Romans 1:21

Plain English Version

The trouble was this. Even though people could work that out about God, they really didn’t want to know him. They didn’t want to say to him, “Thank you, you really are the true God.” They couldn’t think properly about him. They could only think in stupid ways. They didn’t understand anything.

Cross References

Genesis 6:5

God looked at the people on the earth, and he saw them doing lots of bad things. He knew the way they were thinking. They were thinking bad things all the time. God saw that the people were very bad.

Genesis 8:21

God smelled the meat cooking on that stone table, and he was happy. Then God said to himself, “People always just want to do bad things. They do that all their lives, from when they are little kids, right up until the time they die. But I will never again punish them the same way that I did this time. I will never again finish up everything that breathes air, and I will never again curse the earth. While the earth is still here, the seasons will stay the same. There will always be day and night, and every year there will be a hot time and a cold time, a wet season and a dry season. There will always be a right time to plant seeds for food, and a right time to get the food from those plants.”

John 3:19

So God will judge them. You see, the light has come into the world, but people don’t want the light. They love the darkness too much. They love doing bad things in the dark, and they want to keep on doing them.

Acts 26:18

and you will tell them the true message about me. It will be like you will open their eyes so that they can see things properly. They will come to God. Then Satan, the boss over the bad spirits, he will not control them with his power any more. It is like they are always in the dark now, but they will come into the light. They will believe in me, and they will stop believing lies. And then God will say they are not guilty of the bad things they did, and they will be God’s people.’ Jesus said that to me.”

Romans 1:19

God clearly shows everybody enough for us to understand the true story about him. Everybody knows about him.

Romans 1:28

You see, they didn’t like to even think about God, so he let them think about lots of bad things, and they did all sorts of wrong things.

Romans 15:9

And Jesus came for the people that are not Jews too, to show them that God feels sorry for them, and that God is good to them, so that they will thank God and tell everybody, “God is really good.” God got his men to write about this, and their words are in God’s book. One of them wrote, “All right God, I will tell all the people that are not Jews about you, and I will sing to you and say, ‘You are really great.’ ”

2 Timothy 3:2

Most people will only love themselves, and they will love money. They will think that they are smart, and they will tell everyone they are smart. They will say bad things about other people. They will never do what their parents tell them to do. They will never thank anyone for anything. They will not respect things that belong to God.

1 Peter 1:18

Your grand-parents and elders tried to teach you the way to live, but they didn’t teach you God’s way. That old way was useless, and you weren’t free. But God has saved you from that wrong way. He paid a lot to set you free from that old way. Sometimes people pay money to get somebody out of prison and let them go free. But money doesn’t last for ever.

1 Peter 2:9

But you are the people God picked out for himself. Together you work for him, like the men that looked after his ceremonies. You are his own family. God called you away from doing bad things, so you can do good things. It is like you used to live in the dark so that nobody could see you do bad things there, but now he called you away from that to live in his good light. So let’s tell everyone that God is really great and really good.