1 After the death of Moshe the servant of Adonai, Adonai said to Y’hoshua the son of Nun, Moshe’s assistant, ² “Moshe my servant is dead. So now, get up and cross over this Yarden, you and all the people, to the land I am giving to them, the people of Isra’el. ³ I am giving you every place you will step on with the sole of your foot, as I said to Moshe. ⁴ All the land from the desert and the L’vanon to the great river, the Euphrates River — all the land of the Hitti — and on to the Great Sea in the west will be your territory. ⁵ No one will be able to withstand you as long as you live. Just as I was with Moshe, so I will be with you. I will neither fail you nor abandon you.

⁶ “Be strong, be bold; for you will cause this people to inherit the land I swore to their fathers I would give them. ⁷ Only be strong and very bold in taking care to follow all the Torah which Moshe my servant ordered you to follow; do not turn from it either to the right or to the left; then you will succeed wherever you go. ⁸ Yes, keep this book of the Torah on your lips, and meditate on it day and night, so that you will take care to act according to everything written in it. Then your undertakings will prosper, and you will succeed. ⁹ Haven’t I ordered you, ‘Be strong, be bold’? So don’t be afraid or downhearted, because Adonai your God is with you wherever you go.”

¹⁰ Y’hoshua instructed the officials of the people ¹¹ to go through the camp and order the people, “Prepare provisions, because in three days you will cross this Yarden to go in and take possession of the land Adonai your God is giving you.”

¹² To the Re’uveni, the Gadi and the half-tribe of M’nasheh Y’hoshua said, ¹³ “Remember what Moshe the servant of Adonai ordered you: ‘Adonai your God has let you rest and will give you this land.’ ¹⁴ Your wives, your little ones and your livestock will stay in the land Moshe gave you on the east side of the Yarden; but you are to cross over armed as a fighting force ahead of your brothers, to help them; ¹⁵ until Adonai allows your brothers to rest, as he has allowed you; and they too have taken possession of the land Adonai your God is giving them. At that point, you will return to the land which is yours and possess it, the land Moshe the servant of Adonai gave you in ‘Ever-HaYarden to the east, toward the sunrise.”

¹⁶ They answered Y’hoshua, “We will do everything you have ordered us to do, and we will go wherever you send us. ¹⁷ Just as we listened to everything Moshe said, so will we listen to you. Only may Adonai your God be with you as he was with Moshe. ¹⁸ If anyone rebels against your order and doesn’t heed what you say in every detail of your order, he will be put to death. Just be strong, be bold!”

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5 Seeing the crowds, Yeshua walked up the hill. After he sat down, his talmidim came to him, ² and he began to speak. This is what he taught them:

¹¹ “How blessed you are when people insult you and persecute you and tell all kinds of vicious lies about you because you follow me! ¹² Rejoice, be glad, because your reward in heaven is great — they persecuted the prophets before you in the same way.

¹³ “You are salt for the Land. But if salt becomes tasteless, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything except being thrown out for people to trample on.

¹⁴ “You are light for the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. ¹⁵ Likewise, when people light a lamp, they don’t cover it with a bowl but put it on a lampstand, so that it shines for everyone in the house. ¹⁶ In the same way, let your light shine before people, so that they may see the good things you do and praise your Father in heaven.

¹⁷ “Don’t think that I have come to abolish the Torah or the Prophets. I have come not to abolish but to complete. ¹⁸ Yes indeed! I tell you that until heaven and earth pass away, not so much as a yud or a stroke will pass from the Torah — not until everything that must happen has happened. ¹⁹ So whoever disobeys the least of these mitzvot and teaches others to do so will be called the least in the Kingdom of Heaven. But whoever obeys them and so teaches will be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven. ²⁰ For I tell you that unless your righteousness is far greater than that of the Torah-teachers and P’rushim, you will certainly not enter the Kingdom of Heaven!

