The Letter of Paul to the Romans, chapters 7 - 11
7 You cannot be unaware, my friends — I am speaking to those who have
some knowledge of law — that a person is subject to the law so long as he is
alive, and no longer. For example, a married woman is by law bound to her
husband while he lives; but if her husband dies, she is discharged from the
obligations of the marriage-law. If, therefore, in her husband's lifetime
she consorts with another man, she will incur the charge of adultery; but
if her husband dies she is free of the law, and she does not commit adultery
by consorting with another man. So you, my friends, have died to the law
by becoming identified with the body of Christ, and accordingly you have
found another husband in him who rose from the dead, so that we may
bear fruit from God. While we lived on the level of our lower nature, the sin-
ful passions evoked by the law worked in our bodies, to bear fruit for death.
But now, having died to that which held us bound, we are discharged from
the law, to serve God in a new way, the way of the spirit, in contrast to the
old way, the way of a written code.
What follows? Is the law identical with sin? Of course not. But except
through law I should never have become acquainted with sin. For example,
I should never have known what it was to covet, if the law had not said,
'Thou shalt not covet.' Through that commandment sin found its oppor-
tunity, and produced in me all kinds of wrong desires. In the absence of
law, sin is a dead thing. There was a time when, in the absence of law , I
was fully alive; but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life and
I died. The commandment which should have led to life proved in my
experience to lead to death, because sin found its opportunity in the com-
mandment, seduced me, and through the commandment killed me.
Therefore the law is in itself holy, and the commandment is holy and
just and good. are we to say then that this good thing was the death of me?
By no means. It was sin that killed me, and thereby sin exposed its true
character: it used a good thing to bring about my death, and so, through the
commandment, sin became more sinful than ever.
We know that the law is spiritual; but I am not: I am unspiritual, the
purchased slave of sin. I do not even acknowledge my own actions as mine,
for what I do is not what I want to do, but what I detest. But if what I do
is against my will, it means that I agree with the law and hold it to be
admirable. But as things are, it is no longer I who perform the action, but
sin that lodges in me. For I know that nothing good lodges in me — in my
unspiritual nature, I mean — for though the will to do good is there, the
deed is not. The good which I want to do, I fail to do; but what I do is the
wrong which is against my will; and if what I do is against my will, clearly
it is no longer I who am the agent, but sin that has its lodging in me.
I discover this principle, then: that when I want to do the right, only
the wrong is within my reach. In my inmost self I delight in the law of God,
but I perceive that there is in my bodily members a different law, fighting
against the law that my reason approves and making me a prisoner under
the law that is in my members, the law of sin. Miserable creature that I
am, who is there to rescue me out of this body doomed to death? God
alone, through Jesus Christ our Lord! Thanks be to God! In a word then,
I myself, subject to God's law as a rational being, am yet, in my un-
spiritual nature, a slave to the law of sin.
8 The conclusion of the matter is this: there is no condemnation for those
who are united with Christ Jesus, because in Christ Jesus the life-giving
law of the Spirit has set you free from the law of sin and death. What the
law could never do, because our lower nature robbed it of all potency, God
has done: by sending his own Son in a form like that of our own sinful
nature, and as a sacrifice for sin, he has passed judgement against sin
within that very nature, so that the commandment of the law may find
fulfilment in us, whose conduct, no longer under the control of our lower
nature, is directed by the Spirit.
Those who live on the level of our lower nature have their outlook
formed by it, and that spells death; but those who live on the level of the
spirit have the spiritual outlook, and that is life and peace. For the outlook
of the lower nature is enmity with God; it is not subject to the law of God;
indeed t cannot be: those who live on such a level cannot possibly please
God.
But that is not how you live. You are on the spiritual level, if only God's
Spirit dwells within you; and if a man does not possess the Spirit of Christ,
he is no Christian. But if Christ is dwelling within you, then although the
body is a dead thing because you sinned, yet the spirit is life itself because
you have been justified. Moreover, if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus
from the dead dwells within you, then the God who raised Christ Jesus
from the dead will also give new life to your mortal bodies through his
indwelling Spirit.
