Night Watch Devotion

To the choirmaster: with stringed instruments. A Psalm of David.
¹ Answer me when I call, O God of my righteousness! You have given me relief when I was in distress. Be gracious to me and hear my prayer!
² O men, how long shall my honor be turned into shame? How long will you love vain words and seek after lies? Selah
³ But know that the LORD has set apart the godly for himself; the LORD hears when I call to him.
⁴ Be angry, and do not sin; ponder in your own hearts on your beds, and be silent. Selah
⁵ Offer right sacrifices, and put your trust in the LORD.
⁶ There are many who say, “Who will show us some good? Lift up the light of your face upon us, O LORD!”
⁷ You have put more joy in my heart than they have when their grain and wine abound.
⁸ In peace I will both lie down and sleep; for you alone, O LORD, make me dwell in safety. (ESV)

¹ In you, O LORD, do I take refuge; let me never be put to shame!
² In your righteousness deliver me and rescue me; incline your ear to me, and save me!
³ Be to me a rock of refuge, to which I may continually come; you have given the command to save me, for you are my rock and my fortress.
⁴ Rescue me, O my God, from the hand of the wicked, from the grasp of the unjust and cruel man.
⁵ For you, O Lord, are my hope, my trust, O LORD, from my youth.
⁶ Upon you I have leaned from before my birth; you are he who took me from my mother’s womb. My praise is continually of you.
⁷ I have been as a portent to many, but you are my strong refuge.
⁸ My mouth is filled with your praise, and with your glory all the day.
⁹ Do not cast me off in the time of old age; forsake me not when my strength is spent.
¹⁰ For my enemies speak concerning me; those who watch for my life consult together
¹¹ and say, “God has forsaken him; pursue and seize him, for there is none to deliver him.”
¹² O God, be not far from me; O my God, make haste to help me!
¹³ May my accusers be put to shame and consumed; with scorn and disgrace may they be covered who seek my hurt.
¹⁴ But I will hope continually and will praise you yet more and more.
¹⁵ My mouth will tell of your righteous acts, of your deeds of salvation all the day, for their number is past my knowledge.
¹⁶ With the mighty deeds of the Lord GOD I will come; I will remind them of your righteousness, yours alone.
¹⁷ O God, from my youth you have taught me, and I still proclaim your wondrous deeds.
¹⁸ So even to old age and gray hairs, O God, do not forsake me, until I proclaim your might to another generation, your power to all those to come.
¹⁹ Your righteousness, O God, reaches the high heavens. You who have done great things, O God, who is like you?
²⁰ You who have made me see many troubles and calamities will revive me again; from the depths of the earth you will bring me up again.
²¹ You will increase my greatness and comfort me again.
²² I will also praise you with the harp for your faithfulness, O my God; I will sing praises to you with the lyre, O Holy One of Israel.
²³ My lips will shout for joy, when I sing praises to you; my soul also, which you have redeemed.
²⁴ And my tongue will talk of your righteous help all the day long, for they have been put to shame and disappointed who sought to do me hurt. (ESV)

¹ When Israel went out from Egypt, the house of Jacob from a people of strange language,
² Judah became his sanctuary, Israel his dominion.
³ The sea looked and fled; Jordan turned back.
⁴ The mountains skipped like rams, the hills like lambs.
⁵ What ails you, O sea, that you flee? O Jordan, that you turn back?
⁶ O mountains, that you skip like rams? O hills, like lambs?
⁷ Tremble, O earth, at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the God of Jacob,
⁸ who turns the rock into a pool of water, the flint into a spring of water.