²¹ “You have heard that our fathers were told, ‘Do not murder,’^[b] and that anyone who commits murder will be subject to judgment. ²² But I tell you that anyone who nurses anger against his brother will be subject to judgment; that whoever calls his brother, ‘You good-for-nothing!’ will be brought before the Sanhedrin; that whoever says, ‘Fool!’ incurs the penalty of burning in the fire of Gei-Hinnom! ²³ So if you are offering your gift at the Temple altar and you remember there that your brother has something against you, ²⁴ leave your gift where it is by the altar, and go, make peace with your brother. Then come back and offer your gift. ²⁵ If someone sues you, come to terms with him quickly, while you and he are on the way to court; or he may hand you over to the judge, and the judge to the officer of the court, and you may be thrown in jail! ²⁶ Yes indeed! I tell you, you will certainly not get out until you have paid the last penny.

²⁷ “You have heard that our fathers were told, ‘Do not commit adultery.’^{[c] 28} But I tell you that a man who even looks at a woman with the purpose of lusting after her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. ²⁹ If your right eye makes you sin, gouge it out and throw it away! Better that you should lose one part of you than have your whole body thrown into Gei-Hinnom. ³⁰ And if your right hand makes you sin, cut it off and throw it away! Better that you should lose one part of you than have your whole body thrown into Gei-Hinnom.

³¹ “It was said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife must give her a get.’^{[d] 32} But I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of fornication, makes her an adulteress; and that anyone who marries a divorcee commits adultery.

³³ “Again, you have heard that our fathers were told, ‘Do not break your oath,’ and ‘Keep your vows to Adonai.’^{[e] 34} But I tell you not to swear at all — not ‘by heaven,’ because it is God’s throne; ³⁵ not ‘by the earth,’ because it is his footstool;^[f] and not ‘by Yerushalayim,’ because it is the city of the Great King.^{[g] 36} And don’t swear by your head, because you can’t make a single hair white or black. ³⁷ Just let your ‘Yes’ be a simple ‘Yes,’ and your ‘No’ a simple ‘No’; anything more than this has its origin in evil.

³⁸ “You have heard that our fathers were told, ‘Eye for eye and tooth for tooth.’^{[h] 39} But I tell you not to stand up against someone who does you wrong. On the contrary, if someone hits you on the right cheek, let him hit you on the left cheek too! ⁴⁰ If someone wants to sue you for your shirt, let him have your coat as well! ⁴¹ And if a soldier forces you to carry his pack for one mile, carry it for two! ⁴² When someone asks you for something, give it to him; when someone wants to borrow something from you, lend it to him.

⁴³ “You have heard that our fathers were told, ‘Love your neighbor^[i] — and hate your enemy.’ ⁴⁴ But I tell you, love your enemies! Pray for those who persecute you! ⁴⁵ Then you will become children of your Father in heaven. For he makes his sun shine on good and bad people alike, and he sends rain to the righteous and the unrighteous alike. ⁴⁶ What reward do you get if you love only those who love you? Why, even tax-collectors do that! ⁴⁷ And if you are friendly only to your friends, are you doing anything out of the ordinary? Even the Goyim do that! ⁴⁸ Therefore, be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect.

6 “Be careful not to parade your acts of tzedakah in front of people in order to be seen by them! If you do, you have no reward from your Father in heaven. ² So, when you do tzedakah, don’t announce it with trumpets to win people’s praise, like the hypocrites in the synagogues and on the streets. Yes! I tell you, they have their reward already! ³ But you, when you do tzedakah, don’t even let your left hand know what your right hand is doing. ⁴ Then your tzedakah will be in secret; and your Father, who sees what you do in secret, will reward you.

⁵ “When you pray, don’t be like the hypocrites, who love to pray standing in the synagogues and on street corners, so that people can see them. Yes! I tell you, they have their reward already! ⁶ But you, when you pray, go into your room, close the door, and pray to your Father in secret. Your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.

⁷ “And when you pray, don’t babble on and on like the pagans, who think God will hear them better if they talk a lot. ⁸ Don’t be like them, because your Father knows what you need before you ask him. ⁹ You, therefore, pray like this:

¹⁴ For if you forgive others their offenses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you; ¹⁵ but if you do not forgive others their offenses, your heavenly Father will not forgive yours.

