| Because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen. For this reason God gave them up to degrading passions. Their women exchanged natural intercourse for unnatural, and in the same way also the men, giving up natural intercourse with women, were consumed with passion for one another. Men committed shameless acts with men and received in their own persons the due penalty for their error. And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind and to things that should not be done. | They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen. Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error. Furthermore, just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so God gave them over to a depraved mind, so that they do what ought not to be done. |
| If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love. | If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. |
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| Each of you, however, should love his wife as himself, and a wife should respect her husband. | However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband. |
| And may the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all, just as we abound in love for you. | May the Lord make your love increase and overflow for each other and for everyone else, just as ours does for you. |
| For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you should follow in his steps. | To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps. |
| He declared to you his covenant, which he charged you to observe, that is, the ten commandments; and he wrote them on two stone tablets. | He declared to you his covenant, the Ten Commandments, which he commanded you to follow and then wrote them on two stone tablets. |
| For to me, living is Christ and dying is gain. | For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. |
| This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. | My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. |
| We ourselves are Jews by birth and not Gentile sinners; yet we know that a person is justified not by the works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ. And we have come to believe in Christ Jesus, so that we might be justified by faith in Christ, and not by doing the works of the law, because no one will be justified by the works of the law. | We who are Jews by birth and not sinful Gentiles know that a person is not justified by the works of the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So we, too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law, because by the works of the law no one will be justified. |
| The unfolding of your words gives light; it imparts understanding to the simple. | The unfolding of your words gives light; it gives understanding to the simple. |
| And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit. | And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit. |
| For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from fornication; that each one of you know how to control your own body in holiness and honor, not with lustful passion, like the Gentiles who do not know God. | It is God’s will that you should be sanctified: that you should avoid sexual immorality; that each of you should learn to control your own body in a way that is holy and honorable, not in passionate lust like the pagans, who do not know God. |
| And as I began to speak, the Holy Spirit fell upon them just as it had upon us at the beginning. | As I began to speak, the Holy Spirit came on them as he had come on us at the beginning. |
| Just as you do not know how the breath comes to the bones in the mother's womb, so you do not know the work of God, who makes everything. | As you do not know the path of the wind, or how the body is formed in a mother’s womb, so you cannot understand the work of God, the Maker of all things. |
| My child, do not despise the Lord's discipline or be weary of his reproof, for the Lord reproves the one he loves, as a father the son in whom he delights. | My son, do not despise the Lord’s discipline, and do not resent his rebuke, because the Lord disciplines those he loves, as a father the son he delights in. |
| Welcome one another, therefore, just as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God. | Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God. |
| Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, in order to make her holy by cleansing her with the washing of water by the word. | Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word. |
| God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are, so that no one might boast in the presence of God. | God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him. |
| Wealth is a ransom for a person's life, but the poor get no threats. | A person’s riches may ransom their life, but the poor cannot respond to threatening rebukes. |
| Fine speech is not becoming to a fool; still less is false speech to a ruler. | Eloquent lips are unsuited to a godless fool— how much worse lying lips to a ruler! |
| Do not wear yourself out to get rich; be wise enough to desist. | Do not wear yourself out to get rich; do not trust your own cleverness. |
| He has made everything suitable for its time; moreover he has put a sense of past and future into their minds, yet they cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end. | He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end. |
| My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. | My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. |
| To make an apt answer is a joy to anyone, and a word in season, how good it is! | A person finds joy in giving an apt reply— and how good is a timely word! |
| But he said, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it!” | He replied, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it.” |