¹ Not to us, O LORD, not to us, but to your name give glory, for the sake of your steadfast love and your faithfulness!
² Why should the nations say, “Where is their God?”
³ Our God is in the heavens; he does all that he pleases.
⁴ Their idols are silver and gold, the work of human hands.
⁵ They have mouths, but do not speak; eyes, but do not see.
⁶ They have ears, but do not hear; noses, but do not smell.
⁷ They have hands, but do not feel; feet, but do not walk; and they do not make a sound in their throat.
⁸ Those who make them become like them; so do all who trust in them.
⁹ O Israel, trust in the LORD! He is their help and their shield.
¹⁰ O house of Aaron, trust in the LORD! He is their help and their shield.
¹¹ You who fear the LORD, trust in the LORD! He is their help and their shield.
¹² The LORD has remembered us; he will bless us; he will bless the house of Israel; he will bless the house of Aaron;
¹³ he will bless those who fear the LORD, both the small and the great.
¹⁴ May the LORD give you increase, you and your children!
¹⁵ May you be blessed by the LORD, who made heaven and earth!
¹⁶ The heavens are the LORD’s heavens, but the earth he has given to the children of man.
¹⁷ The dead do not praise the LORD, nor do any who go down into silence.
¹⁸ But we will bless the LORD from this time forth and forevermore. Praise the LORD! (ESV)

¹ Now concerning the times and the seasons, brothers, you have no need to have anything written to you.
² For you yourselves are fully aware that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night.
³ While people are saying, “There is peace and security,” then sudden destruction will come upon them as labor pains come upon a pregnant woman, and they will not escape.
⁴ But you are not in darkness, brothers, for that day to surprise you like a thief.
⁵ For you are all children of light, children of the day. We are not of the night or of the darkness.
⁶ So then let us not sleep, as others do, but let us keep awake and be sober.
⁷ For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, are drunk at night. (ESV)

¹ Now Joseph had been brought down to Egypt, and Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh, the captain of the guard, an Egyptian, had bought him from the Ishmaelites who had brought him down there.
² The LORD was with Joseph, and he became a successful man, and he was in the house of his Egyptian master.
³ His master saw that the LORD was with him and that the LORD caused all that he did to succeed in his hands.
⁴ So Joseph found favor in his sight and attended him, and he made him overseer of his house and put him in charge of all that he had.
⁵ From the time that he made him overseer in his house and over all that he had, the LORD blessed the Egyptian’s house for Joseph’s sake; the blessing of the LORD was on all that he had, in house and field.
⁶ So he left all that he had in Joseph’s charge, and because of him he had no concern about anything but the food he ate. Now Joseph was handsome in form and appearance.
⁷ And after a time his master’s wife cast her eyes on Joseph and said, “Lie with me.”
⁸ But he refused and said to his master’s wife, “Behold, because of me my master has no concern about anything in the house, and he has put everything that he has in my charge.
⁹ He is not greater in this house than I am, nor has he kept back anything from me except you, because you are his wife. How then can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?”
¹⁰ And as she spoke to Joseph day after day, he would not listen to her, to lie beside her or to be with her.
¹¹ But one day, when he went into the house to do his work and none of the men of the house was there in the house,
¹² she caught him by his garment, saying, “Lie with me.” But he left his garment in her hand and fled and got out of the house.
¹³ And as soon as she saw that he had left his garment in her hand and had fled out of the house,
¹⁴ she called to the men of her household and said to them, “See, he has brought among us a Hebrew to laugh at us. He came in to me to lie with me, and I cried out with a loud voice.
¹⁵ And as soon as he heard that I lifted up my voice and cried out, he left his garment beside me and fled and got out of the house.”
¹⁶ Then she laid up his garment by her until his master came home,
¹⁷ and she told him the same story, saying, “The Hebrew servant, whom you have brought among us, came in to me to laugh at me.
¹⁸ But as soon as I lifted up my voice and cried, he left his garment beside me and fled out of the house.”
¹⁹ As soon as his master heard the words that his wife spoke to him, “This is the way your servant treated me,” his anger was kindled.
²⁰ And Joseph’s master took him and put him into the prison, the place where the king’s prisoners were confined, and he was there in prison.
²¹ But the LORD was with Joseph and showed him steadfast love and gave him favor in the sight of the keeper of the prison.
²² And the keeper of the prison put Joseph in charge of all the prisoners who were in the prison. Whatever was done there, he was the one who did it.
²³ The keeper of the prison paid no attention to anything that was in Joseph’s charge, because the LORD was with him. And whatever he did, the LORD made it succeed. (ESV)

