1   The conclusion of the matter is this: there is no condemnation for those who are united with Christ Jesus, 2   because in Christ Jesus the life-giving law of the Spirit has set you free from the law of sin and death. 3   What the law could never do, because our lower nature robbed it of all potency, God has done: by sending his own Son in a form like that of our own sinful nature, and as a sacrifice for sin, ^note he has passed judgement against sin within that very nature, 4   so that the commandment of the law may find fulfilment in us, whose conduct, no longer under the control of our lower nature, is directed by the Spirit.

5   Those who live on the level of our lower nature have their outlook formed by it, and that spells death; 6   but those who live on the level of the spirit have the spiritual outlook, and that is life and peace. 7   For the outlook of the lower nature is enmity with God; it is not subject to the law of God; indeed it cannot be: 8   those who live on such a level cannot possibly please God.

9   But that is not how you live. You are on the spiritual level, if only God's Spirit dwells within you; and if a man does not possess the Spirit of Christ, he is no Christian. 10   But if Christ is dwelling within you, then although the body is a dead thing because you sinned, yet the spirit is life itself because you have been justified. ^note

The Gospel according to Paul 11   Moreover, if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells within you, then the God who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give new life to your mortal bodies through his indwelling Spirit.

12   It follows, my friends, that our lower nature has no claim upon us; we are not obliged to live on that level. 13   If you do so, you must die. But if by the Spirit you put to death all the base pursuits of the body, then you will live.

14    15   For all who are moved by the Spirit of God are sons of God. The Spirit you have received is not a spirit of slavery leading you back into a life of fear, but a Spirit that makes us sons, enabling us to cry ‘Abba! 16   Father!’ In that cry the Spirit of God joins with our spirit in testifying that we are God's children; 17   and if children, then heirs. We are God's heirs and Christ's fellow-heirs, if we share his sufferings now in order to share his splendour hereafter.

18   For I reckon that the sufferings we now endure bear no comparison with the splendour, as yet unrevealed, which is in store for us. 19   For the created universe waits with eager expectation for God's sons to be revealed. 20   It was made the victim of frustration, not by its own choice, but because of him who made it so; ^note yet always there was hope, 21   because ^note the universe itself is to be freed from the shackles of mortality and enter upon the liberty and splendour of the children of God. 22   Up to the present, we know, the whole created universe groans in all its parts as if in the pangs of childbirth. 23   Not only so, but even we, to whom the Spirit is given as firstfruits of the harvest to come, are groaning inwardly while we wait for God to make us his sons and ^note set our whole body free. 24   For we have been saved, though only in hope. Now to see is no longer to hope: why should a man endure and wait ^note for what he already sees? 25   But if we hope for something we do not yet see, then, in waiting for it, we show our endurance.

26   In the same way the Spirit comes to the aid of our weakness. We do not even know how we ought to pray, ^note but through our inarticulate groans the Spirit himself is pleading for us, 27   and God who searches our inmost being knows what the Spirit means, because he pleads for God's people in God's own way; 28   and in everything,

The Gospel according to Paul as we know, he co-operates for good with those who love God ^note and are called according to his purpose. 29   For God knew his own before ever they were, and also ordained that they should be shaped to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the eldest among a large family of brothers; 30   and it is these, so fore-ordained, whom he has also called. And those whom he called he has justified, and to those whom he justified he has also given his splendour.

31   With all this in mind, what are we to say? If God is on our side, who is against us? 32   He did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all; and with this gift how can he fail to lavish upon us all he has to give? 33   Who will be the accuser of God's chosen ones? It is God who pronounces acquittal; then who can condemn? 34   It is Christ— Christ who died, and, more than that, was raised from the dead— who is at God's right hand, and indeed pleads our cause. ^note 35   Then what can separate us from the love of Christ? Can affliction or hardship? 36   Can persecution, hunger, nakedness, peril, or the sword? ‘We are being done to death for thy sake all day long,’ as Scripture says; ‘we have been treated like sheep for slaughter’—and yet, 37   in spite of all, overwhelming victory is ours through him who loved us. 38   For I am convinced that there is nothing in death or life, in the realm of spirits or superhuman powers, in the world as it is or the world as it shall be, 39   in the forces of the universe, in heights or depths—nothing in all creation that can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Previous section

Next section