But when you are invited, go and sit down in the lowest place, so that when he who invited you comes he may say to you, Friend, go up higher. Then you will have glory in the presence of those who sit at the table with you.

For whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.

even the righteousness of God, through the faith of Jesus Christ, to all and upon all who believe. For there is no difference;

being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,

that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs, of the same body, and joint partakers of His promise in Christ through the gospel,

Yet they seek Me daily, and delight to know My ways, as a nation that did righteousness, and did not forsake the ordinance of their God. They ask of Me the ordinances of justice; they take delight in drawing near to God.

They say, Why have we fasted, and You do not see? Why have we afflicted our souls, and You take no notice? Behold, in the day of your fast you devise pleasures, and oppress all your laborers.

and to speak to the priests who were in the house of Jehovah of Hosts, and to the prophets, saying, Should I weep in the fifth month, consecrating myself as I have done these many years?

Speak to all the people of the land, and to the priests, saying, When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months, even those seventy years, did you truly fast to Me, even to Me?

And you have said, Behold, what weariness. And you have sniffed at it, says Jehovah of Hosts. And you bring what was stolen, and the lame, and the sick; and you bring the grain offering. Should I accept it from your hand? says Jehovah.

You have said, It is vain to serve God. And, What profit is it that we have kept His charge, and that we have walked as mourners before Jehovah of Hosts?

So he answered and said to his father, Lo, these many years I have been serving you; I never transgressed your commandment at any time; and yet you never gave me a young goat, that I might make merry with my friends.

But as soon as this son of yours came, who has devoured your livelihood with harlots, you killed the fatted calf for him.

The Pharisee stood and prayed thus to himself, God, I thank You that I am not like other men; extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector.

I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I possess.

Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? Of works? No, but through the law of faith.

What shall we say then? That Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have taken hold of righteousness, even the righteousness of faith;

Why? Because it was not by faith, but as out of works of the Law. For they stumbled at the stumbling stone.

Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is for them to be saved.

For they, being ignorant of God's righteousness, and seeking to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted to the righteousness of God.

Even so then, at this present time there is a remnant according to the election of grace.

And if by grace, then it is no longer of works; otherwise grace no longer becomes grace. But if it is of works, it is no longer grace; otherwise work is no longer work.

To the present hour we both hunger and thirst, and we are poorly clothed, and beaten, and wander homeless.

Are they ministers of Christ? (I speak as a fool) I excel them: in labors more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequently, in deaths often.

Three times I was beaten with rods; once I was stoned; three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I have been in the deep;

in hardship and toil, in sleeplessness often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness;