16

1 I recommend my sister Phoebe to you highly, who serves the assembly that takes place in the Greek port of Cenchrea; 2 I commend her in the hope that you will receive her as someone who also participates in our divine ruler, and do so in a manner that is worthy of his purified followers. Please help her out in whatever way she might need something from you. She has been a wonderful hostess of many people and most especially of me. 

3 I would ask you to pay your respects to Prisca (whom I call “Severe”) and her husband, Aquila (“Eagle”), who are my co-workers as we all participate together within the Messiah Jesus. 4 They have risked their necks for me although I’m not the only one who is grateful for them; all the Jesus followers among the pagans who are part of God’s assembly give thanks for them.

15:14 Now, in and of myself I am absolutely certain about you, my brothers and sisters, that you are full of goodness, filled to the brim with all knowledge, and capable of instructing one another. 15 So I have written to you here rather boldly at times simply to remind you of what you already know, and this because of the particular gift that has been given to me by God—16that I should be a priest of Israel’s Messiah Jesus among the pagans, entrusted with the cultic duty of making the great proclamation about God, ultimately so that a sacred offering from the pagans should be acceptable to God, being purified by the Spirit who sanctifies us. 17 Thus, from my place within our Messiah, I can even boast about these things before God, 18although I do not dare to speak about anything which the Messiah is not effecting through me. His activity has resulted in the submission of the pagans, accomplished as I speak and work, as well as through the miracles and wonders I have done, although these were really accomplished by the Spirit. 19 So then, the proclamation about the Messiah has been declared by me from Jerusalem in a great circle up and around as far as Croatia.

15

1 We who are strong-minded—who lack concerns about food or days or whatever—ought to bear with the particular concerns of those who lack this robust outlook, and not simply please ourselves. 2 Indeed, each of us should seek to please our neighbors, seeking what is good for them—what will build them up. 3 In just this way the Messiah did not please himself but, as it is written, ‘the insults of those insulting you fell upon me.’ 4 Now whatever was written beforehand was written to instruct us so that through the perseverance and the encouragement that come from the Scriptures we might have hope. 5 So may the God of perseverance and encouragement give you the same mentality amongst yourselves that characterized the Messiah Jesus,

14

1 Accept those who have concerns as they think about various matters without entering into aggressive debates and disputes. 2 On the one hand, someone thinks that they can eat everything, but on the other hand, a person who has particular concerns eats just vegetables. 3 The one who eats everything shouldn’t despise the person who doesn’t eat so freely. And the person who doesn’t eat everything shouldn’t judgmentally condemn the person who eats freely; after all, God receives him.

 4 Who are you to judge someone else’s employee? It is only in the presence of his own employer that he is judged right or wrong. And he will be judged upright, for his employer—the Lord—is able to make him upright. 5 So, on the one hand, a certain person singles out days from other days as special, while, on the other hand, someone views all days as the same. Every person should be fully convinced about this in their own minds.

8 You are to pay exactly nothing to anyone except the payment of loving one another. Everyone loving another person has also fulfilled the Teachings of Moses.  9 The commandments “do not commit adultery,” “do not murder,” “do not steal,” “do not lust,” along with any other commandment, are definitively summed up in this word: “love your neighbor as you love yourself.” 10 Love does not “work” evil against a neighbor. So it follows that love fulfills all the commands found in the Teachings.

13

[The pompous voice of the Teacher returns at this point and the reading of the paragraph should be performed accordingly.]

1 “Let the soul of every person be subjugated to the authoritative authorities. For there are no authorities except those which exist at the deity’s behest; those that exist are ordained by the deity.2 So then the terrorist resisting the authorities resists that which the deity has commanded, and those so resisting will receive judgment.

12

1 I now beg you brothers and sisters, as we are enfolded by God’s compassion, to present your bodies back to God as sacrifices which are alive, pure, and pleasing, this being an appropriately intellectual act of sacred service. 2 So do not conform yourselves to this age but be transformed by the recreation of your minds, ultimately so that you can discern the will of God—that which is good and pleasing and perfect.

 3 Because of the gift that has been given to me I can instruct each one of you not to think too highly of yourselves, beyond what it is appropriate to think, but think wisely. So think about each person in your community as God has measured out a quantity of faith for them.

11

1 Speaker 1: “Well then, I would want to respond that surely God has not actually abandoned his people?!”

Speaker 2: “Of course not—note that I myself am an Israelite, descended from Abraham, from the tribe of Benjamin. 2 God has not abandoned his people whom he predicted would act like this. And don’t you realize what the Scripture says about Elijah as he was complaining to God about Israel? 3 ‘Lord, they have murdered your prophets and they have burned your altars to the ground; I alone have been left behind and they are seeking my life.’ 4 But what does the oracle say to him? ‘I have held back for myself seven thousand men who have not bent their knee to Baal.’ 5 Just so in the present season a remnant exists which has been chosen by God’s gracious patronage. 6 (And note how if it is by gracious patronage then it is not through works; indeed [if it was by works] then grace would not be grace.)”

10

1 Brothers and sisters, the deepest desire of my heart and my prayer on their behalf to God is for their salvation.

2 I can certainly attest that they are zealous for God, although not in an appropriately understanding fashion.

3 By ignoring the deliverance from God, and seeking to establish their own, they fail to subject themselves to the deliverance that comes from God himself.

4 The Messiah is the goal of the Torah, ultimately so that everyone who believes can receive deliverance.

5 So Moses writes about the deliverance which is achieved through the Torah, ‘the person who does these things, by means of them, will live.’”

9

1 I speak the truth as one located within the Messiah—I am not lying; my conscience attests to this within me as attested in turn by the divine spirit— 2that grief and constant pain press down on my heart. 3 I wish that I myself was accursed and cut off from the Messiah for the sake of my brothers and sisters, those who are my compatriots in terms of our human nature, 4 the Israelites. Theirs is the original historical adoption by God, the shining glory of his presence, the many covenants, the gift of the Teachings, the gift of the temple service, and the manifold promises. 5 Theirs are the great ancestors, and from them comes the Messiah in his human nature, the one who rules over everything as divine. (May he be blessed forever! “Amen.”)