Romans 3

God’s determined faithfulness

1What advantage, then, does the Jew possess? What, indeed, is the point of circumcision? 2A great deal, in every way. To begin with, the Jews were entrusted with God’s oracles. 3What follows from that? If some of them were unfaithful to their commission, does their unfaithfulness nullify God’s faithfulness? 4Certainly not! Let God be true, and every human being false! As the Bible says,

So that you may be found in the right in what you say, and may win the victory when you come to court.

5But if our being in the wrong proves that God is in the right, what are we going to say? That God is unjust to inflict anger on people? (I’m reducing things to a human scale!) 6Certainly not! How then could God judge the world? 7But if God’s truthfulness grows all the greater and brings him glory in and through my falsehood, why am I still being condemned as a sinner? 8And why not “do evil so that good may come”—as some people blasphemously say about us, and as some allege that we say? People like that, at least, deserve the judgment they get!

Jews as well as Gentiles are guilty of sin

9What then? Are we in fact better off? No, certainly not. I have already laid down this charge, you see: Jews as well as Greeks are all under the power of sin. 10This is what the Bible says:

No one is in the right—nobody at all!

11No one understands, or goes looking for God;

12all of them alike have wandered astray,

together they have all become futile;

none of them behaves kindly, no, not one.

13Their throat is an open grave,

they use their tongues to deceive,

the poison of vipers is under their lips.

14Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness,

15their feet are quick when there’s blood to be shed,

16disaster and wretchedness are in their paths,

17and they did not know the way of peace.

18They have no fear of God before their eyes.

19Now we know that whatever the law says, it is speaking to those who are “in the law.” The purpose of this is that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be brought to the bar of God’s judgment. 20No mere mortal, you see, can be declared to be in the right before God on the basis of the works of the law. What you get through the law is the knowledge of sin.

The unveiling of God’s covenant justice

21But now, quite apart from the law (though the law and the prophets bore witness to it), God’s covenant justice has been displayed. 22God’s covenant justice comes into operation through the faithfulness of Jesus the Messiah, for the benefit of all who have faith. For there is no distinction: 23all sinned, and fell short of God’s glory—24and by God’s grace they are freely declared to be in the right, to be members of the covenant, through the redemption which is found in the Messiah, Jesus.

Jesus’ death reveals God’s covenant justice

25God put Jesus forth as the place of mercy, through faithfulness, by means of his blood. He did this to demonstrate his covenant justice, because of the passing over (in divine forbearance) of sins committed beforehand. 26This was to demonstrate his covenant justice in the present time: that is, that he himself is in the right, and that he declares to be in the right everyone who trusts in the faithfulness of Jesus.

The God of both Jew and Gentile

27So what happens to boasting? It is ruled out! Through what sort of law? The law of works? No: through the law of faith! 28We calculate, you see, that a person is declared to be in the right on the basis of faith, apart from works of the law. 29Or does God belong only to Jews? Doesn’t he belong to the nations as well? Yes, of course, to the nations as well, 30since God is one. He will make the declaration “in the right” over the circumcised on the basis of faith, and over the uncircumcised through faith.

31Do we then abolish the law through faith? Certainly not! Rather, we establish the law.

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Romans 3: NTFE

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a. The New Testament for Everyone, Third Edition. Copyright © 2011, 2018, 2019 by Nicholas Thomas Wright, The Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge. All rights reserved. Published by Zondervan, 2023.

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