¹⁶ “Now when you fast, don’t go around looking miserable, like the hypocrites. They make sour faces so that people will know they are fasting. Yes! I tell you, they have their reward already! ¹⁷ But you, when you fast, wash your face and groom yourself, ¹⁸ so that no one will know you are fasting — except your Father, who is with you in secret. Your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.

¹⁹ “Do not store up for yourselves wealth here on earth, where moths and rust destroy, and burglars break in and steal. ²⁰ Instead, store up for yourselves wealth in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and burglars do not break in or steal. ²¹ For where your wealth is, there your heart will be also. ²² ‘The eye is the lamp of the body.’ So if you have a ‘good eye’ [that is, if you are generous] your whole body will be full of light; ²³ but if you have an ‘evil eye’ [if you are stingy] your whole body will be full of darkness. If, then, the light in you is darkness, how great is that darkness! ²⁴ No one can be slave to two masters; for he will either hate the first and love the second, or scorn the second and be loyal to the first. You can’t be a slave to both God and money.

²⁵ “Therefore, I tell you, don’t worry about your life — what you will eat or drink; or about your body — what you will wear. Isn’t life more than food and the body more than clothing? ²⁶ Look at the birds flying about! They neither plant nor harvest, nor do they gather food into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Aren’t you worth more than they are? ²⁷ Can any of you by worrying add a single hour to his life?

²⁸ “And why be anxious about clothing? Think about the fields of wild irises, and how they grow. They neither work nor spin thread, ²⁹ yet I tell you that not even Shlomo in all his glory was clothed as beautifully as one of these. ³⁰ If this is how God clothes grass in the field — which is here today and gone tomorrow, thrown in an oven — won’t he much more clothe you? What little trust you have!

³¹ “So don’t be anxious, asking, ‘What will we eat?,’ ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘How will we be clothed?’ ³² For it is the pagans who set their hearts on all these things. Your heavenly Father knows you need them all. ³³ But seek first his Kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. ³⁴ Don’t worry about tomorrow — tomorrow will worry about itself! Today has enough tsuris already!

7 “Don’t judge, so that you won’t be judged. ² For the way you judge others is how you will be judged — the measure with which you measure out will be used to measure to you. ³ Why do you see the splinter in your brother’s eye but not notice the log in your own eye? ⁴ How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the splinter out of your eye,’ when you have the log in your own eye? ⁵ You hypocrite! First, take the log out of your own eye; then you will see clearly, so that you can remove the splinter from your brother’s eye!

⁶ “Don’t give to dogs what is holy, and don’t throw your pearls to the pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, then turn and attack you.

⁷ “Keep asking, and it will be given to you; keep seeking, and you will find; keep knocking, and the door will be opened to you. ⁸ For everyone who keeps asking receives; he who keeps seeking finds; and to him who keeps knocking, the door will be opened. ⁹ Is there anyone here who, if his son asks him for a loaf of bread, will give him a stone? ¹⁰ or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? ¹¹ So if you, even though you are bad, know how to give your children gifts that are good, how much more will your Father in heaven keep giving good things to those who keep asking him!

¹² “Always treat others as you would like them to treat you; that sums up the teaching of the Torah and the Prophets.

¹³ “Go in through the narrow gate; for the gate that leads to destruction is wide and the road broad, and many travel it; ¹⁴ but it is a narrow gate and a hard road that leads to life, and only a few find it.

¹⁵ “Beware of the false prophets! They come to you wearing sheep’s clothing, but underneath they are hungry wolves! ¹⁶ You will recognize them by their fruit. Can people pick grapes from thorn bushes, or figs from thistles? ¹⁷ Likewise, every healthy tree produces good fruit, but a poor tree produces bad fruit. ¹⁸ A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, or a poor tree good fruit. ¹⁹ Any tree that does not produce good fruit is cut down and thrown in the fire! ²⁰ So you will recognize them by their fruit.