¹³ And they were bringing children to him that he might touch them, and the disciples rebuked them.
¹⁴ But when Jesus saw it, he was indignant and said to them, “Let the children come to me; do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God.
¹⁵ Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it.”
¹⁶ And he took them in his arms and blessed them, laying his hands on them.
¹⁷ And as he was setting out on his journey, a man ran up and knelt before him and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
¹⁸ And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone.
¹⁹ You know the commandments: ‘Do not murder, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Do not defraud, Honor your father and mother.’”
²⁰ And he said to him, “Teacher, all these I have kept from my youth.”
²¹ And Jesus, looking at him, loved him, and said to him, “You lack one thing: go, sell all that you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.”
²² Disheartened by the saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.
²³ And Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How difficult it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!”
²⁴ And the disciples were amazed at his words. But Jesus said to them again, “Children, how difficult it is to enter the kingdom of God!
²⁵ It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.”
²⁶ And they were exceedingly astonished, and said to him, “Then who can be saved?”
²⁷ Jesus looked at them and said, “With man it is impossible, but not with God. For all things are possible with God.”
²⁸ Peter began to say to him, “See, we have left everything and followed you.”
²⁹ Jesus said, “Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel,
³⁰ who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life.
³¹ But many who are first will be last, and the last first.” (ESV)

¹ The LORD spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying,
² “Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, When you come into the land that I give you, the land shall keep a Sabbath to the LORD.
³ For six years you shall sow your field, and for six years you shall prune your vineyard and gather in its fruits,
⁴ but in the seventh year there shall be a Sabbath of solemn rest for the land, a Sabbath to the LORD. You shall not sow your field or prune your vineyard.
⁵ You shall not reap what grows of itself in your harvest, or gather the grapes of your undressed vine. It shall be a year of solemn rest for the land.
⁶ The Sabbath of the land shall provide food for you, for yourself and for your male and female slaves and for your hired worker and the sojourner who lives with you,
⁷ and for your cattle and for the wild animals that are in your land: all its yield shall be for food.
⁸ “You shall count seven weeks of years, seven times seven years, so that the time of the seven weeks of years shall give you forty-nine years.
⁹ Then you shall sound the loud trumpet on the tenth day of the seventh month. On the Day of Atonement you shall sound the trumpet throughout all your land.
¹⁰ And you shall consecrate the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you, when each of you shall return to his property and each of you shall return to his clan.
¹¹ That fiftieth year shall be a jubilee for you; in it you shall neither sow nor reap what grows of itself nor gather the grapes from the undressed vines.
¹² For it is a jubilee. It shall be holy to you. You may eat the produce of the field.
¹³ “In this year of jubilee each of you shall return to his property.
¹⁴ And if you make a sale to your neighbor or buy from your neighbor, you shall not wrong one another.
¹⁵ You shall pay your neighbor according to the number of years after the jubilee, and he shall sell to you according to the number of years for crops.
¹⁶ If the years are many, you shall increase the price, and if the years are few, you shall reduce the price, for it is the number of the crops that he is selling to you.
¹⁷ You shall not wrong one another, but you shall fear your God, for I am the LORD your God.
¹⁸ “Therefore you shall do my statutes and keep my rules and perform them, and then you will dwell in the land securely.
¹⁹ The land will yield its fruit, and you will eat your fill and dwell in it securely.
²⁰ And if you say, ‘What shall we eat in the seventh year, if we may not sow or gather in our crop?’
²¹ I will command my blessing on you in the sixth year, so that it will produce a crop sufficient for three years.
²² When you sow in the eighth year, you will be eating some of the old crop; you shall eat the old until the ninth year, when its crop arrives.
