Romans 3

1 So does a Jew have any advantage? Does circumcision have any benefits?

What then is the advantage of the Jew, or what is the profit of circumcision?

2 Yes, there are many benefits! First of all, God's message was entrusted to them.

Much, every way: chiefly, because they were intrusted with the oracles of God.

3 What if some of them didn't trust in God? Does their lack of trust in God obliterate the trustworthiness of God?

For what if some did not believe? shall their incredulity make the faithfulness of God of no effect?

4 Of course not! Even if everyone else is proved to be lying, God always tells the truth. As Scripture says, “What you say will be proved right, and you will win your case when you are judged.”

God forbid: yea, let God be acknowledged true, though every man be a liar; as it is written, That thou mightest be justified in thy words, and mightest overcome, when thou judgest.

5 But if the fact that we're wrong helps to show that God is right, what should we conclude? That God is wrong to pronounce judgment on us? (I'm talking from a human perspective here.)

"But if our unrighteousness confirm the righteousness of God, what shall we say? Is not God unrighteous, who inflicteth his wrath?" (I speak as a man) God forbid:

6 Of course not! How else could God judge the world?

for then how shall God judge the world?

7 Someone could say, “Why am I still condemned as a sinner if my lies make the truth of God and his glory more obvious in contrast?”

"But, say you, if the truth of God hath abounded unto his glory through my falshood, why yet am I also judged as a sinner?

8 Is it a case of, “Let's sin to bring about good”? That's what some people have slanderously accused us of saying. They should be rightly condemned!

and why may we not do evil that good may come?"---as we are injuriously charged, and as some affirm that we say; whose condemnation is just.

9 So then, are we Jews better than others? Definitely not! Remember that we've already argued that both Jews and foreigners are under the control of sin.

"What then are we the better?" Not at all, in point of justification; for we have before proved that both Jews and Gentiles are all under sin: as it is written,

10 As Scripture says, “No one does what is right, not even one.

"There is none righteous, no not one;

11 No one understands; no one seeks God.

there is none that understandeth; there is none that seeketh after God.

12 Everyone has turned their backs on him; everyone does what is totally wrong. No one does what is good, not a single one.

They are all gone out of the way, they are become unprofitable, there is none that practiseth goodness, no not one.

13 Their throats are like an open grave; their tongues spread deceit; their lips ooze with the venom of snakes.

Their throat is an open sepulchre: with their tongues they have used deceit; the poison of asps is under their lips:

14 Their mouths are full of bitterness and curses,

whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness:

15 and they are quick to cause pain and death.

their feet are swift to shed blood:

16 Their way leads to disaster and misery;

destruction and misery are in their ways:

17 they don't know how to live in peace.

and the way of peace they have not known; and the fear of God is not before their eyes."

18 They don't care about respecting God at all.”

Now we know that whatsoever the law saith,

19 It's clear that everything in the law applies to those who live under the law so that no one could have any excuses, and to make sure everyone in the whole world is answerable to God.

it saith to those under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world obnoxious to the justice of God.

20 For no one is made right before God by doing what the law requires. The law only helps us recognize what sin really is.

Wherefore by the works of the law no flesh shall be justified before Him: for by the law is the knowledge of sin.

21 But now God's character of goodness and right has been demonstrated. It has nothing to do with law-keeping, even though it was spoken of by the law and the prophets.

But now, without the law, righteousness before God is manifested, being attested by the law and the prophets;

22 This character of God that is good and right comes to everyone who trusts in Jesus Christ, those who place their confidence in him. It doesn't matter who we are:

and this righteousness of God is by faith in Jesus Christ unto all and upon all believers; for there is no difference;

23 We have all sinned, and we fall far short of God's glorious ideal.

for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God;

24 Yet through the free gift of his grace God makes us right through Christ Jesus who sets us free.

being justified freely by his grace, because of the redemption that is in Christ Jesus:

25 God openly presented Jesus as the gift that brings peace to those trusting in him, the one who shed his blood. God did this to demonstrate he is truly good and right, for previously he would hold back and pass over sins,

whom God hath appointed to be a propitiation, through faith in his blood, for a demonstration of his righteousness, in the remission of past sins, according to the forbearance of God;

26 but now at this present time God proves he is fair and does what is right, and that he makes right those who trust in Jesus.

for a demonstration, I say, of his righteousness at this time: that He might be just, and the justifier of him, that believeth in Jesus.

27 So do we have anything to boast about then? Absolutely not, there's no place for that! And why's that? Is it because we follow the law of observing requirements? No, we follow the law of trusting in God.

Where then is boasting? it is excluded: by what law? of works? no: but by the law of faith.

28 We conclude that people are made right with God through their trust in him, and not from legal observance.

Therefore we conclude, that a man is justified by faith, without the works of the law:

29 Is God only the God of the Jews? Isn't he the God of other people as well? Of course he is!

or is He the God of the Jews only, and not also of the Gentiles?

30 There is only one God, and he makes us morally right through our trust in him, whoever we are, Jew or foreigner.

surely of the Gentiles also: seeing it is one God who will justify the circumcision by faith, and uncircumcision also through faith.

31 Does that mean that by trusting in God we do away with the law? Of course not! In fact we affirm the importance of the law.

Do we then make the law of none effect through faith? God forbid: yea we establish the law.