²¹ “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord!’ will enter the Kingdom of Heaven, only those who do what my Father in heaven wants. ²² On that Day, many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord! Didn’t we prophesy in your name? Didn’t we expel demons in your name? Didn’t we perform many miracles in your name?’ ²³ Then I will tell them to their faces, ‘I never knew you! Get away from me, you workers of lawlessness!’^[k]

²⁴ “So, everyone who hears these words of mine and acts on them will be like a sensible man who built his house on bedrock. ²⁵ The rain fell, the rivers flooded, the winds blew and beat against that house, but it didn’t collapse, because its foundation was on rock. ²⁶ But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not act on them will be like a stupid man who built his house on sand. ²⁷ The rain fell, the rivers flooded, the wind blew and beat against that house, and it collapsed — and its collapse was horrendous!”

²⁸ When Yeshua had finished saying these things, the crowds were amazed at the way he taught, ²⁹ for he was not instructing them like their Torah-teachers but as one who had authority himself.

²⁸ One of the Torah-teachers came up and heard them engaged in this discussion. Seeing that Yeshua answered them well, he asked him, “Which is the most important mitzvah of them all?” ²⁹ Yeshua answered, “The most important is,

³¹ The second is this:

There is no other mitzvah greater than these.” ³² The Torah-teacher said to him, “Well said, Rabbi; you speak the truth when you say that he is one, and that there is no other besides him; ³³ and that loving him with all one’s heart, understanding and strength, and loving one’s neighbor as oneself, mean more than all the burnt offerings and sacrifices.” ³⁴ When Yeshua saw that he responded sensibly, he said to him, “You are not far from the Kingdom of God.” And after that, no one dared put to him another sh’eilah.

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7 Surely you know, brothers — for I am speaking to those who understand Torah — that the Torah has authority over a person only so long as he lives? ² For example, a married woman is bound by Torah to her husband while he is alive; but if the husband dies, she is released from the part of the Torah that deals with husbands. ³ Therefore, while the husband is alive, she will be called an adulteress if she marries another man; but if the husband dies, she is free from that part of the Torah; so that if she marries another man, she is not an adulteress.

⁴ Thus, my brothers, you have been made dead with regard to the Torah through the Messiah’s body, so that you may belong to someone else, namely, the one who has been raised from the dead, in order for us to bear fruit for God. ⁵ For when we were living according to our old nature, the passions connected with sins worked through the Torah in our various parts, with the result that we bore fruit for death. ⁶ But now we have been released from this aspect of the Torah, because we have died to that which had us in its clutches, so that we are serving in the new way provided by the Spirit and not in the old way of outwardly following the letter of the law.

⁷ Therefore, what are we to say? That the Torah is sinful? Heaven forbid! Rather, the function of the Torah was that without it, I would not have known what sin is. For example, I would not have become conscious of what greed is if the Torah had not said, “Thou shalt not covet.”^{[a] 8} But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, worked in me all kinds of evil desires — for apart from Torah, sin is dead. ⁹ I was once alive outside the framework of Torah. But when the commandment really encountered me, sin sprang to life, ¹⁰ and I died. The commandment that was intended to bring me life was found to be bringing me death! ¹¹ For sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, deceived me; and through the commandment, sin killed me. ¹² So the Torah is holy; that is, the commandment is holy, just and good.

¹³ Then did something good become for me the source of death? Heaven forbid! Rather, it was sin working death in me through something good, so that sin might be clearly exposed as sin, so that sin through the commandment might come to be experienced as sinful beyond measure. ¹⁴ For we know that the Torah is of the Spirit; but as for me, I am bound to the old nature, sold to sin as a slave. ¹⁵ I don’t understand my own behavior — I don’t do what I want to do; instead, I do the very thing I hate! ¹⁶ Now if I am doing what I don’t want to do, I am agreeing that the Torah is good. ¹⁷ But now it is no longer “the real me” doing it, but the sin housed inside me. ¹⁸ For I know that there is nothing good housed inside me — that is, inside my old nature. I can want what is good, but I can’t do it! ¹⁹ For I don’t do the good I want; instead, the evil that I don’t want is what I do! ²⁰ But if I am doing what “the real me” doesn’t want, it is no longer “the real me” doing it but the sin housed inside me. ²¹ So I find it to be the rule, a kind of perverse “torah,” that although I want to do what is good, evil is right there with me! ²² For in my inner self I completely agree with God’s Torah; ²³ but in my various parts, I see a different “torah,” one that battles with the Torah in my mind and makes me a prisoner of sin’s “torah,” which is operating in my various parts. ²⁴ What a miserable creature I am! Who will rescue me from this body bound for death? ²⁵ Thanks be to God [, he will]! — through Yeshua the Messiah, our Lord!

