He made no difference between us and them; he forgave their sins because they believed.

A foreigner who has joined the LORD's people should not say, "The LORD will not let me worship with his people." A man who has been castrated should never think that because he cannot have children, he can never be part of God's people.

then your name will be remembered in my Temple and among my people longer than if you had sons and daughters. You will never be forgotten."

"I will bring you to Zion, my sacred hill, give you joy in my house of prayer, and accept the sacrifices you offer on my altar. My Temple will be called a house of prayer for the people of all nations."

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

If you obey the Law, your circumcision is of value; but if you disobey the Law, you might as well never have been circumcised.

And so you Jews will be condemned by the Gentiles because you break the Law, even though you have it written down and are circumcised; but they obey the Law, even though they are not physically circumcised.

Rather, the real Jew is the person who is a Jew on the inside, that is, whose heart has been circumcised, and this is the work of God's Spirit, not of the written Law. Such a person receives praise from God, not from human beings.

God puts people right through their faith in Jesus Christ. God does this to all who believe in Christ, because there is no difference at all:

Or is God the God of the Jews only? Is he not the God of the Gentiles also? Of course he is.

God is one, and he will put the Jews right with himself on the basis of their faith, and will put the Gentiles right through their faith.

This includes everyone, because there is no difference between Jews and Gentiles; God is the same Lord of all and richly blesses all who call to him.

As the scripture says, "Everyone who calls out to the Lord for help will be saved."

In the same way, all of us, whether Jews or Gentiles, whether slaves or free, have been baptized into the one body by the same Spirit, and we have all been given the one Spirit to drink.

So there is no difference between Jews and Gentiles, between slaves and free people, between men and women; you are all one in union with Christ Jesus.

But now, in union with Christ Jesus you, who used to be far away, have been brought near by the blood of Christ.

He abolished the Jewish Law with its commandments and rules, in order to create out of the two races one new people in union with himself, in this way making peace.

So Christ came and preached the Good News of peace to all---to you Gentiles, who were far away from God, and to the Jews, who were near to him.

The secret is that by means of the gospel the Gentiles have a part with the Jews in God's blessings; they are members of the same body and share in the promise that God made through Christ Jesus.

I am less than the least of all God's people; yet God gave me this privilege of taking to the Gentiles the Good News about the infinite riches of Christ,

It is we, not they, who have received the true circumcision, for we worship God by means of his Spirit and rejoice in our life in union with Christ Jesus. We do not put any trust in external ceremonies.

The gospel keeps bringing blessings and is spreading throughout the world, just as it has among you ever since the day you first heard about the grace of God and came to know it as it really is.

You must, of course, continue faithful on a firm and sure foundation, and must not allow yourselves to be shaken from the hope you gained when you heard the gospel. It is of this gospel that I, Paul, became a servant---this gospel which has been preached to everybody in the world.

And I have been made a servant of the church by God, who gave me this task to perform for your good. It is the task of fully proclaiming his message,

God's plan is to make known his secret to his people, this rich and glorious secret which he has for all peoples. And the secret is that Christ is in you, which means that you will share in the glory of God.

As a result, there is no longer any distinction between Gentiles and Jews, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarians, savages, slaves, and free, but Christ is all, Christ is in all.

He was a religious man; he and his whole family worshiped God. He also did much to help the Jewish poor people and was constantly praying to God.

And so it was that the church throughout Judea, Galilee, and Samaria had a time of peace. Through the help of the Holy Spirit it was strengthened and grew in numbers, as it lived in reverence for the Lord.

God said to us humans, "To be wise, you must have reverence for the Lord. To understand, you must turn from evil."

Reverence for the LORD is good; it will continue forever. The judgments of the LORD are just; they are always fair.

Surely he is ready to save those who honor him, and his saving presence will remain in our land.

The way to become wise is to honor the LORD; he gives sound judgment to all who obey his commands. He is to be praised forever.

To have knowledge, you must first have reverence for the LORD. Stupid people have no respect for wisdom and refuse to learn.

If you do, you will know what it means to fear the LORD and you will succeed in learning about God.

Never let yourself think that you are wiser than you are; simply obey the LORD and refuse to do wrong.

Be loyal and faithful, and God will forgive your sin. Obey the LORD and nothing evil will happen to you.

After all this, there is only one thing to say: Have reverence for God, and obey his commands, because this is all that we were created for.

All these promises are made to us, my dear friends. So then, let us purify ourselves from everything that makes body or soul unclean, and let us be completely holy by living in awe of God.

Submit yourselves to one another because of your reverence for Christ.

You know that Christ is righteous; you should know, then, that everyone who does what is right is God's child.

but he rejected Cain and his offering. Cain became furious, and he scowled in anger.

If you had done the right thing, you would be smiling; but because you have done evil, sin is crouching at your door. It wants to rule you, but you must overcome it."

They offer sacrifices to me and eat the meat of the sacrifices. But I, the LORD, am not pleased with them, and now I will remember their sin and punish them for it; I will send them back to Egypt!

The angel came to her and said, "Peace be with you! The Lord is with you and has greatly blessed you!"

Let us praise God for his glorious grace, for the free gift he gave us in his dear Son!

It was faith that made Abel offer to God a better sacrifice than Cain's. Through his faith he won God's approval as a righteous man, because God himself approved of his gifts. By means of his faith Abel still speaks, even though he is dead.

No one can please God without faith, for whoever comes to God must have faith that God exists and rewards those who seek him.