It follows, my friends, that our lower nature has no claim upon us;
we are not obliged to live on that level. If you do so, you must die. But
if by the Spirit you put to death all the base pursuits of the body, then
you will live.
For all who are moved by the Spirit of God are sons of God. The Spirit
you have received is not a spirit of slavery leading you back into a life of
fear, but a Spirit that makes us sons, enabling us to cry 'Abba! Father!'
In that cry the Spirit of God joins with our spirit in testifying that we are
God's children; and if children, then heirs. We are God's hears and Christ's
fellow-heirs, if we share his sufferings now in order to share in the splendour
hereafter.
For I reckon that the sufferings we now endure bear no comparison with
the splendour, as yet unrevealed, which is in store for us. For the created
universe waits with eager expectation for God's sons to be revealed. It was
made the victim of frustration, not by its own choice, but because of him
who made it so; yet always there was hope, because the universe itself
is to be freed from the shackles of mortality and enter upon the liberty and
splendour of the children of God. Up to the present, we know, the whole
created universe groans in all its pats as if in the pangs of childbirth. Not
only so, but even we, to whom the Spirit is given as firstfruits of the harvest
to come, are groaning inwardly while we wait for God to make us his sons
and set our whole body free. For we have been saved, though only in
hope. Now to see is no longer to hope: why should man endure and
wait for what he already sees? But if we hope for something we do not yet
see, then, in waiting for it, we show our endurance.
In the same way the Spirit comes to the aid of our weakness. We do not
even know how we ought to pray, but through our inarticulate groans the
Spirit himself is pleading for us, and God who searches our inmost being
know what the Spirit means, because he pleads for God's people in God's
own way; and in everything, as we know, he co-operates for good with those
who love God and are called according to his purpose. For God knew his
own before ever they were, and also ordained that they should be shaped
to the likeness of the Son, that he might be eldest among a large family
of brothers; and it is these, so fore-ordained, whom he has also called. And
those whom he called he has justified, and to those whom he justified he
he has also given his splendour.
With all this in mind, what are we to say? If God is on our side, who is
against us? He did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all; and
with this gift how can he fail to lavish upon us all he has to give? Who will
be the accuser of God's chosen ones? It is God who pronounces acquittal;
then who can condemn? It is Christ — Christ who died, and, more than that,
was raised from the dead — who is at God's right hand, and indeed pleads
our cause. Then what can separate us from the love of Christ? Can
affliction or hardship? Can persecution, hunger, nakedness, peril, or the
sword? 'We are being done to death for thy sake all day long,' as Scripture
says; 'we have been treated like sheep for slaughter' — and yet, in spite of
all, overwhelming victory is our through him who loved us. For I am
convinced that there is nothing in death or life, in the realm of spirits or
superhuman powers, in the world as it is or the world as it shall be, in the
forces of the universe, in heights or depths — nothing in all creation that can
separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
9 I AM SPEAKING the truth as a Christian, and my own conscience,
enlightened by the Holy Spirit, assures me it is no lie: in my heart there
is great grief and unceasing sorrow. For I could even pray to be outcast
from Christ myself for the sake of my brothers, my natural kinsfolk. They
are Israelites: they were made God's sons; theirs is the splendour of the
divine presence, theirs the covenants, the law, the temple worship, and the
promises. Theirs are the patriarchs, and from them, in natural decent,
sprang the Messiah. May God, supreme above all, be blessed for ever!
Amen.
It is impossible that the word of God should have proved false. For not
all descendants of Israel are truly Israel, nor because they are Abraham's
offspring, are they all his true children; but, in the words of Scripture,
'Through the line of Isaac your descendants shall be traced. That is to
say, it is not those born in the course of nature who are children of God;
it is the children born through God's promise who are reckoned as Abra-
ham's descendants. For the promise runs: 'At the time fixed I will come,
and Sarah shall have a son.'
But that is not all, for Rebekah's children had one and the same father,
our ancestor Isaac; and yet, in order that God's selective purpose might
stand, based not upon men's deeds but upon the call of God, she was told,
even before they were born, when they had as yet done nothing, good or
ill, 'The elder shall be servant to the younger'; and that accords with the
text of Scripture, 'Jacob I loved and Esau I hated.'