To sum up: with my mind, I am a slave of God’s Torah; but with my old nature, I am a slave of sin’s “Torah.”

8 Therefore, there is no longer any condemnation awaiting those who are in union with the Messiah Yeshua. ² Why? Because the Torah of the Spirit, which produces this life in union with Messiah Yeshua, has set me free from the “Torah” of sin and death. ³ For what the Torah could not do by itself, because it lacked the power to make the old nature cooperate, God did by sending his own Son as a human being with a nature like our own sinful one [but without sin]. God did this in order to deal with sin, and in so doing he executed the punishment against sin in human nature, ⁴ so that the just requirement of the Torah might be fulfilled in us who do not run our lives according to what our old nature wants but according to what the Spirit wants. ⁵ For those who identify with their old nature set their minds on the things of the old nature, but those who identify with the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. ⁶ Having one’s mind controlled by the old nature is death, but having one’s mind controlled by the Spirit is life and shalom. ⁷ For the mind controlled by the old nature is hostile to God, because it does not submit itself to God’s Torah — indeed, it cannot. ⁸ Thus, those who identify with their old nature cannot please God.

⁹ But you, you do not identify with your old nature but with the Spirit — provided the Spirit of God is living inside you, for anyone who doesn’t have the Spirit of the Messiah doesn’t belong to him. ¹⁰ However, if the Messiah is in you, then, on the one hand, the body is dead because of sin; but, on the other hand, the Spirit is giving life because God considers you righteous. ¹¹ And if the Spirit of the One who raised Yeshua from the dead is living in you, then the One who raised the Messiah Yeshua from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit living in you.

¹² So then, brothers, we don’t owe a thing to our old nature that would require us to live according to our old nature. ¹³ For if you live according to your old nature, you will certainly die; but if, by the Spirit, you keep putting to death the practices of the body, you will live.

¹⁴ All who are led by God’s Spirit are God’s sons. ¹⁵ For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to bring you back again into fear; on the contrary, you received the Spirit, who makes us sons and by whose power we cry out, “Abba!” (that is, “Dear Father!”). ¹⁶ The Spirit himself bears witness with our own spirits that we are children of God; ¹⁷ and if we are children, then we are also heirs, heirs of God and joint-heirs with the Messiah — provided we are suffering with him in order also to be glorified with him.

¹⁸ I don’t think the sufferings we are going through now are even worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed to us in the future. ¹⁹ The creation waits eagerly for the sons of God to be revealed; ²⁰ for the creation was made subject to frustration — not willingly, but because of the one who subjected it. But it was given a reliable hope ²¹ that it too would be set free from its bondage to decay and would enjoy the freedom accompanying the glory that God’s children will have. ²² We know that until now, the whole creation has been groaning as with the pains of childbirth; ²³ and not only it, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we continue waiting eagerly to be made sons — that is, to have our whole bodies redeemed and set free. ²⁴ It was in this hope that we were saved. But if we see what we hope for, it isn’t hope — after all, who hopes for what he already sees? ²⁵ But if we continue hoping for something we don’t see, then we still wait eagerly for it, with perseverance.

²⁶ Similarly, the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we don’t know how to pray the way we should. But the Spirit himself pleads on our behalf with groanings too deep for words; ²⁷ and the one who searches hearts knows exactly what the Spirit is thinking, because his pleadings for God’s people accord with God’s will. ²⁸ Furthermore, we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called in accordance with his purpose; ²⁹ because those whom he knew in advance, he also determined in advance would be conformed to the pattern of his Son, so that he might be the firstborn among many brothers; ³⁰ and those whom he thus determined in advance, he also called; and those whom he called, he also caused to be considered righteous; and those whom he caused to be considered righteous he also glorified!

