ROMANS CHAPTER 1 - 6

THE EPISTLE OF PAUL TO THE ROMANS

On his third journey to bring out the word
Of Gospel to the folk who have not heard,
Paul writes a note to Rome to those who share
Your worship, my Beloved, on Nero's stair.
His message is how are men set right with
You, their Creator and not god of myth.
It's not by faithfulness or doing well,
But by Your act alone, the truth to tell.
The same power that breathed life into the clay
Breathes life eternal on the slumbered day.
You choose Your own and with creating power
Make them atone the stricken heart an hour,
And raise up from total depravity
The saints that You set on the glassy sea.

ROMANS 1

1 Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ,
Called an apostle, not enticed,
But separated to the work
Of God’s gospel and not to shirk,
2 Which he had promised before through
His prophets in the Books of YHWH,
3 Concerning Jesus Christ His son
Or servant as the word’s best done,
Who is our lord and master, who
Was born of David’s seed and stock
According to the flesh and rock,
4 And declared son of God, Messiah,
With power and without pariah
According to the Spirit of
Holiness, grace and divine love,
By resurrection from the dead,
As Paul’s Damascus vision said.

It’s true, Beloved, there is a word in Greek
For servant and another when we seek
To say son, but Semitic thought confuses
Both concepts in the waled, boy, it uses
Sometimes for offspring and at other times
For underling. Since there’s no God the Mother
Mentioned in Scripture, son must mean the other.
Expression Son of God is clearly used
To mean Christ, so I need not be confused.
Paul’s vision of him made him think he was
Raised from the dead, but visionary clause
Shows nothing more than that the master lives,
Occulted and within the grace God gives.
I take his promises for all my rhymes.

It was his escape from the grave that made
Jesus the Son of God or Christ, not shade
Of cosmic or eternal pre-existence.
The gospel’s in escape from the insistence
Of knuckling under Rome despite the cross
And all the machinations and their loss.
Declared son by escape from death is greater
Than being primordial god and creator.
Let me, Beloved, participate in that
Great gospel promise, that where I am at
I may escape the consequence of death
At the hands of Rome’s gaunt authorities,
As I rely on You from breath to breath
And tread down visions of both earth and seas.

O my Beloved, Your blessed Messiah’s born
Into a stock both royal, without scorn,
Descendant of David whose reign is free
Beneath the heavens on earth eternally,
Who sought refuge and solace in the tent
Of Kedar, and left there blessèd descent
Joining the stocks of Abraham in one
And making prophets all brothers when done.
Brotherhood of the flesh, though right and true,
Is not all that You’ve meant in faith to do.
The promised ones speak by the holy word
Of Your grace and Your spirit undeterred.
Beloved, keep me in love and loyalty
To David’s holy sons and family.

5 Through him we have received grace and
Apostleship in the command
To obey the faith in all nations
For his name and his name’s elations,
6 Among whom you too are the called
Of Jesus Christ, be not appalled,
7 To all who are beloved of God,
In Rome, called to be saints and shod:
Grace to you and peace from our Father
God, and from Jesus who is rather
Lord and Christ, not Almighty God.

Before Jesus all prophets came alone
To their own kin and family as shown
In Balaam’s inability to curse
Another righteous nation for the worse,
And Jonah’s flight to avoid being sent
To Nineveh to preach repentance lent.
Jesus himself came to Israel’s lost sheep,
But when he escaped death his were to keep
All nations who came to the one to save
From power of sin and Rome and from the grave.
Since Jesus now all prophets come to bear
On men and women of faith everywhere.
His victory is witness You are one,
Beloved, who sees humanity as done.

8 First, I thank my God through Christ Jesus,
(“Through” means he’s not my God as pleases),
For all of you, since your faith is
Well-spoken in the whole world whiz.
9 For God’s my witness, whom I serve
With my spirit and not to swerve
From His son-servant’s gospel, that
I never cease to mention at
My prayers your case, 10 making request
If, by some means, and now at best
And last I may find in God’s will
A way to come to you with quill.
11 For I long to see you, that I
May impart to you some gift by
The spirit, so that you may be
Established in the gospel free,
12 That is, that I may take comfort
Together with you by report
Of common faith we have in short.

