For we conclude that a person is put right with God only through faith, and not by doing what the Law commands.

For it is not by hearing the Law that people are put right with God, but by doing what the Law commands.

When God promised Abraham and his descendants that the world would belong to him, he did so, not because Abraham obeyed the Law, but because he believed and was accepted as righteous by God.

And why not? Because they did not depend on faith but on what they did. And so they stumbled over the "stumbling stone"

(SEE 13:38)

Yet we know that a person is put right with God only through faith in Jesus Christ, never by doing what the Law requires. We, too, have believed in Christ Jesus in order to be put right with God through our faith in Christ, and not by doing what the Law requires. For no one is put right with God by doing what the Law requires.

So far as the Law is concerned, however, I am dead---killed by the Law itself---in order that I might live for God. I have been put to death with Christ on his cross,

Those who depend on obeying the Law live under a curse. For the scripture says, "Whoever does not always obey everything that is written in the book of the Law is under God's curse!"

But the Law has nothing to do with faith. Instead, as the scripture says, "Whoever does everything the Law requires will live."

Those of you who try to be put right with God by obeying the Law have cut yourselves off from Christ. You are outside God's grace.

For it is by God's grace that you have been saved through faith. It is not the result of your own efforts, but God's gift, so that no one can boast about it.

(SEE 2:8)

he saved us. It was not because of any good deeds that we ourselves had done, but because of his own mercy that he saved us, through the Holy Spirit, who gives us new birth and new life by washing us.

so that by his grace we might be put right with God and come into possession of the eternal life we hope for.

But if you treat people according to their outward appearance, you are guilty of sin, and the Law condemns you as a lawbreaker.

Whoever breaks one commandment is guilty of breaking them all.

Can anyone be righteous or pure in God's sight?

If you kept a record of our sins, who could escape being condemned?

Don't put me, your servant, on trial; no one is innocent in your sight.

You fool! Do you want to be shown that faith without actions is useless?

Can't you see? His faith and his actions worked together; his faith was made perfect through his actions.

You see, then, that it is by our actions that we are put right with God, and not by our faith alone.

So then, as the body without the spirit is dead, also faith without actions is dead.

Why, God does not trust even his angels; even they are not pure in his sight.

In his eyes even the moon is not bright, or the stars pure.

Shall we say, then, that the Law itself is sinful? Of course not! But it was the Law that made me know what sin is. If the Law had not said, "Do not desire what belongs to someone else," I would not have known such a desire.

I myself was once alive apart from law; but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life,

So far as the Law is concerned, however, I am dead---killed by the Law itself---in order that I might live for God. I have been put to death with Christ on his cross,