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Romans 6-8
Common English Bible
Romans 6-8
Common English Bible
Our new life in Christ
6 So what are we going to say? Should we continue sinning so grace will multiply? 2 Absolutely not! All of us died to sin. How can we still live in it? 3 Or don’t you know that all who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 Therefore, we were buried together with him through baptism into his death, so that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too can walk in newness of life. 5 If we were united together in a death like his, we will also be united together in a resurrection like his. 6 This is what we know: the person that we used to be was crucified with him in order to get rid of the corpse that had been controlled by sin. That way we wouldn’t be slaves to sin anymore, 7 because a person who has died has been freed from sin’s power. 8 But if we died with Christ, we have faith that we will also live with him. 9 We know that Christ has been raised from the dead and he will never die again. Death no longer has power over him. 10 He died to sin once and for all with his death, but he lives for God with his life. 11 In the same way, you also should consider yourselves dead to sin but alive for God in Christ Jesus.
12 So then, don’t let sin rule your body, so that you do what it wants. 13 Don’t offer parts of your body to sin, to be used as weapons to do wrong. Instead, present yourselves to God as people who have been brought back to life from the dead, and offer all the parts of your body to God to be used as weapons to do right. 14 Sin will have no power over you, because you aren’t under Law but under grace.
Freedom from sin
15 So what? Should we sin because we aren’t under Law but under grace? Absolutely not! 16 Don’t you know that if you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, that you are slaves of the one whom you obey? That’s true whether you serve as slaves of sin, which leads to death, or as slaves of the kind of obedience that leads to righteousness. 17 But thank God that although you used to be slaves of sin, you gave wholehearted obedience to the teaching that was handed down to you, which provides a pattern. 18 Now that you have been set free from sin, you have become slaves of righteousness. 19 (I’m speaking with ordinary metaphors because of your limitations.) Once, you offered the parts of your body to be used as slaves to impurity and to lawless behavior that leads to still more lawless behavior. Now, you should present the parts of your body as slaves to righteousness, which makes your lives holy. 20 When you were slaves of sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. 21 What consequences did you get from doing things that you are now ashamed of? The outcome of those things is death. 22 But now that you have been set free from sin and become slaves to God, you have the consequence of a holy life, and the outcome is eternal life. 23 The wages that sin pays are death, but God’s gift is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Freedom from the Law
7 Brothers and sisters, I’m talking to you as people who know the Law. Don’t you know that the Law has power over someone only as long as he or she lives? 2 A married woman is united with her husband under the Law while he is alive. But if her husband dies, she is released from the Law concerning her husband. 3 So then, if she lives with another man while her husband is alive, she’s committing adultery. But if her husband dies, she’s free from the Law, so she won’t be committing adultery if she marries someone else. 4 Therefore, my brothers and sisters, you also died with respect to the Law through the body of Christ, so that you could be united with someone else. You are united with the one who was raised from the dead so that we can bear fruit for God. 5 When we were self-centered, the sinful passions aroused through the Law were at work in all the parts of our body, so that we bore fruit for death. 6 But now we have been released from the Law. We have died with respect to the thing that controlled us, so that we can be slaves in the new life under the Spirit, not in the old life under the written Law.
The function of the Law
7 So what are we going to say? That the Law is sin? Absolutely not! But I wouldn’t have known sin except through the Law. I wouldn’t have known the desire for what others have if the Law had not said, Don’t desire to take what others have.[a] 8 But sin seized the opportunity and used this commandment to produce all kinds of desires in me. Sin is dead without the Law. 9 I used to be alive without the Law, but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life, 10 and I died. So the commandment that was intended to give life brought death. 11 Sin seized the opportunity through the commandment, deceived me, and killed me. 12 So the Law itself is holy, and the commandment is holy, righteous, and good.
Living under the Law
13 So did something good bring death to me? Absolutely not! But sin caused my death through something good so that sin would be exposed as sin. That way sin would become even more thoroughly sinful through the commandment. 14 We know that the Law is spiritual, but I’m made of flesh and blood, and I’m sold as a slave to sin. 15 I don’t know what I’m doing, because I don’t do what I want to do. Instead, I do the thing that I hate. 16 But if I’m doing the thing that I don’t want to do, I’m agreeing that the Law is right. 17 But now I’m not the one doing it anymore. Instead, it’s sin that lives in me. 18 I know that good doesn’t live in me—that is, in my body. The desire to do good is inside of me, but I can’t do it. 19 I don’t do the good that I want to do, but I do the evil that I don’t want to do. 20 But if I do the very thing that I don’t want to do, then I’m not the one doing it anymore. Instead, it is sin that lives in me that is doing it.