Sweet Paul retracts his words unless they seem
Too egotistical for Roman dream.
Instead of benefactor after all,
He is content to be equals in stall,
Not teaching or pretending to teach others,
He’s willing to take comfort in his brothers.
I trust this is said in sincerity
And not mere clerical diplomacy.
Ach, I am touched by priestcraft in the state
Of modern ecclesiast’s reprobate.
Forgive, Beloved, suspicions I might raise
Against sweet Paul’s sincerity in ways.
Make me as sweet as he is for my hope,
And equal as he is to priest and pope.

13 Now I do not want you to be
Unconscious of the fixity
Of my plan to come to you, brothers,
But until now hindered by others,
That I might have some fruit among
You too, as with Gentiles of tongue.
14 I am a debtor both to Greeks
And to barbarians, who seeks
Both wise and unwise. 15 So, as much
As is in me, ready to touch
The gospel preaching to you who
Are living in far-off Rome too.

Such good news this! That even Rome can hide
Some barbarians in whom hopes abide
That faith like candles in a darkened cave
Burn on though pagan banners taller wave
Above the city of eternity.
That Rome like heathen Babylon of old
Has ten of faith more than in Sodom told,
To whom Paul turns a loving eye and pen.
There is no place where there are no good men,
And even Nazareth produced our lord.
Therefore let all men bare and break the sword,
Since there’s no city to attack where all
Are fully depraved not to hear Your call
To obey You, Beloved, in unity.

16 For I am not ashamed of Christ
And his gospel, it’s power and priced
Of God to the salvation of
Everyone who believes with love,
For the Jew first, also the Greek,
Or any other that may seek.
17 For in it’s seen God’s righteousness
From faith to faith, as is witness
In Scripture, “The just shall live by
Faithfulness.” 18 For the wrath thereby,
God’s, is revealed from heaven against
All men’s ungodliness and more
Their unrighteousness, who suppress
The truth for unrighteousness’ score,
19 Because what may of God be known
Is clear in them, for God has shown
It to them. 20 For since the creation
Of the world there’s a demonstration
Of his invisible virtues,
Being grasped by the things and views
That are created here to be,
Eternal power, divinity,
So that they are without excuse,
21 Because that, although they knew God,
They did not glorify as God,
Nor were they thankful, but became
Futile in their thoughts, to their shame,
And their foolish hearts were darkened.
22 Professing to be wise, by end
They became fools, 23 and changed the glory
Of incorruptible God to
An image made like mortal man
In fabled legend, mythic story
Of birds, dove, eagle and emu,
And the four-footed beast that ran,
And creeping things instead of glory.

Whatever gospel is in Paul’s clear sight,
It’s not a tale of gods made in man’s plight,
And being born, and dying and some day
Reviving corn and sighing on the way.
Oh no, the God of Paul’s Gospel’s One that
Is in eternal power, divinity,
In every manifest appearance sat
Upon the throne of His own sovereignty.
Their foolish hearts are darkened to relate
That one man above others is in state
Of God Almighty while the rest resign
To role of servants to the divine kine.
I thank You, my Beloved, You’re not a man
Or even woman, for no human can.

24 Therefore God also gave them up
To uncleanness, and the filled cup
Of lusts in their hearts, to dishonour
Their own bodies themselves, a goner,
25 Who exchanged the truth of God for
The lie, and prostrated before
And served the creature rather than
Creator, ever blessed. Amen.
26 For this reason God gave them up
To the vile passions of their cup.
For even their women exchanged
The natural for what is estranged.
27 Likewise also the men, leaving
The natural use of women, fling
Their burning lust on one another,
Men with men and brother with brother
Committing what is shameful act,
And having in themselves the due
Penalty that their errors drew.

Who serve the local gods by rite and dream,
Find that their punishment is worth a scream.
Who turn gods into men and mythic tale
Find that their own bodies against them flail.
What can be worse in judgement for a man,
Who is a wencher in the tavern span,
Suddenly to burn in lust for the male
After his constant seeking female tale?
The ones who used to laugh deriding gays
And bash them for their pride and for their ways
Are driven in a bloody, lusty haze
To rock with one another, plunge and pitch,
And welter in the caudal ground and ditch.
The punishment You mete out, Lord, is rich.

28 And even as they did not wish
To retain God in heathenish
Knowledge, God gave them over to
Debased mind, those things that they do
Are not fitting, 29 but being filled
With all unrighteousness self-willed,
And sexual immorality,
And wickedness abundantly,
Covetousness, maliciousness,
Full of envy, murder, and strife,
Deceit, and evil-mindedness,
Whisperers, 30 backbiters, haters
Of God, violent, proud, boasters,
Inventors of things evil, and
To parents disobedient,
31 And undiscerning in the land,
And untrustworthy where they went,
Unloving, unforgiving, and
Unmerciful, 32 who, knowing that
God’s judgement’s righteous, knowing that
Those who practice such things deserve
Death, not only do the same but
Also approve practice of smut.

