Romans 1:18-3:20
New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition
The Guilt of Humankind
18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and injustice of those who by their injustice suppress the truth.(A) 19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20 Ever since the creation of the world God’s eternal power and divine nature, invisible though they are, have been seen and understood through the things God has made. So they are without excuse,(B) 21 for though they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their senseless hearts were darkened.(C) 22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools, 23 and they exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling a mortal human or birds or four-footed animals or reptiles.(D)
24 Therefore God gave them over in the desires of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves.(E) 25 They exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.(F)
26 For this reason God gave them over to dishonorable passions. Their females exchanged natural intercourse[a] for unnatural,(G) 27 and in the same way also the males, giving up natural intercourse[b] with females, were consumed with their passionate desires for one another. Males committed shameless acts with males and received in their own persons the due penalty for their error.(H)
28 And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them over to an unfit mind and to do things that should not be done.(I) 29 They were filled with every kind of injustice, evil, covetousness, malice. Full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, craftiness, they are gossips, 30 slanderers, God-haters,[c] insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, rebellious toward parents,(J) 31 foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless.(K) 32 They know God’s decree, that those who practice such things deserve to die, yet they not only do them but even applaud others who practice them.(L)
The Righteous Judgment of God
2 Therefore you are without excuse, whoever you are, when you judge others, for in passing judgment on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, are doing the very same things.(M) 2 We know that God’s judgment on those who do such things is in accordance with truth. 3 Do you imagine, whoever you are, that when you judge those who do such things and yet do them yourself, you will escape the judgment of God? 4 Or do you despise the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience? Do you not realize that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?(N) 5 But by your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath, when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed.(O) 6 He will repay according to each one’s deeds:(P) 7 to those who by patiently doing good seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life, 8 while for those who are self-seeking and who obey not the truth but injustice, there will be wrath and fury.(Q) 9 There will be affliction and distress for everyone who does evil, both the Jew first and the Greek,(R) 10 but glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, both the Jew first and the Greek. 11 For God shows no partiality.(S)
12 All who have sinned apart from the law will also perish apart from the law, and all who have sinned under the law will be judged in accordance with the law. 13 For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous in God’s sight but the doers of the law who will be justified.(T) 14 When gentiles, who do not possess the law, by nature do[d] what the law requires, these, though not having the law, are a law to themselves. 15 They show that what the law requires is written on their hearts, as their own conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts will accuse or perhaps excuse them 16 on the day when, according to my gospel, God through Christ Jesus judges the secret thoughts of all.(U)
The Jews and the Law
17 But if you call yourself a Jew and rely on the law and boast of your relation to God(V) 18 and know his will and determine what really matters because you are instructed in the law, 19 and if you are sure that you are a guide to the blind, a light to those who are in darkness, 20 a corrector of the foolish, a teacher of children, having in the law the embodiment of knowledge and truth,(W) 21 you, then, who teach others, will you not teach yourself? You who preach against stealing, do you steal?(X) 22 You who forbid adultery, do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples? 23 You who boast in the law, do you dishonor God by your transgression of the law? 24 For, as it is written, “The name of God is blasphemed[e] among the gentiles because of you.”(Y)
25 Circumcision indeed is of value if you obey the law, but if you are a transgressor of the law your circumcision has become uncircumcision.(Z) 26 So, if the uncircumcised keep the requirements of the law, will not their uncircumcision be regarded as circumcision? 27 Then the physically uncircumcised person who keeps the law will judge you who, though having the written code and circumcision, are a transgressor of the law. 28 For a person is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is circumcision something external and physical.(AA) 29 Rather, a person is a Jew who is one inwardly, and circumcision is a matter of the heart, by the Spirit, not the written code. Such a person receives praise not from humans but from God.(AB)
3 Then what advantage has the Jew? Or what is the value of circumcision? 2 Much, in every way. For in the first place, the Jews[f] were entrusted with the oracles of God.(AC) 3 What if some were unfaithful? Will their faithlessness nullify the faithfulness of God?(AD) 4 By no means! Although every human is a liar, let God be proved true, as it is written,
5 But if our injustice serves to confirm the justice of God, what should we say? That God is unjust to inflict wrath on us? (I speak in a human way.)(AF) 6 By no means! For then how could God judge the world? 7 But if through my falsehood God’s truthfulness abounds to his glory, why am I still being judged as a sinner? 8 And why not say (as some people slander us by saying that we say), “Let us do evil so that good may come”? Their judgment is deserved!(AG)
None Is Righteous
9 What then? Are we any better off?[h] No, not at all, for we have already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks, are under the power of sin,(AH) 10 as it is written:
“There is no one who is righteous, not even one;(AI)
11 there is no one who has understanding;
there is no one who seeks God.
12 All have turned aside; together they have become worthless;
there is no one who shows kindness;
there is not even one.”
13 “Their throats are opened graves;
they use their tongues to deceive.”
“The venom of vipers is under their lips.”(AJ)
14 “Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness.”
15 “Their feet are swift to shed blood;(AK)
16 ruin and misery are in their paths,
17 and the way of peace they have not known.”
18 “There is no fear of God before their eyes.”
19 Now we know that, whatever the law says, it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world may be held accountable to God.(AL) 20 For no human will be justified before him by deeds prescribed by the law, for through the law comes the knowledge of sin.(AM)
New Revised Standard Version, Updated Edition. Copyright © 2021 National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.