21 So I find that, as a rule, when I want to do what is good, evil is right there with me. 22 I gladly agree with the Law on the inside, 23 but I see a different law at work in my body. It wages a war against the law of my mind and takes me prisoner with the law of sin that is in my body. 24 I’m a miserable human being. Who will deliver me from this dead corpse? 25 Thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then I’m a slave to God’s Law in my mind, but I’m a slave to sin’s law in my body.
Set free by the Spirit
8 So now there isn’t any condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. 2 The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death. 3 God has done what was impossible for the Law, since it was weak because of selfishness. God condemned sin in the body by sending his own Son to deal with sin in the same body as humans, who are controlled by sin. 4 He did this so that the righteous requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us. Now the way we live is based on the Spirit, not based on selfishness. 5 People whose lives are based on selfishness think about selfish things, but people whose lives are based on the Spirit think about things that are related to the Spirit. 6 The attitude that comes from selfishness leads to death, but the attitude that comes from the Spirit leads to life and peace. 7 So the attitude that comes from selfishness is hostile to God. It doesn’t submit to God’s Law, because it can’t. 8 People who are self-centered aren’t able to please God.
9 But you aren’t self-centered. Instead you are in the Spirit, if in fact God’s Spirit lives in you. If anyone doesn’t have the Spirit of Christ, they don’t belong to him. 10 If Christ is in you, the Spirit is your life because of God’s righteousness, but the body is dead because of sin. 11 If the Spirit of the one who raised Jesus from the dead lives in you, the one who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your human bodies also, through his Spirit that lives in you.
12 So then, brothers and sisters, we have an obligation, but it isn’t an obligation to ourselves to live our lives on the basis of selfishness. 13 If you live on the basis of selfishness, you are going to die. But if by the Spirit you put to death the actions of the body, you will live. 14 All who are led by God’s Spirit are God’s sons and daughters. 15 You didn’t receive a spirit of slavery to lead you back again into fear, but you received a Spirit that shows you are adopted as his children. With this Spirit, we cry, “Abba, Father.” 16 The same Spirit agrees with our spirit, that we are God’s children. 17 But if we are children, we are also heirs. We are God’s heirs and fellow heirs with Christ, if we really suffer with him so that we can also be glorified with him.
Our suffering and our hope
18 I believe that the present suffering is nothing compared to the coming glory that is going to be revealed to us. 19 The whole creation waits breathless with anticipation for the revelation of God’s sons and daughters. 20 Creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice—it was the choice of the one who subjected it—but in the hope 21 that the creation itself will be set free from slavery to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of God’s children. 22 We know that the whole creation is groaning together and suffering labor pains up until now. 23 And it’s not only the creation. We ourselves who have the Spirit as the first crop of the harvest also groan inside as we wait to be adopted and for our bodies to be set free. 24 We were saved in hope. If we see what we hope for, that isn’t hope. Who hopes for what they already see? 25 But if we hope for what we don’t see, we wait for it with patience.
26 In the same way, the Spirit comes to help our weakness. We don’t know what we should pray, but the Spirit himself pleads our case with unexpressed groans. 27 The one who searches hearts knows how the Spirit thinks, because he pleads for the saints, consistent with God’s will. 28 We know that God works all things together for good for the ones who love God, for those who are called according to his purpose. 29 We know this because God knew them in advance, and he decided in advance that they would be conformed to the image of his Son. That way his Son would be the first of many brothers and sisters. 30 Those who God decided in advance would be conformed to his Son, he also called. Those whom he called, he also made righteous. Those whom he made righteous, he also glorified.
31 So what are we going to say about these things? If God is for us, who is against us? 32 He didn’t spare his own Son but gave him up for us all. Won’t he also freely give us all things with him?
33 Who will bring a charge against God’s elect people? It is God who acquits them. 34 Who is going to convict them? It is Christ Jesus who died, even more, who was raised, and who also is at God’s right side. It is Christ Jesus who also pleads our case for us.
35 Who will separate us from Christ’s love? Will we be separated by trouble, or distress, or harassment, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? 36 As it is written,
We are being put to death all day long for your sake.
We are treated like sheep for slaughter.[b]
37 But in all these things we win a sweeping victory through the one who loved us. 38 I’m convinced that nothing can separate us from God’s love in Christ Jesus our Lord: not death or life, not angels or rulers, not present things or future things, not powers 39 or height or depth, or any other thing that is created.