Beloved, cleanse me today in mind and soul,
The body temple that I still hold whole,
And show me greater visions from on high
That raise me from debasing earthly cry.
I lift my eyes like the disciples past
From Olivet and see the rising mast
Of ship upon the crystal sea, I cast
My anchors on the heavenly shore and fast.
I follow in the veil before Your throne,
I see the Son of God weigh there alone
The prayers of those whose sins he can atone,
And give myself in sacrifice to You,
A living sacrifice in heavenly view,
In humble toil upon the earthly dew.

ROMANS 2

1 Therefore you’re inexcusable,
O man, whoever you are full
Of judgement for others, for you
Who judge, practice the same things too.

The question I ask Paul if whether it
Would be appropriate or even fit
To judge another for the things that I
Do not do seeking ever to comply
With the divine law that You one time bit.
Fact is all men judge others and give blame
Whether they do or not sins just the same.
My own goal has been only to judge others
By the ten rules you gave to human brothers,
And leave the judging of all other things
To You alone, though in my surmisings,
It seems You judge no one for great or small
Apart from the ten words writ on the wall.
The divine judgement takes a lot of gall.

2 But we know that God’s judgement comes
According to truth against bums
Who practice such things. 3 Do you think
This, O man, you who judge (and drink)
Those practising such things, yet do
The same, that you’ll escape then too
The judgement of God? 4 Or do you
Despise the riches of His grace,
Forbearance, and longsuffering face,
Not knowing that God’s goodness leads
You to repentance? 5 But that feeds,
With your hard, unrepentant heart,
The storing up for your own part
Of wrath for the soon coming day
Of wrath and revelation of
The righteous judgement of God’s love,
6 Who “will render to each one well
According to his deeds”: 7 a spell
Of life eternal to those who
By patient well-doing are true
In seeking glory, honour, and
Their immortality to stand,
8 But to those who’re self-seeking and
Don’t obey the truth, but obey
Unrighteousness, lie in their way
Indignation and wrath that day,
9 Tribulation and anguish, on
Each soul of man who does evil,
Of the Jew first, also the bill
Of the Greek, 10 but glory, honour,
And peace to everyone confer
Who works what is good, at first to
The Jew and also to the Greek.
11 For there’s no partiality
With God. 12 For as many as seek
Sin without law’s knowledge to do
Will also perish in the sea
Of lawlessness, and as many
As have sinned in the law will be
Judged by the law 13 (for not who hear
The law are just before God’s fear,
But those who do are justified,
14 For when Gentiles, who do not side
With the law, by nature abide
In the things in the law, these, though
Not having the law, are a law
To themselves, 15 and are such as show
The work of the law writ in awe
In their hearts, their conscience also
Bearing witness, and so between
Themselves their thoughts are fairly seen
Accusing or excusing them)
16 In the day when God will judge them,
Men’s secrets by Jesus Christ, by
My gospel and my alibi.

You’ve given me a year or two, it seems,
Beyond the decade that anyone’s dreams
Could expect needful for repentance work.
There must have been times here when I would shirk.
Still as I daily repent of my past
And present lack of adherence aghast,
Give me the grace to live above the line
Of sin and lust that often will combine
In human heart to blind the soul in fine.
A pagan I may be, indeed, I trow,
Unless my Celtic ancestry somehow
Is Jewish enough by the holy cow.
The ten commandments written on my heart
Give me repentance now to make a start.

17 Indeed you may be called a Jew,
And rest on the law, and make you
Your boast in God, 18 and know his will,
And approve the things that are still
Excellent, instructed out of
The law, 19 and are confident of
Yourself to be guide to the blind,
A light to those who are resigned
In darkness, 20 an instructor of
The foolish, a teacher of babes,
Having the forms and astrolabes
Of knowledge and truth in the law.
21 You, therefore, who another’s maw
Fill, do you not teach yourself awe?
You who preach that a man should not
Steal, do you steal? 22 And you who taught
“Do not commit adultery,”
Do you commit adultery?
You who abhor idols, do you
Rob temples of their idols? 23 You
Who make your boast in the law, do
You dishonour God as you break
The law? 24 For “God’s name for your sake
Is blasphemed in the Gentiles’ wake,”
As it is written. 25 For indeed
Is circumcision profit’s seed
If you keep the law, but if you
Are a breaker of the law true,
Your circumcision has become
Uncircumcision in its sum.

