Ezekiel 36:27

36:27 I will put my Spirit within you; ¹  I will take the initiative and you will obey my statutes ²  and carefully observe my regulations. ³ 

Deuteronomy 30:6

30:6 The Lord your God will also cleanse ⁴  your heart and the hearts of your descendants ⁵  so that you may love him ⁶  with all your mind and being and so that you may live.

Jeremiah 31:33

31:33 “But I will make a new covenant with the whole nation of Israel ⁷  after I plant them back in the land,” ⁸  says the Lord. ⁹  “I will ¹⁰  put my law within them ¹¹  and write it on their hearts and minds. ¹²  I will be their God and they will be my people. ¹³ 

Jeremiah 32:39

32:39 I will give them a single-minded purpose to live in a way that always shows respect for me. They will want to do that for ¹⁴  their own good and the good of the children who descend from them.

Jeremiah 32:1

Jeremiah Buys a Field

32:1 In the tenth year that Zedekiah was ruling over Judah the Lord spoke to Jeremiah. ¹⁵  That was the same as the eighteenth year of Nebuchadnezzar.

Colossians 1:2

1:2 to the saints, the faithful ¹⁶  brothers and sisters ¹⁷  in Christ, at Colossae. Grace and peace to you ¹⁸  from God our Father! ¹⁹ 

Ephesians 2:10

2:10 For we are his workmanship, having been created in Christ Jesus for good works that God prepared beforehand so we may do them. ²⁰ 

Philippians 2:12-13

Lights in the World

2:12 So then, my dear friends, just as you have always obeyed, not only in my presence but even more in my absence, continue working out your salvation with awe and reverence, ²¹  2:13 for the one bringing forth in you both the desire and the effort – for the sake of his good pleasure – is God.

Titus 2:11-13

2:11 For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all people. ²²  2:12 It trains us ²³  to reject godless ways ²⁴  and worldly desires and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, 2:13 as we wait for the happy fulfillment of our hope in the glorious appearing ²⁵  of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ. ²⁶ 

Titus 3:3-8

3:3 For we too were once foolish, disobedient, misled, enslaved to various passions and desires, spending our lives in evil and envy, hateful and hating one another. 3:4 ²⁷  But “when the kindness of God our Savior and his love for mankind appeared, 3:5 he saved us not by works of righteousness that we have done but on the basis of his mercy, through the washing of the new birth and the renewing of the Holy Spirit, 3:6 whom he poured out on us in full measure ²⁸  through Jesus Christ our Savior. 3:7 And so, ²⁹  since we have been justified by his grace, we become heirs with the confident expectation of eternal life.” ³⁰ 

Summary of the Letter

3:8 This saying ³¹  is trustworthy, and I want you to insist on such truths, ³²  so that those who have placed their faith in God may be intent on engaging in good works. These things are good and beneficial for all people.

Titus 3:1

Conduct Toward Those Outside the Church

3:1 Remind them to be subject to rulers and ³³  authorities, to be obedient, to be ready for every good work.

Titus 2:6

2:6 Encourage younger men likewise to be self-controlled, ³⁴ 

[36:27]  ¹ tn Or “in the midst of you.” The word “you” is plural.

[36:27]  ² tn Heb “and I will do that which in my statutes you will walk.” The awkward syntax (verb “to do, act” + accusative sign + relative clause + prepositional phrase + second person verb) is unique, though Eccl 3:14 contains a similar construction. In the last line of that verse we read that “God acts so that (relative pronoun) they fear before him.” However, unlike Ezek 36:27, the statement has no accusative sign before the relative pronoun.

[36:27]  ³ tn Heb “and my laws you will guard and you will do them.” Jer 31:31-34 is parallel to this passage.

[30:6]  ⁴ tn Heb “circumcise” (so KJV, NAB, NIV, NRSV); TEV “will give you and your descendents obedient hearts.” See note on the word “cleanse” in Deut 10:16.

[30:6]  ⁵ tn Heb “seed” (so KJV, ASV).

[30:6]  ⁶ tn Heb “the Lord your God.” See note on the second occurrence of the word “he” in v. 3.

[31:33]  ⁷ tn Heb “with the house of Israel.” All commentators agree that the term here refers to both the whole nation which was divided into the house of Israel and the house of Judah in v. 30.

[31:33]  ⁸ tn Heb “after those days.” Commentators are generally agreed that this refers to the return from exile and the repopulation of the land referred to in vv. 27-28 and not to something subsequent to the time mentioned in v. 30. This is the sequencing that is also presupposed in other new covenant passages such as Deut 30:1-6; Ezek 11:17-20; 36:24-28.

[31:33]  ⁹ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[31:33]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “‘But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after these days:’ says the Lord, ‘I will….’” The sentence has been reworded and restructured to avoid the awkwardness of the original style.

[31:33]  ¹¹ tn Heb “in their inward parts.” The Hebrew word here refers to the seat of the thoughts, emotions, and decisions (Jer 9:8 [9:7 HT]). It is essentially synonymous with “heart” in Hebrew psychological terms.

[31:33]  ¹² tn The words “and minds” is not in the text but is supplied in the translation to bring the English psychology more into line with the Hebrew where the “heart” is the center both of knowing/thinking/reflecting and deciding/willing.

[31:33]  ¹³ sn Compare Jer 24:7; 30:22; 31:1 and see the study note on 30:2.