What shall we say to that? Is God to be charged with injustice? By no
means. For he says to Moses, 'Where I show mercy, I will show mercy,
and where I pity, I will pity.' Thus it does not depend on man's will or
effort, but on God's mercy. For Scripture says to Pharaoh, 'I have raised
you up for this very purpose, to exhibit my power in my dealings with you,
and to spread my fame over all the world.' Thus he not only shows mercy
as he chooses, but also makes men stubborn as he chooses.
You will say, 'Then why does God blame a man? For who can resist his
will?' Who are you, sir, to answer God back? Can the pot speak to the
potter and say, 'Why did you make me like this?'? Surely the potter can
do what he likes with the clay. Is he not free to make out of the same lump
two vessels, one to be treasured, the other for common use?
But what if God, desiring to exhibit his retribution at work and to make
his power known, tolerated very patiently those vessels which were objects
of retribution due for destruction, and did so in order to make known the
full wealth of his splendour upon vessels which were objects of mercy, and
which from the first had been prepared for this splendour?
Such vessels are we, whom he has called from among Gentiles as well
as Jews, as it says in the Book of Hosea: 'Those who were not my people
I will call My People, and the unloved nation I will call My Beloved. For
in the very place where they were told 'you are no people of mine", they
shall be called Sons of the living God.' But Isaiah makes this proclamation
about Israel: 'Though the Israelites be countless as the sands of the sea,
only a remnant shall be saved; for the Lord's sentence on the land will be
summary and final'; as also he said previously, 'If the Lord of Hosts had
not left us the mere germ of a nation, we should have become like Sodom,
and no better than Gomorrah.'
Then what are we to say? That Gentiles, who made no effort after
righteousness, nevertheless achieved it, a righteousness based on faith;
whereas Israel made great efforts after a law of righteousness, but never
attained to it. Why was this? Because their efforts were not based on faith;
but (as they supposed) on deeds. They fell over the 'stone' mentioned in
Scripture: 'Here I lay in Zion a stone to trip over, a rock to stumble against;
but he who has faith in him will not be put to shame.'
10 BROTHERS, MY DEEPEST DESIRE and my prayer to God is for their
salvation. To their zeal for God I can testify; but it is an ill-informed zeal.
For they ignore God's way of righteousness, and try to set up their own, and
therefore they have not submitted themselves to God's righteousness. For
Christ ends the law and brings righteousness for everyone who has faith.
Of legal righteousness Moses writes, 'The man who does this shall gain
life by it.' But the righteousness that comes by faith says, 'Do not say to
yourself, "Who can go up to heaven?" ' (that is to bring Christ down),
'or, "Who can go down to the abyss?" ' (to bring Christ up from the dead).
But what does it say? 'The word is near you; it is upon your lips and in your
heart.' This means the word of faith which we proclaim. If on your lips is
the confession, 'Jesus is Lord', and in your heart the faith that God raised
him from the dead, then you will find salvation. For the faith that leads to
righteousness is in the heart, and the confession that leads to salvation is
upon the lips.
Scripture says, 'Everyone who has faith in him will be saved from shame'
— everyone: there is no distinction between Jew and Greek, because the
same Lord is Lord of all, and is rich enough for the need of all who invoke
him. For everyone, as it says again — 'everyone who invokes the name of the
Lord will be saved'. How could they invoke one in whom they had no faith?
And how could they have faith in one they had never heard of? And how
hear without someone to spread the news? And how could anyone spread
the news without a commission to do so? And that is what Scripture
affirms: 'How welcome are the feet of the messengers of good news!'
But not all have responded to the good news. For Isaiah says, 'Lord,
who has believed our message?' We conclude that faith is awakened by the
message, and the message that awakens it comes through the word of
Christ.
But, I ask, can it be that they never heard of it? Of course they did: 'Their
voice has surrounded all over the earth, and their words to the bounds of the
inhabited world.' But, I ask again, can it be that Israel failed to recognize
the message? In reply, I first cite Moses, who says, 'I will use a nation that
is no nation to stir your envy, and a foolish nation to rouse your angers.'
