Romans 3–6

3So, do Jews have anything that other people do not have? Is there anything special about being circumcised? ²Yes, of course, there is in every way. The most important thing is this: God trusted the Jews with his teachings. ³If some Jews were not faithful to him, will that stop God from doing what he promised? ⁴No! God will continue to be true even when every person is false. As the Scriptures say:

“So you will be shown to be right when you speak,

and you will win your case.”

⁵When we do wrong, that shows more clearly that God is right. So can we say that God is wrong to punish us? (I am talking as people might talk.) ⁶No! If God could not punish us, he could not judge the world.

⁷A person might say, “When I lie, it really gives him glory, because my lie shows God’s truth. So why am I judged a sinner?” ⁸It would be the same to say, “We should do evil so that good will come.” Some people find fault with us and say we teach this, but they are wrong and deserve the punishment they will receive.

All People Are Guilty

⁹So are we Jews better than others? No! We have already said that Jews and those who are not Jews are all guilty of sin. ¹⁰As the Scriptures say:

“There is no one who always does what is right,

not even one.

¹¹There is no one who understands.

There is no one who looks to God for help.

¹²All have turned away.

Together, everyone has become useless.

There is no one who does anything good;

there is not even one.”

¹³“Their throats are like open graves;

they use their tongues for telling lies.”

“Their words are like snake poison.”

¹⁴“Their mouths are full of cursing and hate.”

¹⁵“They are always ready to kill people.

¹⁶Everywhere they go they cause ruin and misery.

¹⁷They don’t know how to live in peace.”

¹⁸“They have no fear of God.”

¹⁹We know that the law’s commands are for those who have the law. This stops all excuses and brings the whole world under God’s judgment, ²⁰because no one can be made right with God by following the law. The law only shows us our sin.

How God Makes People Right

²¹But God has a way to make people right with him without the law, and he has now shown us that way which the law and the prophets told us about. ²²God makes people right with himself through their faith in Jesus Christ. This is true for all who believe in Christ, because all people are the same: ²³Everyone has sinned and fallen short of God’s glorious standard, ²⁴and all need to be made right with God by his grace, which is a free gift. They need to be made free from sin through Jesus Christ. ²⁵God sent him to die in our place to take away our sins. We receive forgiveness through faith in the blood of Jesus’ death. This showed that God always does what is right and fair, as in the past when he was patient and did not punish people for their sins. ²⁶And God gave Jesus to show today that he does what is right. God did this so he could judge rightly and so he could make right any person who has faith in Jesus.

²⁷So do we have a reason to brag about ourselves? No! And why not? It is the way of faith that stops all bragging, not the way of trying to obey the law. ²⁸A person is made right with God through faith, not through obeying the law. ²⁹Is God only the God of the Jews? Is he not also the God of those who are not Jews? ³⁰Of course he is, because there is only one God. He will make Jews right with him by their faith, and he will also make those who are not Jews right with him through their faith. ³¹So do we destroy the law by following the way of faith? No! Faith causes us to be what the law truly wants.

The Example of Abraham

4So what can we say that Abraham, ⁿ the father of our people, learned about faith? ²If Abraham was made right by the things he did, he had a reason to brag. But this is not God’s view, ³because the Scripture says, “Abraham believed God, and God accepted Abraham’s faith, and that faith made him right with God.” ⁿ

⁴When people work, their pay is not given as a gift, but as something earned. ⁵But people cannot do any work that will make them right with God. So they must trust in him, who makes even evil people right in his sight. Then God accepts their faith, and that makes them right with him. ⁶David said the same thing. He said that people are truly blessed when God, without paying attention to their deeds, makes people right with himself.

⁷“Blessed are they

whose sins are forgiven,

whose wrongs are pardoned.

⁸Blessed is the person

whom the Lord does not consider guilty.”