³¹ What, then, are we to say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? ³² He who did not spare even his own Son, but gave him up on behalf of us all — is it possible that, having given us his Son, he would not give us everything else too? ³³ So who will bring a charge against God’s chosen people? Certainly not God — he is the one who causes them to be considered righteous! ³⁴ Who punishes them? Certainly not the Messiah Yeshua, who died and — more than that — has been raised, is at the right hand of God and is actually pleading on our behalf! ³⁵ Who will separate us from the love of the Messiah? Trouble? Hardship? Persecution? Hunger? Poverty? Danger? War? ³⁶ As the Tanakh puts it,

³⁷ No, in all these things we are superconquerors, through the one who has loved us. ³⁸ For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor other heavenly rulers, neither what exists nor what is coming, ³⁹ neither powers above nor powers below, nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from the love of God which comes to us through the Messiah Yeshua, our Lord.

7 Surely you know, brothers — for I am speaking to those who understand Torah — that the Torah has authority over a person only so long as he lives? ² For example, a married woman is bound by Torah to her husband while he is alive; but if the husband dies, she is released from the part of the Torah that deals with husbands. ³ Therefore, while the husband is alive, she will be called an adulteress if she marries another man; but if the husband dies, she is free from that part of the Torah; so that if she marries another man, she is not an adulteress.

⁴ Thus, my brothers, you have been made dead with regard to the Torah through the Messiah’s body, so that you may belong to someone else, namely, the one who has been raised from the dead, in order for us to bear fruit for God. ⁵ For when we were living according to our old nature, the passions connected with sins worked through the Torah in our various parts, with the result that we bore fruit for death. ⁶ But now we have been released from this aspect of the Torah, because we have died to that which had us in its clutches, so that we are serving in the new way provided by the Spirit and not in the old way of outwardly following the letter of the law.

⁷ Therefore, what are we to say? That the Torah is sinful? Heaven forbid! Rather, the function of the Torah was that without it, I would not have known what sin is. For example, I would not have become conscious of what greed is if the Torah had not said, “Thou shalt not covet.”^{[a] 8} But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, worked in me all kinds of evil desires — for apart from Torah, sin is dead. ⁹ I was once alive outside the framework of Torah. But when the commandment really encountered me, sin sprang to life, ¹⁰ and I died. The commandment that was intended to bring me life was found to be bringing me death! ¹¹ For sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, deceived me; and through the commandment, sin killed me. ¹² So the Torah is holy; that is, the commandment is holy, just and good.

¹³ Then did something good become for me the source of death? Heaven forbid! Rather, it was sin working death in me through something good, so that sin might be clearly exposed as sin, so that sin through the commandment might come to be experienced as sinful beyond measure. ¹⁴ For we know that the Torah is of the Spirit; but as for me, I am bound to the old nature, sold to sin as a slave. ¹⁵ I don’t understand my own behavior — I don’t do what I want to do; instead, I do the very thing I hate! ¹⁶ Now if I am doing what I don’t want to do, I am agreeing that the Torah is good. ¹⁷ But now it is no longer “the real me” doing it, but the sin housed inside me. ¹⁸ For I know that there is nothing good housed inside me — that is, inside my old nature. I can want what is good, but I can’t do it! ¹⁹ For I don’t do the good I want; instead, the evil that I don’t want is what I do! ²⁰ But if I am doing what “the real me” doesn’t want, it is no longer “the real me” doing it but the sin housed inside me. ²¹ So I find it to be the rule, a kind of perverse “torah,” that although I want to do what is good, evil is right there with me! ²² For in my inner self I completely agree with God’s Torah; ²³ but in my various parts, I see a different “torah,” one that battles with the Torah in my mind and makes me a prisoner of sin’s “torah,” which is operating in my various parts. ²⁴ What a miserable creature I am! Who will rescue me from this body bound for death? ²⁵ Thanks be to God [, he will]! — through Yeshua the Messiah, our Lord!

To sum up: with my mind, I am a slave of God’s Torah; but with my old nature, I am a slave of sin’s “Torah.”