Footnotes
Romans 6-8
New International Version
Romans 6-8
New International Version
Dead to Sin, Alive in Christ
6 What shall we say, then?(A) Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase?(B) 2 By no means! We are those who have died to sin;(C) how can we live in it any longer? 3 Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized(D) into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death(E) in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead(F) through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.(G)
5 For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his.(H) 6 For we know that our old self(I) was crucified with him(J) so that the body ruled by sin(K) might be done away with,[a] that we should no longer be slaves to sin(L)— 7 because anyone who has died has been set free from sin.(M)
8 Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him.(N) 9 For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead,(O) he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him.(P) 10 The death he died, he died to sin(Q) once for all;(R) but the life he lives, he lives to God.
11 In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin(S) but alive to God in Christ Jesus. 12 Therefore do not let sin reign(T) in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. 13 Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness,(U) but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness.(V) 14 For sin shall no longer be your master,(W) because you are not under the law,(X) but under grace.(Y)
Slaves to Righteousness
15 What then? Shall we sin because we are not under the law but under grace?(Z) By no means! 16 Don’t you know that when you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one you obey(AA)—whether you are slaves to sin,(AB) which leads to death,(AC) or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? 17 But thanks be to God(AD) that, though you used to be slaves to sin,(AE) you have come to obey from your heart the pattern of teaching(AF) that has now claimed your allegiance. 18 You have been set free from sin(AG) and have become slaves to righteousness.(AH)
19 I am using an example from everyday life(AI) because of your human limitations. Just as you used to offer yourselves as slaves to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer yourselves as slaves to righteousness(AJ) leading to holiness. 20 When you were slaves to sin,(AK) you were free from the control of righteousness.(AL) 21 What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death!(AM) 22 But now that you have been set free from sin(AN) and have become slaves of God,(AO) the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life.(AP) 23 For the wages of sin is death,(AQ) but the gift of God is eternal life(AR) in[b] Christ Jesus our Lord.
Released From the Law, Bound to Christ
7 Do you not know, brothers and sisters(AS)—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law has authority over someone only as long as that person lives? 2 For example, by law a married woman is bound to her husband as long as he is alive, but if her husband dies, she is released from the law that binds her to him.(AT) 3 So then, if she has sexual relations with another man while her husband is still alive, she is called an adulteress.(AU) But if her husband dies, she is released from that law and is not an adulteress if she marries another man.
4 So, my brothers and sisters, you also died to the law(AV) through the body of Christ,(AW) that you might belong to another,(AX) to him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God. 5 For when we were in the realm of the flesh,[c](AY) the sinful passions aroused by the law(AZ) were at work in us,(BA) so that we bore fruit for death.(BB) 6 But now, by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law(BC) so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code.(BD)
The Law and Sin
7 What shall we say, then?(BE) Is the law sinful? Certainly not!(BF) Nevertheless, I would not have known what sin was had it not been for the law.(BG) For I would not have known what coveting really was if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.”[d](BH) 8 But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment,(BI) produced in me every kind of coveting. For apart from the law, sin was dead.(BJ) 9 Once I was alive apart from the law; but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life and I died. 10 I found that the very commandment that was intended to bring life(BK) actually brought death. 11 For sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment,(BL) deceived me,(BM) and through the commandment put me to death. 12 So then, the law is holy, and the commandment is holy, righteous and good.(BN)
13 Did that which is good, then, become death to me? By no means! Nevertheless, in order that sin might be recognized as sin, it used what is good(BO) to bring about my death,(BP) so that through the commandment sin might become utterly sinful.
14 We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual,(BQ) sold(BR) as a slave to sin.(BS) 15 I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.(BT) 16 And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good.(BU) 17 As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me.(BV) 18 For I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is, in my sinful nature.[e](BW) For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. 19 For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing.(BX) 20 Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.(BY)
21 So I find this law at work:(BZ) Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. 22 For in my inner being(CA) I delight in God’s law;(CB) 23 but I see another law at work in me, waging war(CC) against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin(CD) at work within me. 24 What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death?(CE) 25 Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!(CF)
So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law,(CG) but in my sinful nature[f] a slave to the law of sin.(CH)
Life Through the Spirit
8 Therefore, there is now no condemnation(CI) for those who are in Christ Jesus,(CJ) 2 because through Christ Jesus(CK) the law of the Spirit who gives life(CL) has set you[g] free(CM) from the law of sin(CN) and death. 3 For what the law was powerless(CO) to do because it was weakened by the flesh,[h](CP) God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh(CQ) to be a sin offering.[i](CR) And so he condemned sin in the flesh, 4 in order that the righteous requirement(CS) of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.(CT)
5 Those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires;(CU) but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires.(CV) 6 The mind governed by the flesh is death,(CW) but the mind governed by the Spirit is life(CX) and peace. 7 The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God;(CY) it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. 8 Those who are in the realm of the flesh(CZ) cannot please God.