Beloved, I rob no temples in my way,
I leave their images to set astray.
I only raise a humble voice today
Or yesterday, or rarely to remark
That images for worship mar the park.
But every time my word is heard by those
Who enter the high places that they chose,
They scorn the message placed beneath their nose.
That’s why, Beloved, I keep myself apart,
And speak to you, the sparrows, and the tart
Or two that stop a moment where I stay.
And then I go back to the way I pray.
Irreverence I lay on the church of stone,
My reverence is such for You alone.

26 Therefore, if an uncircumcised
Man keeps righteous and well-advised
Requirements of the law, will not
His uncircumcision be aught
But counted as circumcision?
27 Will not the uncircumcised one
In the flesh, if he keeps the law,
Judge you who, with your written caw
And circumcision, still transgress
The law? 28 For he is not a Jew
Who’s one outwardly with ado,
Nor is circumcision that which
Is outward in the flesh for switch,
29 But he’s a Jew who's one inside,
And circumcision to abide
Within the heart, and in the spirit,
Not in the letter somewhat near it,
Whose praise is not from men but from
The God who takes in count the sum.
My circumcision is no work at large
To keep me on the holy Jewish barge.
That act is mentioned not at all I see
Among the big ten for their liberty.
I’m not sure how the circumcision laid
Upon the heart and spirit in parade
Should manifest in anything I’ve made.
I’m not sure. Maybe when I take the tome
Of Decalogue and try to bring it home,
The circumcision of the hand and foot
Is there to see where such a thing is put.
I’ll be a Jew inside if that’s enough,
Despite my circumcision in the rough,
And love and keep Your law, it is not tough.

ROMANS 3

1 What advantage then has the Jew,
What profit circumcision’s due?
2 Much then in every way! Chiefly
Because to them were set in fee
The oracles of God. 3 For what
If some did not believe clear-cut?
Will unbelieving on their part
Make faithfulness of God depart?
4 Most certainly not! Indeed, let
God be true but every man set
A liar. As it’s written “That
You may be justified out flat
In Your words, and may overcome
When You are judged and by the sum.”

Advantage of the Jew is that in school
He learns to read the Hebrew as a rule,
And so pronounces out the holy word,
Whether or not he understands what’s heard.
My profit is no smaller when I take
The ten commandments for Your own sweet sake
And for my love of life and peace to make
A platform free of dangers at the stake
Where life and love may come to play the game
Successfully upon the sward in flame.
Some may believe and some may play a part,
And some may drive the donkey after cart,
But let all men lie, if they choose, but I
Cling to Your word, Beloved, until I die.

5 But if our unrighteousness shows
The righteousness of God, what goes
For us to say? Is God unjust
Who inflicts wrath? (I speak as must
A man.) 6 Certainly not! For then
How will God judge the world of men?
7 For if the truth of God increased
Through my lie to His glory feast,
Why am I still judged sinner too?
8 And why not say, “Then let us do
Evil that good may come and true”?
As we are slandered to have said,
And some affirm against our stead.
Such ones’ condemnation is just.
9 What then? Are we better than dust?
Not at all. We’ve already charged
Both Jews and Greeks and so enlarged
That all of them are under sin.
10 As it is written “There’s none in
Righteousness, no, not one at all,
11 “There’s none who understands the call,
There’s none who seeks after his God.
12 “They have all turned aside to plod,
Become unprofitable all,
There’s none who does good, none at all.”
13 “Their throat’s an open tomb, With tongue
They have practised deceit where they’ve sung”,
“Asps poison is under their lips”,
14 “Whose mouth is full of cursing sips
And bitterness.” 15 “Their feet are swift
To shed blood, 16 Destruction will lift
To misery are in their ways,
17 And the way of peace their days
Have not known.” 18 “And there is no fear
Of God before their eyes appear.”

The fact that You will judge the world does not
Proof that You’re qualified to fill the slot.
Paul’s logic is deficient here and there.
And yet perhaps my own logic is bare:
At least what is is justified by many,
And just because it does not cost a penny.
The change that’s purposeful implies the rate
That what exists may not be the best state.
But that’s not all of my complaint: the text
He quotes from Psalms that all sin when perplexed
Ignores the Psalmist’s note that righteous men
Still call upon Your name in faith again.
If nothing David knows two groups exist:
The tsadiqim and resha’im persist.