8 Therefore, there is no longer any condemnation awaiting those who are in union with the Messiah Yeshua. ² Why? Because the Torah of the Spirit, which produces this life in union with Messiah Yeshua, has set me free from the “Torah” of sin and death. ³ For what the Torah could not do by itself, because it lacked the power to make the old nature cooperate, God did by sending his own Son as a human being with a nature like our own sinful one [but without sin]. God did this in order to deal with sin, and in so doing he executed the punishment against sin in human nature, ⁴ so that the just requirement of the Torah might be fulfilled in us who do not run our lives according to what our old nature wants but according to what the Spirit wants. ⁵ For those who identify with their old nature set their minds on the things of the old nature, but those who identify with the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. ⁶ Having one’s mind controlled by the old nature is death, but having one’s mind controlled by the Spirit is life and shalom. ⁷ For the mind controlled by the old nature is hostile to God, because it does not submit itself to God’s Torah — indeed, it cannot. ⁸ Thus, those who identify with their old nature cannot please God.

⁹ But you, you do not identify with your old nature but with the Spirit — provided the Spirit of God is living inside you, for anyone who doesn’t have the Spirit of the Messiah doesn’t belong to him. ¹⁰ However, if the Messiah is in you, then, on the one hand, the body is dead because of sin; but, on the other hand, the Spirit is giving life because God considers you righteous. ¹¹ And if the Spirit of the One who raised Yeshua from the dead is living in you, then the One who raised the Messiah Yeshua from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit living in you.

¹² So then, brothers, we don’t owe a thing to our old nature that would require us to live according to our old nature. ¹³ For if you live according to your old nature, you will certainly die; but if, by the Spirit, you keep putting to death the practices of the body, you will live.

¹⁴ All who are led by God’s Spirit are God’s sons. ¹⁵ For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to bring you back again into fear; on the contrary, you received the Spirit, who makes us sons and by whose power we cry out, “Abba!” (that is, “Dear Father!”). ¹⁶ The Spirit himself bears witness with our own spirits that we are children of God; ¹⁷ and if we are children, then we are also heirs, heirs of God and joint-heirs with the Messiah — provided we are suffering with him in order also to be glorified with him.

¹⁸ I don’t think the sufferings we are going through now are even worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed to us in the future. ¹⁹ The creation waits eagerly for the sons of God to be revealed; ²⁰ for the creation was made subject to frustration — not willingly, but because of the one who subjected it. But it was given a reliable hope ²¹ that it too would be set free from its bondage to decay and would enjoy the freedom accompanying the glory that God’s children will have. ²² We know that until now, the whole creation has been groaning as with the pains of childbirth; ²³ and not only it, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we continue waiting eagerly to be made sons — that is, to have our whole bodies redeemed and set free. ²⁴ It was in this hope that we were saved. But if we see what we hope for, it isn’t hope — after all, who hopes for what he already sees? ²⁵ But if we continue hoping for something we don’t see, then we still wait eagerly for it, with perseverance.

²⁶ Similarly, the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we don’t know how to pray the way we should. But the Spirit himself pleads on our behalf with groanings too deep for words; ²⁷ and the one who searches hearts knows exactly what the Spirit is thinking, because his pleadings for God’s people accord with God’s will. ²⁸ Furthermore, we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called in accordance with his purpose; ²⁹ because those whom he knew in advance, he also determined in advance would be conformed to the pattern of his Son, so that he might be the firstborn among many brothers; ³⁰ and those whom he thus determined in advance, he also called; and those whom he called, he also caused to be considered righteous; and those whom he caused to be considered righteous he also glorified!

³¹ What, then, are we to say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? ³² He who did not spare even his own Son, but gave him up on behalf of us all — is it possible that, having given us his Son, he would not give us everything else too? ³³ So who will bring a charge against God’s chosen people? Certainly not God — he is the one who causes them to be considered righteous! ³⁴ Who punishes them? Certainly not the Messiah Yeshua, who died and — more than that — has been raised, is at the right hand of God and is actually pleading on our behalf! ³⁵ Who will separate us from the love of the Messiah? Trouble? Hardship? Persecution? Hunger? Poverty? Danger? War? ³⁶ As the Tanakh puts it,

³⁷ No, in all these things we are superconquerors, through the one who has loved us. ³⁸ For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor other heavenly rulers, neither what exists nor what is coming, ³⁹ neither powers above nor powers below, nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from the love of God which comes to us through the Messiah Yeshua, our Lord.