[32:39]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “I will give to them one heart and one way to [= in order that they may] fear me all the days for good to them.” The phrase “one heart” refers both to unanimity of will and accord (cf. 1 Chr 12:38 [12:39 HT]; 2 Chr 30:12) and to singleness of purpose or intent (cf. Ezek 11:19 and see BDB 525 s.v. ֵלב 4 where reference is made to “inclinations, resolutions, and determinations of the will”). The phrase “one way” refers to one way of life or conduct (cf. BDB 203 s.v. דֶּרֶךְ 6.a where reference is made to moral action and character), a way of life that is further qualified by the goal of showing “fear, reverence, respect” for the Lord. The Hebrew sentence has been broken up to avoid a long complex sentence in English which is contrary to contemporary English style. However, an attempt has been made to preserve all the connections of the original.

[32:1]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “The word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord in the eleventh year of…” See 7:1; 11:1; 18:1; 21:1; 30:1 for this same formula.

[1:2]  ¹⁶ tn Grk “and faithful.” The construction in Greek (as well as Paul’s style) suggests that the saints are identical to the faithful; hence, the καί (kai) is best left untranslated (cf. Eph 1:1). See ExSyn 281-82.

[1:2]  ¹⁷ tn Grk “brothers,” but the Greek word may be used for “brothers and sisters” or “fellow Christians” as here (cf. BDAG 18 s.v. ἀδελφός 1, where considerable nonbiblical evidence for the plural ἀδελφοί [adelfoi] meaning “brothers and sisters” is cited).

[1:2]  ¹⁸ tn Or “Grace to you and peace.”

[1:2]  ¹⁹ tc Most witnesses, including some important ones (א A C F G I [P] 075 Ï it bo), read “and the Lord Jesus Christ” at the end of this verse, no doubt to conform the wording to the typical Pauline salutation. However, excellent and early witnesses (B D K L Ψ 33 81 1175 1505 1739 1881 al sa) lack this phrase. Since the omission is inexplicable as arising from the longer reading (otherwise, these mss would surely have deleted the phrase in the rest of the corpus Paulinum), it is surely authentic.

[2:10]  ²⁰ tn Grk “so that we might walk in them” (or “by them”).

[2:12]  ²¹ tn Grk “with fear and trembling.” The Greek words φόβος and τρόμος both imply fear in a negative sense (L&N 25.251 and 16.6 respectively) while the former can also refer to respect and awe for deity (L&N 53.59). Paul’s use of the terms in other contexts refers to “awe and reverence in the presence of God” (P. T. O’Brien, Philippians [NIGTC], 284; see discussion on 282-84). The translation “awe and reverence” was chosen to portray the attitude the believer should have toward God as they consider their behavior in light of God working through Jesus Christ (2:6-11) and in the believer’s life (2:13) to accomplish their salvation.

[2:11]  ²² tn Grk “all men”; but ἀνθρώποις (anqrwpois) is generic here, referring to both men and women.

[2:12]  ²³ tn Grk “training us” (as a continuation of the previous clause). Because of the length and complexity of the Greek sentence, a new sentence was started at the beginning of v. 12 by translating the participle παιδεύουσα (paideuousa) as a finite verb and supplying the pronoun “it” as subject.

[2:12]  ²⁴ tn Grk “ungodliness.”

[2:13]  ²⁵ tn Grk “the blessed hope and glorious appearing.”

[2:13]  ²⁶ tn The terms “God and Savior” both refer to the same person, Jesus Christ. This is one of the clearest statements in the NT concerning the deity of Christ. The construction in Greek is known as the Granville Sharp rule, named after the English philanthropist-linguist who first clearly articulated the rule in 1798. Sharp pointed out that in the construction article-noun-καί-noun (where καί [kai] = “and”), when two nouns are singular, personal, and common (i.e., not proper names), they always had the same referent. Illustrations such as “the friend and brother,” “the God and Father,” etc. abound in the NT to prove Sharp’s point. The only issue is whether terms such as “God” and “Savior” could be considered common nouns as opposed to proper names. Sharp and others who followed (such as T. F. Middleton in his masterful The Doctrine of the Greek Article) demonstrated that a proper name in Greek was one that could not be pluralized. Since both “God” (θεός, qeos) and “savior” (σωτήρ, swthr) were occasionally found in the plural, they did not constitute proper names, and hence, do fit Sharp’s rule. Although there have been 200 years of attempts to dislodge Sharp’s rule, all attempts have been futile. Sharp’s rule stands vindicated after all the dust has settled. For more information on Sharp’s rule see ExSyn 270-78, esp. 276. See also 2 Pet 1:1 and Jude 4.

[3:4]  ²⁷ tn Verses 4-7 are set as poetry in NA²⁶/NA²⁷. These verses probably constitute the referent of the expression “this saying” in v. 8.

[3:6]  ²⁸ tn Or “on us richly.”

[3:7]  ²⁹ tn This is the conclusion of a single, skillfully composed sentence in Greek encompassing Titus 3:4-7. Showing the goal of God’s merciful salvation, v. 7 begins literally, “in order that, being justified…we might become heirs…”

[3:7]  ³⁰ tn Grk “heirs according to the hope of eternal life.”

[3:8]  ³¹ sn This saying (Grk “the saying”) refers to the preceding citation (Titus 3:4-7). See 1 Tim 1:15; 3:1; 4:9; 2 Tim 2:11 for other occurrences of this phrase.

[3:8]  ³² tn Grk “concerning these things.”

[3:1]  ³³ tc Most later witnesses (D² 0278 Ï lat sy) have καί (kai, “and”) after ἀρχαῖς (arcai", “rulers”), though the earliest and best witnesses (א A C D* F G Ψ 33 104 1739 1881) lack the conjunction. Although the καί is most likely not authentic, it has been added in translation due to the requirements of English style. For more discussion, see TCGNT 586.

[2:6]  ³⁴ tn Or “sensible.”