Book of Common Prayer

¹⁹ We know that everything the law says, it says to the people who have the law. Then no one can say a word for themselves. All the people in the world will be brought to God to be judged.

²⁰ No one will be put right with God because he has tried to obey the law. The law only makes people know what they have done wrong.

²¹ So now God has shown how people can be put right with him without the law. The law and the prophets said he would do it.

²² God puts people right with himself when they believe in Jesus Christ. He does this for all who believe. They are all alike.

²³ All have done wrong and all are far from being as good as God.

²⁴ But God is kind and makes them right with himself. It is a gift. He does it because Christ Jesus paid the price to set them free.

²⁵ God gave him as a sacrifice. When people believe in him, his blood pays for the wrong things they have done. This shows that God is good and right. He was right when he forgave the wrong things that people did long ago.

²⁶ God also shows that he is right now. He does this when he makes right any person who believes in Jesus.

²⁷ Then what have we to be proud of? Nothing at all. Why not? Does God put us right with himself because of anything we have done? No. He does it because we believe.

²⁸ We know that if a person believes in Christ, God makes him right again. It is not because that person has obeyed the law.

²⁹ Is God the God of the Jews only? Is he not the God of other people also? Yes, he is. There is only one God of all peoples.

³⁰ He will put right people who have been circumcised [the Jews] because they believe. And he will also put right people who are not circumcised when they believe.

³¹ When we believe, does that make the law no good to us? No. That is not so. When we believe, we show that the law is right.

7 After this, Jesus travelled around in Galilee. He would not travel around in Judea because the leaders of the Jews wanted to kill him.

² Every year the Jews had a feast to remember the time when their fathers lived in tents in the desert. The time was near for that feast.

³ Jesus' brothers said to him, `Go away from here to Judea. Let your disciples also see the work you are doing.

⁴ When a person wants people to know about him, he does not hide what he is doing. If you are doing these big things, let the world see you.'

⁵ Even his brothers did not believe in Jesus.

⁶ Jesus said to them, `It is not yet the time for me to go. But you may go any time you want to.

⁷ The people of the world cannot hate you. But they hate me because I say what they do is wrong.

⁸ Go to the feast yourselves. I am not going to the feast until it is the right time for me to go.'

⁹ He said this to them and stayed in Galilee.

¹⁰ After his brothers went to the feast, Jesus went also. He did not go with the other people, but he went by himself.

¹¹ The leaders of the Jews at the feast tried to find him. They said, `Where is he?'

¹² People were talking among themselves about Jesus. Some said, `He is a good man.' Others said, `No. He is leading people to do wrong things.'

¹³ But they were afraid of the Jewish leaders, so no one talked about him out in the open.