²³ “The land shall not be sold in perpetuity, for the land is mine. For you are strangers and sojourners with me.
²⁴ And in all the country you possess, you shall allow a redemption of the land.
²⁵ “If your brother becomes poor and sells part of his property, then his nearest redeemer shall come and redeem what his brother has sold.
²⁶ If a man has no one to redeem it and then himself becomes prosperous and finds sufficient means to redeem it,
²⁷ let him calculate the years since he sold it and pay back the balance to the man to whom he sold it, and then return to his property.
²⁸ But if he does not have sufficient means to recover it, then what he sold shall remain in the hand of the buyer until the year of jubilee. In the jubilee it shall be released, and he shall return to his property.
²⁹ “If a man sells a dwelling house in a walled city, he may redeem it within a year of its sale. For a full year he shall have the right of redemption.
³⁰ If it is not redeemed within a full year, then the house in the walled city shall belong in perpetuity to the buyer, throughout his generations; it shall not be released in the jubilee.
³¹ But the houses of the villages that have no wall around them shall be classified with the fields of the land. They may be redeemed, and they shall be released in the jubilee.
³² As for the cities of the Levites, the Levites may redeem at any time the houses in the cities they possess.
³³ And if one of the Levites exercises his right of redemption, then the house that was sold in a city they possess shall be released in the jubilee. For the houses in the cities of the Levites are their possession among the people of Israel.
³⁴ But the fields of pastureland belonging to their cities may not be sold, for that is their possession forever.
³⁵ “If your brother becomes poor and cannot maintain himself with you, you shall support him as though he were a stranger and a sojourner, and he shall live with you.
³⁶ Take no interest from him or profit, but fear your God, that your brother may live beside you.
³⁷ You shall not lend him your money at interest, nor give him your food for profit.
³⁸ I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt to give you the land of Canaan, and to be your God.
³⁹ “If your brother becomes poor beside you and sells himself to you, you shall not make him serve as a slave:
⁴⁰ he shall be with you as a hired worker and as a sojourner. He shall serve with you until the year of the jubilee.
⁴¹ Then he shall go out from you, he and his children with him, and go back to his own clan and return to the possession of his fathers.
⁴² For they are my servants, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt; they shall not be sold as slaves.
⁴³ You shall not rule over him ruthlessly but shall fear your God.
⁴⁴ As for your male and female slaves whom you may have: you may buy male and female slaves from among the nations that are around you.
⁴⁵ You may also buy from among the strangers who sojourn with you and their clans that are with you, who have been born in your land, and they may be your property.
⁴⁶ You may bequeath them to your sons after you to inherit as a possession forever. You may make slaves of them, but over your brothers the people of Israel you shall not rule, one over another ruthlessly.
⁴⁷ “If a stranger or sojourner with you becomes rich, and your brother beside him becomes poor and sells himself to the stranger or sojourner with you or to a member of the stranger’s clan,
⁴⁸ then after he is sold he may be redeemed. One of his brothers may redeem him,
⁴⁹ or his uncle or his cousin may redeem him, or a close relative from his clan may redeem him. Or if he grows rich he may redeem himself.
⁵⁰ He shall calculate with his buyer from the year when he sold himself to him until the year of jubilee, and the price of his sale shall vary with the number of years. The time he was with his owner shall be rated as the time of a hired worker.
⁵¹ If there are still many years left, he shall pay proportionately for his redemption some of his sale price.
⁵² If there remain but a few years until the year of jubilee, he shall calculate and pay for his redemption in proportion to his years of service.
⁵³ He shall treat him as a worker hired year by year. He shall not rule ruthlessly over him in your sight.
⁵⁴ And if he is not redeemed by these means, then he and his children with him shall be released in the year of jubilee.
⁵⁵ For it is to me that the people of Israel are servants. They are my servants whom I brought out of the land of Egypt: I am the LORD your God.

