³ For they don’t understand God’s way of making people right with himself. Refusing to accept God’s way, they cling to their own way of getting right with God by trying to keep the law.

¹⁵ Then he said to them, “You like to appear righteous in public, but God knows your hearts. What this world honors is detestable in the sight of God.

⁹ and become one with him. I no longer count on my own righteousness through obeying the law; rather, I become righteous through faith in Christ.^[a] For God’s way of making us right with himself depends on faith.

¹⁷ This Good News tells us how God makes us right in his sight. This is accomplished from start to finish by faith. As the Scriptures say, “It is through faith that a righteous person has life.”^[a]

²¹ For God made Christ, who never sinned, to be the offering for our sin,^[a] so that we could be made right with God through Christ.

¹⁹ Because one person disobeyed God, many became sinners. But because one other person obeyed God, many will be made righteous.

²² We are made right with God by placing our faith in Jesus Christ. And this is true for everyone who believes, no matter who we are.

Parable of the Pharisee and Tax Collector

⁹ Then Jesus told this story to some who had great confidence in their own righteousness and scorned everyone else: ¹⁰ “Two men went to the Temple to pray. One was a Pharisee, and the other was a despised tax collector. ¹¹ The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed this prayer^[a]: ‘I thank you, God, that I am not like other people—cheaters, sinners, adulterers. I’m certainly not like that tax collector! ¹² I fast twice a week, and I give you a tenth of my income.’

²⁹ The man wanted to justify his actions, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”