Salutation

1From Paul, a slave of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God. 2This gospel he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy scriptures, 3concerning his Son who was a descendant of David with reference to the flesh, 4who was appointed the Son-of-God-in-power according to the Holy Spirit by the resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord. 5Through him we have received grace and our apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles on behalf of his name. 6You also are among them, called to belong to Jesus Christ. 7To all those loved by God in Rome, called to be saints: Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ!

Paul’s Desire to Visit Rome

8First of all, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is proclaimed throughout the whole world. 9For God, whom I serve in my spirit by preaching the gospel of his Son, is my witness that I continually remember you 10and I always ask in my prayers, if perhaps now at last I may succeed in visiting you according to the will of God. 11For I long to see you, so that I may impart to you some spiritual gift to strengthen you, 12that is, that we may be mutually comforted by one another’s faith, both yours and mine. 13I do not want you to be unaware, brothers and sisters, that I often intended to come to you (and was prevented until now), so that I may have some fruit even among you, just as I already have among the rest of the Gentiles. 14I am a debtor both to the Greeks and to the barbarians, both to the wise and to the foolish. 15Thus I am eager also to preach the gospel to you who are in Rome.

The Power of the Gospel

16For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is God’s power for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. 17For the righteousness of God is revealed in the gospel from faith to faith, just as it is written, “The righteous by faith will live.”

The Condemnation of the Unrighteous

18For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of people who suppress the truth by their unrighteousness, 19because what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20For since the creation of the world his invisible attributes – his eternal power and divine nature – have been clearly seen, because they are understood through what has been made. So people are without excuse. 21For although they knew God, they did not glorify him as God or give him thanks, but they became futile in their thoughts and their senseless hearts were darkened. 22Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for an image resembling mortal human beings or birds or four-footed animals or reptiles.

24Therefore God gave them over in the desires of their hearts to impurity, to dishonor their bodies among themselves. 25They exchanged the truth of God for a lie and worshiped and served the creation rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.

26For this reason God gave them over to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged the natural sexual relations for unnatural ones, 27and likewise the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed in their passions for one another. Men committed shameless acts with men and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.

28And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what should not be done. 29They are filled with every kind of unrighteousness, wickedness, covetousness, malice. They are rife with envy, murder, strife, deceit, hostility. They are gossips, 30slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, contrivers of all sorts of evil, disobedient to parents, 31senseless, covenant-breakers, heartless, ruthless. 32Although they fully know God’s righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but also approve of those who practice them.