Montgomery - Romans - 3

3:1  What special privilege, then, has the Jew? Or what is the use of circumcision?

3:2  Much in every way. First of all, because to them were entrusted the oracles of God.

3:3  Supposing some of them have proved faithless?

3:4  By no means! Be sure that God is ever true, though all mankind prove false. As it is written, That thou mayest be found just in thine argument, And gain thy cause when thou contendest.

3:5  But if our unrighteousness thus brings out God’s righteousness, what shall we say? Is God unrighteous - I speak after the manner of men - when he inflicts his anger on us?

3:6  Be it far from us; for in that case how could God judge the world?

3:7  But if by a falsehood of mine the truthfulness of God has been made to redound to his glory, why am I still tried as a sinner?

3:8  And why not say (as I myself am slanderously reported to say), "Let us do evil that good may come out of it"? Such arguments are rightly condemned.

3:9  What then? Are we Jews in a better position? Not at all, for I have already charged all, both Jews and Gentiles, with being under sin.

3:10  As it is written. There is none righteous, no, not one;

3:11  There is none that understands, none that seeks for God!

3:12  All have swerved from the right path; Every one of them has become corrupt. There is none that practises good, no, not one.

3:13  Their throat is an open grave; With their tongues they have used deceit. The venom of asps is under their lips.

3:14  Their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness.

3:15  Their feet are swift to shed blood.

3:16  Destruction and ruin are in their paths;

3:17  And the path of peace they have not known.

3:18  Reverence for God is not before their eyes.

3:19  Now we know that whatever the Law says, it speaks to those who are under the Law; so that every mouth may be shut, and all the world may be brought under the judgment of God.

3:20  For no man will be justified in God’s sight by works of the Law; for through the Law comes the consciousness of sin.

3:21  But now, quite apart from any law, a righteousness coming from God has been fully brought to light, continually witnessed to by the Law and the Prophets.

3:22  I mean a righteousness coming from God through faith in Jesus Christ, for all who believe. For there is no distinction between Jew and Gentile,

3:23  since all have sinned and lack the glory which comes from God;

3:24  but they are now being justified by his free grace through the deliverance that is in Christ Jesus.

3:25  For God openly set him forth for himself as an offering of atonement through faith, by means of his blood, in order to show forth his righteousness - since in his forbearance he had passed over the sins previously committed - to show forth his righteousness,

3:26  I say, at this present time; that he himself might be just, and yet the justifier of him who has faith in Jesus.

3:27  Then what becomes of boasting? It is shut out. What sort of law forbids it? A law of works? No, but a law of faith.

3:28  For I conclude that a man is justified by faith, altogether apart from the deeds of the Law.

3:29  Is God then the God of the Jews alone, and not of the Gentiles also? He is God of the Gentiles also,

3:30  since there is one God who will justify the circumcised through faith, and by their faith will he justify the uncircumcised.

3:31  Do we then render law invalid through faith? Certainly not; on the contrary we make it stand.