⁹Is this blessing only for those who are circumcised or also for those who are not circumcised? We have already said that God accepted Abraham’s faith and that faith made him right with God. ¹⁰So how did this happen? Did God accept Abraham before or after he was circumcised? It was before his circumcision. ¹¹Abraham was circumcised to show that he was right with God through faith before he was circumcised. So Abraham is the father of all those who believe but are not circumcised; he is the father of all believers who are accepted as being right with God. ¹²And Abraham is also the father of those who have been circumcised and who live following the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised.

God Keeps His Promise

¹³Abraham ⁿ and his descendants received the promise that they would get the whole world. He did not receive that promise through the law, but through being right with God by his faith. ¹⁴If people could receive what God promised by following the law, then faith is worthless. And God’s promise to Abraham is worthless, ¹⁵because the law can only bring God’s anger. But if there is no law, there is nothing to disobey.

¹⁶So people receive God’s promise by having faith. This happens so the promise can be a free gift. Then all of Abraham’s children can have that promise. It is not only for those who live under the law of Moses but for anyone who lives with faith like that of Abraham, who is the father of us all. ¹⁷As it is written in the Scriptures: “I am making you a father of many nations.” ⁿ This is true before God, the God Abraham believed, the God who gives life to the dead and who creates something out of nothing.

¹⁸There was no hope that Abraham would have children. But Abraham believed God and continued hoping, and so he became the father of many nations. As God told him, “Your descendants also will be too many to count.” ^{n 19}Abraham was almost a hundred years old, much past the age for having children, and Sarah could not have children. Abraham thought about all this, but his faith in God did not become weak. ²⁰He never doubted that God would keep his promise, and he never stopped believing. He grew stronger in his faith and gave praise to God. ²¹Abraham felt sure that God was able to do what he had promised. ²²So, “God accepted Abraham’s faith, and that faith made him right with God.” ^{n 23}Those words (“God accepted Abraham’s faith”) were written not only for Abraham ²⁴but also for us. God will accept us also because we believe in the One who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead. ²⁵Jesus was given to die for our sins, and he was raised from the dead to make us right with God.

Right with God

5Since we have been made right with God by our faith, we have ⁿ peace with God. This happened through our Lord Jesus Christ, ²who through our faith ⁿ has brought us into that blessing of God’s grace that we now enjoy. And we are happy because of the hope we have of sharing God’s glory. ³We also have joy with our troubles, because we know that these troubles produce patience. ⁴And patience produces character, and character produces hope. ⁵And this hope will never disappoint us, because God has poured out his love to fill our hearts. He gave us his love through the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to us.

⁶When we were unable to help ourselves, at the right time, Christ died for us, although we were living against God. ⁷Very few people will die to save the life of someone else. Although perhaps for a good person someone might possibly die. ⁸But God shows his great love for us in this way: Christ died for us while we were still sinners.

⁹So through Christ we will surely be saved from God’s anger, because we have been made right with God by the blood of Christ’s death. ¹⁰While we were God’s enemies, he made us his friends through the death of his Son. Surely, now that we are his friends, he will save us through his Son’s life. ¹¹And not only that, but now we are also very happy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we are now God’s friends again.

Adam and Christ Compared

¹²Sin came into the world because of what one man did, and with sin came death. This is why everyone must die—because everyone sinned. ¹³Sin was in the world before the law of Moses, but sin is not counted against us as breaking a command when there is no law. ¹⁴But from the time of Adam to the time of Moses, everyone had to die, even those who had not sinned by breaking a command, as Adam had.

Adam was like the One who was coming in the future. ¹⁵But God’s free gift is not like Adam’s sin. Many people died because of the sin of that one man. But the grace from God was much greater; many people received God’s gift of life by the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ. ¹⁶After Adam sinned once, he was judged guilty. But the gift of God is different. God’s free gift came after many sins, and it makes people right with God. ¹⁷One man sinned, and so death ruled all people because of that one man. But now those people who accept God’s full grace and the great gift of being made right with him will surely have true life and rule through the one man, Jesus Christ.

¹⁸So as one sin of Adam brought the punishment of death to all people, one good act that Christ did makes all people right with God. And that brings true life for all. ¹⁹One man disobeyed God, and many became sinners. In the same way, one man obeyed God, and many will be made right. …