then are we to infer? That there is injustice in God?

And from this we learn that everything is dependent not on man's will or endeavour, but upon God who has mercy. For the Scripture said to Pharaoh,

"Why then does God still find fault?" you will ask; "for who is resisting His will?"

Nay, but who are you, a mere man, that you should cavil against GOD? Shall the thing moulded say to him who moulded it, "Why have you made me thus?"

And what if God, while choosing to make manifest the terrors of His anger and to show what is possible with Him, has yet borne with long-forbearing patience with the subjects of His anger who stand ready for destruction,

And in the place where it was said to them, 'No people of Mine are you,' there shall they be called sons of the everliving God."

Even as Isaiah says in an earlier place, "Were it not that the Lord, the God of Hosts, had left us some few descendants, we should have become like Sodom, and have come to resemble Gomorrah."

Brethren, the longing of my heart, and my prayer to God, on behalf of my countrymen is for their salvation.

For I bear witness that they possess an enthusiasm for God, but it is an unenlightened enthusiasm.

Ignorant of the righteousness which God provides and building their hopes upon a righteousness of their own, they have refused submission to God's righteousness.

that if with your mouth you confess Jesus as Lord and in your heart believe that God brought Him back to life, you shall be saved.

I ask then, Has God cast off His People? No, indeed. Why, I myself am an Israelite, of the posterity of Abraham and of the tribe of Benjamin.

God has not cast off His People whom He knew beforehand. Or are you ignorant of what Scripture says in speaking of Elijah--how he pleaded with God against Israel, saying,

But what did God say to him in reply? "I have reserved for Myself 7,000 men who have never bent the knee to Baal."

In the same way also at the present time there has come to be a remnant whom God in His grace has selected.

And so Scripture says, "God has given them a spirit of drowsiness--eyes to see nothing with and ears to hear nothing with--even until now."

Do not be puffed up with pride. Tremble rather--for if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will He spare you.

Moreover, if they turn from their unbelief, they too will be grafted in. For God is powerful enough to graft them in again;

For God does not repent of His free gifts nor of His call;

For God has locked up all in the prison of unbelief, that upon all alike He may have mercy.

"Who has first given God anything, so as to receive payment in return?"

I plead with you therefore, brethren, by the compassionsof God, to present all your faculties to Him as a living and holy sacrifice acceptable to Him. This with you will be an act of reasonable worship.

For through the authority graciously given to me I warn every individual among you not to value himself unduly, but to cultivate sobriety of judgement in accordance with the amount of faith which God has allotted to each one.

Why, this is really the reason you pay taxes; for tax-gatherers are ministers of God, devoting their energies to this very work.

Let not him who eats certain food look down upon him who abstains from it, nor him who abstains from it find fault with him who eats it; for God has received both of them.

He who regards the day as sacred, so regards it for the Master's sake; and he who eats certain food eats it for the Master's sake, for he gives thanks to God; and he who refrains from eating it refrains for the Master's sake, and he also gives thanks to God.

But you, why do you find fault with your brother? Or you, why do you look down upon your brother? We shall all stand before God to be judged;

for it is written, "'As I live,' says the Lord, 'to Me every knee shall bow, and every tongue shall make confession to God.'"

So we see that every one of us will give account of himself to God.

For the Kingdom of God does not consist of eating and drinking, but of right conduct, peace and joy, through the Holy Spirit;

and whoever in this way devotedly serves Christ, God takes pleasure in him, and men highly commend him.

As for you and your faith, keep your faith to yourself in the presence of God. The man is to be congratulated who does not pronounce judgement on himself in what his actions sanction.

And may God, the giver of power of endurance and of that encouragement, grant you to be in full sympathy with one another in accordance with the example of Christ Jesus,

so that with oneness both of heart and voice you may glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Habitually therefore give one another a friendly reception, just as Christ also has received you, and thus promote the glory of God.

and that the Gentiles also have glorified God in acknowledgment of His mercy. So it is written, "For this reason I will praise Thee among the Gentiles, and sing psalms in honour of Thy name."

May God, the giver of hope, fill you with continual joy and peace because you trust in Him--so that you may have abundant hope through the power of the Holy Spirit.

But I write to you the more boldly--partly as reminding you of what you already know--because of the authority graciously entrusted to me by God,

I can therefore glory in Christ Jesus concerning the work for God in which I am engaged.

But I entreat you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ and by the love which His Spirit inspires, to help me by wrestling in prayer to God on my behalf,

in order that if God be willing I may come to you with a glad heart, and may enjoy a time of rest with you.

May God, who gives peace be with you all! Amen.

And before long, God the giver of peace will crush Satan under your feet. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you!

but has now been brought fully to light, and by the command of the God of the Ages has been made known by the writings of the Prophets among all the Gentiles to win them to obedience to the faith--

to God, the only wise, through Jesus Christ, even to Him be the glory through all the Ages! Amen.

Paul, called to be an Apostle of Christ Jesus through the will of God--and our brother Sosthenes:

To the Church of God in Corinth, men and women consecrated in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, with all in every place who call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ-- their Lord as well as ours.

May grace and peace be granted to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

I thank my God continually on your behalf for the grace of God bestowed on you in Christ Jesus--

so that there is no gift of God in which you consciously come short while patiently waiting for the reappearing of our Lord Jesus Christ,

God is ever true to His promises, and it was by Him that you were, one and all, called into fellowship with his Son Jesus Christ, our Lord.

I thank God that I did not baptize any of you except Crispus and Gaius--

For the Message of the Cross is foolishness to those who are on the way to perdition, but it is the power of God to those whom He is saving.

Where is your wise man? Where your expounder of the Law? Where your investigator of the questions of this present age? Has not God shown the world's wisdom to be utter foolishness?

For after the world by its wisdom--as God in His wisdom had ordained--had failed to gain the knowledge of God, God was pleased, by the apparent foolishness of the Message which we preach, to save those who accepted it.

but to those who have received the Call, whether Jews or Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.

Because that which the world deems foolish in God is wiser than men's wisdom, and that which it deems feeble in God is mightier than men's might.

But God has chosen the things which the world regards as foolish, in order to put its wise men to shame; and God has chosen the things which the world regards as destitute of influence, in order to put its powerful things to shame;

and the things which the world regards as base, and those which it sets utterly at nought--things that have no existence--God has chosen in order to reduce to nothing things that do exist;

to prevent any mortal man from boasting in the presence of God.

But you--and it is all God's doing--are in Christ Jesus: He has become for us a wisdom which is from God, consisting of righteousness and sanctification and deliverance;

And as for myself, brethren, when I came to you, it was not with surpassing power of eloquence or earthly wisdom that I came, announcing to you that which God had commanded me to bear witness to.

so that your trust might rest not on the wisdom of man but on the power of God.

But in dealing with truths hitherto kept secret we speak of God's wisdom--that hidden wisdom which, before the world began, God pre-destined, so that it should result in glory to us;

But--to use the words of Scripture--we speak of things which eye has not seen nor ear heard, and which have never entered the heart of man: all that God has in readiness for them that love Him.

For us, however, God has drawn aside the veil through the teaching of the Spirit; for the Spirit searches everything, including the depths of the divine nature.

But we have not received the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which comes forth from God, that we may know the blessings that have been so freely given to us by God.