19 Now we know that whatever things
The law says, it says to their stings
Who’re under law, so every mouth
May be stopped shut, from north to south
The whole world may be in guilt found
Before God and upon the ground.

There have been sinless men, and some may be
As sinless now as in eternity.
I think of Job and the one man born blind,
And even the man’s parents, to be kind.
The reason Christians want all men to find
Their guilt is so they can be steeped and wined.
And yet today, if guilt is true and black,
One must not mention it, nor see the stack.
Only the innocent are blamed for lack,
Only the innocent stabbed in the back
With fair impunity. Good Lord, look here
And see the church and state as they appear.
The law’s a slight protection from insane,
But Paul’s words merely fire the wicked gain.

20 Therefore by the deeds of the law
There shall no flesh by might of claw
Be justified in His sight: for
By the law’s knowledge of sin’s store.
21 But now the righteousness of God
Without the law appears on sod,
Witnessed by the law and the prophets;
22 Even the righteousness and sofits
Of God by faith of Jesus Christ
To all and on all them sufficed
Who are faithful, for there is no
Distinction: 23 for all in the show
Have sinned, and come short of the glory
Of God; 24 so being in their story
Justified freely by His grace
Through the redemption that we trace
In Christ Jesus: 25 whom God’s set out
Propitiation through faith’s clout
In his blood, to declare his right
For the forgiveness of sins’ blight
That are past, through forbearance by
God; 26 to declare at this time why
He is righteous: that He might be
Just and the justifier free
Of faithful ones to Jesus wee.

The deeds of the law are not here to pay
The way to Canaan’s land with heavenly ray.
It’s not to get to heaven I’d obey,
But simply to create a space of peace
Where one can grow a garden and release
The children from the house in safety’s hope.
It’s not for pie in sky commandments’ rope
Is set, but for the here and now in scope.
It’s basic human rights I wish to see:
Freedom from fear of any killing spree,
Freedom from fear of robbers at the door,
Freedom from rapists and the lying store.
Those who look to the future reward are
Detached from gross reality and star.

27 Where’s boasting then? It’s surely out.
By what law? Of works? By no clout,
But by the law of faith, no doubt.
28 Therefore we conclude that a man
Is justified by faith in span
Without deeds of the law to scan.
29 Is He God of the Jews alone?
Is He not also Gentiles’ stone?
Yes, of the Gentiles too in loan.
30 Seeing it is one God, who must
Justify circumcision’s dust
By faith, uncircumcision too
Through faithfulness in what they do,
31 Do we then make the law void through
Faith? God forbid: indeed we do
Establish the law, it is true.

The principle that You are one is not
Proposed to generate a war unsought,
But to reveal that all of humankind
Are under one God, both seeing and blind.
We’re all in the same boat, so temple walls
That separate in multi-pleasing stalls
Are just idolatry and nothing more.
The law is one for all on every score.
Beloved, the many churches seem to pride
Themselves on social class more than the hide
Of faith in You. I swim against the tide.
The faithfulness that justifies the man
Reflects from the commandment in the can.
The black is black, the white white, tan is tan.

ROMANS 4

1 What shall we say then our ancestor
Abraham, in his flesh as quester,
Has found? 2 For if Abraham be
Justified by works, so then he
Has cause to boast, but not before
God and before His holy store.
3 For what says Scripture? Abraham
Believed God, and it was by dram
Counted to him for righteousness.
4 Now to him who works is reward
Not counted by grace, but due scored.
5 But to the one who is not working,
But believes in Him without shirking
Who justifies the wicked ones,
His faith counts for righteousness’ tonnes.
6 Even as David also showed
The blessedness of the man glowed,
To whom God counts righteousness well
Without the works done as a spell,
7 “Blessed are they whose iniquities
Remain forgiven, and whose knees
Of sin are covered. 8 “Blessed is
The man to whom the Lord in whizz
Will not impute sin for his biz.”

Let’s just get this straight from King David’s mouth
Before we enter in the gate at south
Of circumcision and find reason’s quit
The head of Paul and me too where I sit.
I love and follow David’s faith as true,
And take forgiveness coming down from You,
And find that blessedness after the law
(Where blessedness is mentioned at the draw
Only in the last chapters) in the craw
Is sweet, so sweet, I straightway open maw
To lap the honey down and then return
To law as well to find Your love to burn.
I give no whit for anything I earn,
But only for the blessedness in stern.