But Isaiah is still more daring: 'I was found', he says, 'by those who were
not looking for me; I was clearly shown to those who never asked about me';
while to Israel he says, 'All day long I have stretched out my hands to an
unruly and defiant people.'
11 I ASK THEN, has God rejected he people? I cannot believe it! I am an
Israelite myself, of the stock of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. No!
God has not rejected the people which he acknowledged of old as his own.
You know (do you not?) what Scripture says is the story of Elijah — how
Elijah pleads with God against Israel: 'Lord, they have killed thy prophets,
they have torn down thine altars, and I alone am left, and they are seeking
my life.' But what does the divine voice say to him? 'I have left myself
seven thousand men who have not knelt to Baal.' In just the same way at
the present time a 'remnant' has come into being, selected by the grace of
God. But if it is by grace, then it does not rest on deeds alone, or grace
would cease to be grace.
What follows? What Israel sought, Israel has not achieved, but the
selected few have achieved it. The rest were made blind to the truth,
exactly as it stands written: 'God brought upon them a numbness of
spirit; he gave them blind eyes and deaf ears, and so it is still.' Similarly
David says:
'May their table be a snare and a trap,
both stumbling-block and retribution!
May their eyes become so dim that they lose their sight!
Bow down their backs unceasingly!'
I now ask, did their failure mean complete downfall? Far from it!
Because they offended, salvation has come to the Gentiles, to stir Israel
to emulation. But if their offence means the enrichment of the world, and
if their falling-off means the enrichment of the Gentiles, how much more
their coming to full strength!
But I have something to say to you Gentiles. I am a missionary to the
Gentiles, and as such I give all honour to that ministry when I try to stir
emulation in the men of my own race, and so to save some of them. For if
their rejection has meant the reconciliation of the world, what will their
acceptance mean? Nothing less than life from the dead! If the first portion
of dough is consecrated, so is the whole lump. If the root is consecrated, so
are the branches. But if some of branches have been lopped off, and
you, a wild olive, have been grafted in among them, and have come to
share the same root and sap as the olive, do not make yourself superior to
the branches. If you do so, remember that it is not you who sustain the
root: the root sustains you.
You will say, 'Branches were lopped off so that I might be grafted in.'
Very well: they were lopped off for lack of faith, and by faith you hold your
place. Put away your pride, ad be on your guard; for if God did not spare
the native branches, no more will he spare you. Observe the kindness and
the severity of God — severity to those who fell away, divine kindness to
you, if only you remain within its scope; otherwise you too will be cut off,
whereas thy, if they do not continue faithless, will be grafted in; for it is
in God's power to graft them in again. For if you were cut from your native
wild olive and against all nature grafted into the cultivated olive, how much
more readily will they, the natural olive-branches, be grafter into their
native stock!
For there is a deep truth here, my brothers, of which I want you to take
account, so that you may not be complacent about your own discernment:
this partial blindness has come upon Israel only until the Gentiles have
been admitted in full strength; when that has happened, the whole of
Israel will be saved, in agreement with the text of Scripture:
'From Zion shall come the Deliverer;
he shall remove wickedness from Jacob.
And this is the covenant I will grant them,
when I take away their sins.'
In the spreading of the Gospel they are treated as God's enemies for your
sake; but God's choice stands, and they are his friends for the sake of the
patriarchs. For the gracious gifts of God and his calling are irrevocable.
Just as formerly you were disobedient to God, but now you have received mercy
in the time of their disobedience, so now, when you receive mercy, they
have proved disobedient, but only in order that they too may receive mercy.
For in making all mankind prisoners to disobedience, God's purpose was
to show mercy to all mankind.
O depth of wealth, wisdom, and knowledge in God! How unsearchable
his judgements, how untraceable his ways! Who knows the mind of the
Lord? Who has been his counsellor? Who has ever made a gift to him, to
receive a gift in return? Source, Guide, and Goal of all that is — to him be
glory for ever! Amen.
The New English Bible (with Apocrypha)
Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press, 1970
Posted Dec 24, 2018, 3:11 PM UTC · edited
30