¹ “You shall not make idols for yourselves or erect an image or pillar, and you shall not set up a figured stone in your land to bow down to it, for I am the LORD your God.
² You shall keep my Sabbaths and reverence my sanctuary: I am the LORD.
³ “If you walk in my statutes and observe my commandments and do them,
⁴ then I will give you your rains in their season, and the land shall yield its increase, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit.
⁵ Your threshing shall last to the time of the grape harvest, and the grape harvest shall last to the time for sowing. And you shall eat your bread to the full and dwell in your land securely.
⁶ I will give peace in the land, and you shall lie down, and none shall make you afraid. And I will remove harmful beasts from the land, and the sword shall not go through your land.
⁷ You shall chase your enemies, and they shall fall before you by the sword.
⁸ Five of you shall chase a hundred, and a hundred of you shall chase ten thousand, and your enemies shall fall before you by the sword.
⁹ I will turn to you and make you fruitful and multiply you and will confirm my covenant with you.
¹⁰ You shall eat old store long kept, and you shall clear out the old to make way for the new.
¹¹ I will make my dwelling among you, and my soul shall not abhor you.
¹² And I will walk among you and will be your God, and you shall be my people.
¹³ I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that you should not be their slaves. And I have broken the bars of your yoke and made you walk erect. (ESV)

¹ When the Sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and anoint him.
² And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb.
³ And they were saying to one another, “Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance of the tomb?”
⁴ And looking up, they saw that the stone had been rolled back—it was very large.
⁵ And entering the tomb, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, dressed in a white robe, and they were alarmed.
⁶ And he said to them, “Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen; he is not here. See the place where they laid him.
⁷ But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going before you to Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.”
⁸ And they went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had seized them, and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid. [Some of the earliest manuscripts do not include 16:9–20.] [[
⁹ Now when he rose early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, from whom he had cast out seven demons.
¹⁰ She went and told those who had been with him, as they mourned and wept.
¹¹ But when they heard that he was alive and had been seen by her, they would not believe it.
¹² After these things he appeared in another form to two of them, as they were walking into the country.
¹³ And they went back and told the rest, but they did not believe them.
¹⁴ Afterward he appeared to the eleven themselves as they were reclining at table, and he rebuked them for their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they had not believed those who saw him after he had risen.
¹⁵ And he said to them, “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation.
¹⁶ Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.
¹⁷ And these signs will accompany those who believe: in my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues;
¹⁸ they will pick up serpents with their hands; and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.”
¹⁹ So then the Lord Jesus, after he had spoken to them, was taken up into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God.
²⁰ And they went out and preached everywhere, while the Lord worked with them and confirmed the message by accompanying signs.]] (ESV)

¹ Shout for joy in the LORD, O you righteous! Praise befits the upright.
² Give thanks to the LORD with the lyre; make melody to him with the harp of ten strings!
³ Sing to him a new song; play skillfully on the strings, with loud shouts.
⁴ For the word of the LORD is upright, and all his work is done in faithfulness.
⁵ He loves righteousness and justice; the earth is full of the steadfast love of the LORD.
⁶ By the word of the LORD the heavens were made, and by the breath of his mouth all their host.
⁷ He gathers the waters of the sea as a heap; he puts the deeps in storehouses.
⁸ Let all the earth fear the LORD; let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him!
⁹ For he spoke, and it came to be; he commanded, and it stood firm.
¹⁰ The LORD brings the counsel of the nations to nothing; he frustrates the plans of the peoples.
¹¹ The counsel of the LORD stands forever, the plans of his heart to all generations. (ESV)

¹ Or do you not know, brothers—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law is binding on a person only as long as he lives?
² For a married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives, but if her husband dies she is released from the law of marriage.
³ Accordingly, she will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law, and if she marries another man she is not an adulteress.
⁴ Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God.
⁵ For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death.
⁶ But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code.
⁷ What then shall we say? That the law is sin? By no means! Yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.”
⁸ But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead.
⁹ I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died.
¹⁰ The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me.
¹¹ For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me.
¹² So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.
¹³ Did that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, producing death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure.
¹⁴ For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin.
¹⁵ For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.
¹⁶ Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good.
¹⁷ So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.
¹⁸ For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out.
¹⁹ For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.
²⁰ Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.
²¹ So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand.
²² For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being,
²³ but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members.
²⁴ Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?
²⁵ Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.