9 Does this blessedness come just on
The circumcision, or upon
Uncircumcision too in spawn?
For we say that faith was accounted
To Abraham righteousness mounted.
10 How was it then accounted? When
He was in circumcision then,
Or in uncircumcision’s thrall?
Not in the circumcision, but
In the uncircumcision shut.
11 And he got circumcision’s sign,
A seal of faithful righteousness
Which in uncircumcision’s line
He had, so that he in address
Might be the father of all those
That believe, though they sitting in rows
Are not of circumcision’s throes,
That righteousness might be imputed
To them also, when they’re recruited;
12 And father of the circumcized
To those who are not circumcized
Alone, but also walk revised
In that faith of our father guised
Abraham, still uncircumcised.
13 For promise he should be the heir
Of the world was not give fair
To Abraham, or to his seed,
Through the law, but through faith indeed
Of righteousness and not of greed.

Paul fails to take consideration of
The fact that Abraham in rate of love
Before and after circumcision met
Was always the obedient one set.
He never young or old refused the sign
That You gave him, not for a day of wine
Put off the circumcision as commanded,
But on the very day that it was handed,
Took to the knife though in his old age caught.
Example of Abraham to be sought
Is that his faith and righteousness were taught
In his obedience to perfect plot.
Beloved, no matter what You tell me here,
Let me obey the word come to my ear.

14 For if those who are of the law
Are heirs, then faith is void in claw,
The promise without power in craw.
15 For the law perpetrates its wrath:
For where there is no law on path,
There’s no transgression in the math.
16 That’s why it is of faith by grace;
So that the promise might find trace
To all the seed; not just to what
Is of the law, but to the gut
Too of what is Abraham’s faith;
Who’s our father, of every wraith;
17 As it is written, I have made
You father of nations’ parade,
Before the One whom he believed,
God who raises the dead reprieved,
And calls those things which are not so
As though they were set in a row;
18 Who against hope believed in hope,
To become dad of a wide scope,
According to the promise made,
So shall your seed be in parade.

When Abraham becomes the father of
So many nations come after in love,
They are adopted to share in the feel
Of Abrahamic faith for woe and weal.
Yet poor servant that was the Damascene,
And kept accounts of Abram’s wealth as dean
Was not accepted as an heir though he
Was favoured by Abram with jealousy.
When Paul takes early patriarchs to be
Prediction of salvation by decree,
Reflection on the scene fails in perfection,
Some ancient people lived through the selection
Without a trace of unction of prophetic
Or any other saving herb emetic.

19 And being not weak in faith, he
Considered not his own body
Now dead, when he was up in age
Near one hundred years old in stage,
Nor did he think of Sarah’s womb,
20 He did not doubt God’s promise room
But was strong in faith, giving God
The glory to heaven on the sod;
21 He was sure that what promise He
Had made, in His capacity
He might perform it faithfully.
22 That’s why it was counted to him
For righteousness, it was not dim.
23 It was not written for his sake
Alone, that it was counted stake;
24 But for us also, to whom it
Shall be imputed, if we fit
Believe on Him who came to raise
Up Jesus our Lord from the ways
Of the dead; 25 Who was delivered
For our offences, and was stirred
Up again and for our right stays.

There was some doubt about the body dead
Or near dead when the trio came and said
His wife would give birth on the bridal bed
Despite their ages and the way they fed.
Paul does exaggerate in failing to
Remember that Abram as well as crew
Laughed to hear what You promised You would do.
Paul’s purpose was to make a point in state.
The wavering of faith when at the draw
Is something human and in human craw,
And all the writing and the rhetoric
Does not diminish the fact in the thick
Of life faith is a tiny flame when set.
It’s great in retrospect when as is met.

ROMANS 5

1 Therefore being set right by faith,
We have peace with God through the rate
Of our Lord Jesus Christ in state:
2 By whom also we have access
By faith into this grace address
Wherein we stand, and rejoice in
Hope of glory of God to win.

Islam is peace with God by every name
That’s spoken to that great faith’s greater fame.
And yet adherents that I still could name
Deny that You raised from the deadly game
Your Sent One after the cross and its shame.
That’s why, no doubt, so many of that gate
Fail to achieve obedience in state.
But Christians are no better, they are worse,
For they deny the blessing, cling to curse,
Remain in their sins vaunting they are saved,
When being justified among the laved
Entails the godly life lived to the hilt,
The life lived without sin and without guilt,
The life raised from the level of blood spilt.