9 You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh(DA) but are in the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you.(DB) And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ,(DC) they do not belong to Christ. 10 But if Christ is in you,(DD) then even though your body is subject to death because of sin, the Spirit gives life[j] because of righteousness. 11 And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead(DE) is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies(DF) because of[k] his Spirit who lives in you.
12 Therefore, brothers and sisters, we have an obligation—but it is not to the flesh, to live according to it.(DG) 13 For if you live according to the flesh, you will die;(DH) but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body,(DI) you will live.(DJ)
14 For those who are led by the Spirit of God(DK) are the children of God.(DL) 15 The Spirit(DM) you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again;(DN) rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship.[l] And by him we cry, “Abba,[m] Father.”(DO) 16 The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit(DP) that we are God’s children.(DQ) 17 Now if we are children, then we are heirs(DR)—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings(DS) in order that we may also share in his glory.(DT)
Present Suffering and Future Glory
18 I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.(DU) 19 For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God(DV) to be revealed. 20 For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it,(DW) in hope 21 that[n] the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay(DX) and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God.(DY)
22 We know that the whole creation has been groaning(DZ) as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. 23 Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit,(EA) groan(EB) inwardly as we wait eagerly(EC) for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies.(ED) 24 For in this hope we were saved.(EE) But hope that is seen is no hope at all.(EF) Who hopes for what they already have? 25 But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.(EG)
26 In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit(EH) himself intercedes for us(EI) through wordless groans. 27 And he who searches our hearts(EJ) knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes(EK) for God’s people in accordance with the will of God.
28 And we know that in all things God works for the good(EL) of those who love him, who[o] have been called(EM) according to his purpose.(EN) 29 For those God foreknew(EO) he also predestined(EP) to be conformed to the image of his Son,(EQ) that he might be the firstborn(ER) among many brothers and sisters. 30 And those he predestined,(ES) he also called;(ET) those he called, he also justified;(EU) those he justified, he also glorified.(EV)
More Than Conquerors
31 What, then, shall we say in response to these things?(EW) If God is for us,(EX) who can be against us?(EY) 32 He who did not spare his own Son,(EZ) but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? 33 Who will bring any charge(FA) against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. 34 Who then is the one who condemns?(FB) No one. Christ Jesus who died(FC)—more than that, who was raised to life(FD)—is at the right hand of God(FE) and is also interceding for us.(FF) 35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?(FG) Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?(FH) 36 As it is written:
37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors(FJ) through him who loved us.(FK) 38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,[q] neither the present nor the future,(FL) nor any powers,(FM) 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God(FN) that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.(FO)
Footnotes
- Romans 6:6 Or be rendered powerless
- Romans 6:23 Or through
- Romans 7:5 In contexts like this, the Greek word for flesh (sarx) refers to the sinful state of human beings, often presented as a power in opposition to the Spirit.
- Romans 7:7 Exodus 20:17; Deut. 5:21
- Romans 7:18 Or my flesh
- Romans 7:25 Or in the flesh
- Romans 8:2 The Greek is singular; some manuscripts me
- Romans 8:3 In contexts like this, the Greek word for flesh (sarx) refers to the sinful state of human beings, often presented as a power in opposition to the Spirit; also in verses 4-13.
- Romans 8:3 Or flesh, for sin
- Romans 8:10 Or you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive
- Romans 8:11 Some manuscripts bodies through
- Romans 8:15 The Greek word for adoption to sonship is a term referring to the full legal standing of an adopted male heir in Roman culture; also in verse 23.
- Romans 8:15 Aramaic for father
- Romans 8:21 Or subjected it in hope. 21 For
- Romans 8:28 Or that all things work together for good to those who love God, who; or that in all things God works together with those who love him to bring about what is good—with those who
- Romans 8:36 Psalm 44:22
- Romans 8:38 Or nor heavenly rulers
Common English Bible (CEB)
Copyright © 2011 by Common English Bible
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