And to you, who once were 'dead,' by reason of your sins and your uncircumcised nature--to you God gave Life in giving life to Christ! He pardoned all our sins!
As Scripture says-'I have made thee the Father of many nations.') And this they do in the sight of that God in whom Abraham had faith, and who gives life to the dead, and speaks of what does not yet exist as if it did.
Do not offer any part of your bodies to Sin, in the cause of unrighteousness, but once for all offer yourselves to God (as those who, though once dead, now have Life), and devote every part of your bodies to the cause of righteousness.
And, if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead lives within you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will give Life even to your mortal bodies, through his Spirit living within you.
Our fitness comes from God, who himself made us fit to be ministers of a New Covenant, of which the substance is, not a written Law, but a Spirit. For the written Law means Death, but the Spirit gives Life.
To proclaim that God, in Christ, was reconciling the world to himself, not reckoning men's offenses against them, and that he had entrusted us with the Message of this reconciliation.
Remember, therefore, that you were once Gentiles yourselves, as your bodies showed; you were called 'The Uncircumcised' by those who were called 'The Circumcised'--circumcised only by the hand of man!
For everything that has its true character made manifest is clear as light. And that is why it is said--'Sleeper, awake! Arise from the dead, and the Christ shall give thee light!'
For in baptism you were buried with Christ; and in baptism you were also raised to Life with him, through your faith in the omnipotence of God, who raised him from the dead.
Therefore, let us leave behind the elementary teaching about the Christ and press on to perfection, not always laying over again a foundation of repentance for a lifeless formality, of faith in God--
how much more will the blood of the Christ, who, through his eternal Spirit, offered himself up to God, as a victim without blemish, purify our consciences from a lifeless formality, and fit us for the service of the Living God!