3 And not only so, but we raise
Glory in tribulations phase
Also: knowing that tribulation
Works patience before an elation;
4 And patience makes experience; and
Experience brings in hope to stand:
5 And hope will never make ashamed;
Because the love of God unblamed
Is shed abroad in our hearts by
The Holy Spirit from on high.

The tribulation is a thing and time
Sweet Christians now avoid for secret crime.
They think the rapture’s there to save backside
And take them up to glory in a tide.
But patience in adversity brings in
The glory to rise above others’ sin.
The tribulation is the fruit of that
Man of sin who denies Your law in scat
To change both times and laws upon the mat.
He teaches that the Saviour’s death entails
The change in law that every command fails,
And none need keep divine law, only what
The Church reveals to open and to shut.
Patience, my Love, before the wicked butt.

6 For when we were yet without strength,
In due time Christ died and at length
For the ungodly. 7 For hardly
For a righteous man will one see
A man die, yet perhaps for some
Good man some would even succumb.
8 But God commends His love toward us,
In that, while we were yet in fuss
Of sin, Christ died for us freely.
9 Much more then, being now in fee
Justified by his blood, we’ll be
Saved from the awful wrath through him.
10 For if, when we were enemies,
We were reconciled to God trim
By His Son’s death, much more in fees,
As reconciled, we shall be saved
By his life and the things he braved.

Reconciled by his death, indeed, no doubt,
But saved only by his life raised and stout
To stand in sanctuary up above
In ministry of faith and prayers and love,
I praise Your name, Beloved, without a pout.
I’m not saved by a human sacrifice,
I’m not saved by a death that is not nice,
I’m not saved by a god upon a cross,
I’m not saved by my own works and their dross,
But by the intercession made above
By one who lives in glory hand in glove,
By living and not by the dead in tomb,
By heavenly brightness and not by the gloom
Of crucifix in Roman Catholic room.

11 Not only so, but we also
Joy in God through our Lord to show
Jesus Christ, by whom we have now
Received atonement. 12 Wherefore how
As by one man sin entered in
The world, and death by sin to win;
And so death passed upon all men,
For all have sinned and sinned again:
13 For until the law sin was in
The world: but sin’s no count in bin
When there is no law, 14 and yet death
Reigned from Adam to Moses’ breath,
Even over them who’d not sinned
Like Adam’s transgression and kinned,
Who is the figure of the one
That was to come for what he’d done.

The only time the word atonement shows
In the King James V English like a rose
Is in this verse that tells me Jesus makes
Atonement by his life and not the fakes
In wood and metal crucifix in wakes.
Atonement is the life that Jesus gives
Before Your throne, Beloved, there where he lives.
Atonement is not setting law aside
And saying I need no longer abide
In Your obedience. Oh no, I ride
In the good life imparted to my hide.
I thank and praise You for the grace to meet
All trials and every temptation on feet
Well planted in Most Holy Place and seat.

15 But not as the offence, so too
Is the free gift. For then if through
Offence of one are many dead,
So much more God’s grace by one led,
Jesus Christ, in abundance shed.
16 Not as it was by one that sinned,
So is the gift: for judgement’s wind
Is by one to the sentencing,
But the free gift is of the swing
Of many offences to ring
To justification in wing.
17 For if by one man's offence death
Reigned by one; much more those whose breath
Received abundant grace and gift
Of righteousness shall live to lift
By one, Jesus Christ, without shift.
18 Therefore as by offence of one
Judgment came upon every bum
In condemnation; even so
By righteousness of one to show
The free gift came upon all men
To justifying life again.
19 For as by one man's disobeying
Were many turned to sinners swaying,
So by obeying of the one
Shall many be made righteous, hun.
20 Moreover the law entered, that
The offence might abound out flat.
But where sin abounded, grace did
Much more abound: 21 That as sin’s lid
Has reigned to death, so might grace reign
Through righteousness unto the plain
Of the eternal life that’s scored
By Jesus Christ who is our Lord.

The point of exercise is simply that
We may attain to the life that like cat
Of nine or more is the eternal score,
And so not meet the second death on shore
Of lake of fire, when the city comes down
To be upon the earth capital town.
There is no life, no immortality
Outside Christ’s death to win the victory
Over the grave, outside the righteousness
That he lays on each faithful one’s address.
Beloved, I touch in faith immortal crown,
And count the glories of the royal frown
That takes the sting of sin and death from me
And shouts aloud songs of eternity.