¹ There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
² For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.
³ For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh,
⁴ in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.
⁵ For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.
⁶ For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.
⁷ For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot.
⁸ Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
⁹ You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.
¹⁰ But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.
¹¹ If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you.
¹² So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh.
¹³ For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.
¹⁴ For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.
¹⁵ For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!”
¹⁶ The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God,
¹⁷ and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.
¹⁸ For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.
¹⁹ For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God.
²⁰ For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope
²¹ that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.
²² For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now.
²³ And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.
²⁴ For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees?
²⁵ But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.
²⁶ Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words.
²⁷ And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.
²⁸ And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.
²⁹ For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.
³⁰ And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.
³¹ What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?
³² He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?
³³ Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies.
³⁴ Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us.
³⁵ Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword?
³⁶ As it is written, “For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.”
³⁷ No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.
³⁸ For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers,
³⁹ nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

¹ I am speaking the truth in Christ—I am not lying; my conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit—
² that I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart.
³ For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen according to the flesh.
⁴ They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises.
⁵ To them belong the patriarchs, and from their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ, who is God over all, blessed forever. Amen.
⁶ But it is not as though the word of God has failed. For not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel,
⁷ and not all are children of Abraham because they are his offspring, but “Through Isaac shall your offspring be named.”
⁸ This means that it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as offspring.
⁹ For this is what the promise said: “About this time next year I will return, and Sarah shall have a son.”
¹⁰ And not only so, but also when Rebekah had conceived children by one man, our forefather Isaac,
¹¹ though they were not yet born and had done nothing either good or bad—in order that God’s purpose of election might continue, not because of works but because of him who calls—
¹² she was told, “The older will serve the younger.”
¹³ As it is written, “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”
¹⁴ What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God’s part? By no means!
¹⁵ For he says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”
¹⁶ So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy.
¹⁷ For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.”
¹⁸ So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills.
¹⁹ You will say to me then, “Why does he still find fault? For who can resist his will?”
²⁰ But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, “Why have you made me like this?”
²¹ Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use?
²² What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction,
²³ in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory—
²⁴ even us whom he has called, not from the Jews only but also from the Gentiles?
²⁵ As indeed he says in Hosea, “Those who were not my people I will call ‘my people,’ and her who was not beloved I will call ‘beloved.’”
²⁶ “And in the very place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’ there they will be called ‘sons of the living God.’”
²⁷ And Isaiah cries out concerning Israel: “Though the number of the sons of Israel be as the sand of the sea, only a remnant of them will be saved,
²⁸ for the Lord will carry out his sentence upon the earth fully and without delay.”
²⁹ And as Isaiah predicted, “If the Lord of hosts had not left us offspring, we would have been like Sodom and become like Gomorrah.”
³⁰ What shall we say, then? That Gentiles who did not pursue righteousness have attained it, that is, a righteousness that is by faith;
³¹ but that Israel who pursued a law that would lead to righteousness did not succeed in reaching that law.
³² Why? Because they did not pursue it by faith, but as if it were based on works. They have stumbled over the stumbling stone,
³³ as it is written, “Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offense; and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.”

¹ Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for them is that they may be saved.
² For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge.
³ For, being ignorant of the righteousness of God, and seeking to establish their own, they did not submit to God’s righteousness.
⁴ For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.
⁵ For Moses writes about the righteousness that is based on the law, that the person who does the commandments shall live by them.
⁶ But the righteousness based on faith says, “Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?’” (that is, to bring Christ down)
⁷ “or ‘Who will descend into the abyss?’” (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead).
⁸ But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith that we proclaim);
⁹ because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
¹⁰ For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.
¹¹ For the Scripture says, “Everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame.”
¹² For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him.
¹³ For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”
¹⁴ How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching?
¹⁵ And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!”
¹⁶ But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, “Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us?”
¹⁷ So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.
¹⁸ But I ask, have they not heard? Indeed they have, for “Their voice has gone out to all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world.”
¹⁹ But I ask, did Israel not understand? First Moses says, “I will make you jealous of those who are not a nation; with a foolish nation I will make you angry.”
²⁰ Then Isaiah is so bold as to say, “I have been found by those who did not seek me; I have shown myself to those who did not ask for me.”
²¹ But of Israel he says, “All day long I have held out my hands to a disobedient and contrary people.” (ESV)