ROMANS 6

1 What shall we say then? Shall we keep
On sinning for grace in a heap?
2 May God forbid. How shall we, who
Are dead to sin live in that view?
3 Do you not know that all of us
Who were baptized in glorious
Jesus Christ were baptized into
His death? 4 That’s why we’re buried too
Into his death, so like Christ came
To be raised up from deathly claim
By glory of the Father’s fame,
So we too should walk in new life.
5 For if we have been planted rife
Together in what’s like his death,
We shall also in the same breath
Be at his resurrection’s fife.
6 We know our old man’s crucified
With him, so may be liquified
That body of sin, so from now
On we should not serve sin somehow.

All prophecies peripheral and teachings
Are set out for the purposes and reachings
Of keeping humankind from sinful ways.
But humans do not wish to find the maze.
Instead they prefer to argue the right
Way to baptize than enter in the fight
Against transgression of commandments’ light.
The theologian often seems to take
Position that Paul himself for his sake
Would have us all sin in his joyful wake.
Beloved, in love keep me from sinful stake,
Abiding in obedience to You,
No matter what baptism came to do,
No matter where the splash and cry and hue.

7 For the dead man is freed from sin.
8 Now if we are dead in the bin
With Christ, we believe we’ll too live
With him. 9 We know that at the sieve
Christ raised from the dead dies no more,
Death has no power on that shore.
10 For in that he died, so he died
To sin once, but in living stride
He lives to God on every score.
11 So count yourselves to be dead too
To sin, but alive to God’s view
Through Jesus Christ our Lord in pew.
12 So don’t let sin reign in your mortal
Body, obeying at the portal
Its lusts. 13 Do not yield up your members
As instruments of vile Novembers,
But yield yourselves to God, as those
Who are alive from the dead throes,
And your members as instruments
Of righteousness in God’s presence.
14 For sin shall not have power on you,
For you’re not under the law’s hue,
But under grace to live and do.
15 So what? Shall we sin because we
Are not under the law but free
Under grace? God forbid the spree.

I never met paid preacher but he said
The law could not be kept even in bed,
But every soul must sin and sin instead
Of living in the grace of hope when led.
The law in fact converts the heart to be
Obedient to You, not to Trinity.
Paul fights against the rugged Pharisee
Who depends on law to come set him free
From Roman victor in the hostelry.
Paul fights against the Sadducean rate
Who denies the Messiah’s role and fate.
The rule of love in the divine to wait,
In the sent one that frees men’s souls from hate,
Abides above the wicked heart in bate.

16 Don’t you know that to whom you yield
Yourselves as servants in his field
You must obey, whether of sin
To death, or of obeying’s bin
To righteousness and not to sin?
17 But God be thanked, you who were slaves
Of sin, but you’ve come from the graves
To obeying and from the heart
That form of doctrine from the start
Which was delivered to your part.
18 Since you’ve been made free from your sin,
You became slaves of righteous din.
19 I speak after manner of men
Because of the weakness again
Of your flesh, for as you have yielded
Your members as slaves to unfielded
Uncleanness and to wickedness,
To wickedness, now then impress
Yourself to yield your members slaves
To righteousness in holy waves.
20 For when you were servants of sin,
You were free from righteousness’ bin.
21 What fruit did you have in those things
Of which you’re now ashamed for stings?
For the end of those things is death.
22 But now you’re made free from the breath
And have become servants to God,
You have your fruit from holy sod,
Ending in life eternal’s prod.
23 For the wages of sin is death,
But the gift of God is the breath
Of life eternal in Christ Jesus
Our Lord who is not here to tease us.

The concept of death for a simple sin
Is ancient, no doubt, if the prize to win
Equates the ancient and the primitive
In the way the Australians used to live.
Intrusion on the site where things were kept
For ritual initiations ept,
Churingas and vanigas of adept,
Was most oft death, and may indeed remain
An action of the primitive insane.
Death for sin as a fair exchange comes round
In every Christian kind of churchly bound,
As though reason and law could not be found
And anyway were not sufficient sound
As guide and hedge of life at least in main.

AUTHOR: THOMAS G. MCELWAIN

Copyright © 2007 Adams & McElwain Publishers and Thomas McElwain First Published in two volumes, The Beloved and I 2005, and Led of the Beloved, 2006. Second Edition, 2010 Third and revised edition, 2012 All rights reserved. No part of this verse commentary on the sacred Scriptures may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in a retrieval system, in any form or by any means, without permission in writing from publisher.

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