---
title: Romans 1:5
url: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/romans-1-5/
markdown: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/romans-1-5.md
type: verse
perspective: Protestant (historic Nicene) response to Jehovah's Witness teaching
reference: Romans 1:5
testament: NT
section: Letters
index: https://jw-apologetics.app/llms.txt
---

# Romans 1:5

## Text (Berean Standard Bible)

> Through Him and on behalf of His name, we received grace and apostleship to call all those among the Gentiles to the obedience that comes from faith.

## NWT Wording of the Key Phrase

- NWT (2013 revision): "Through him we received undeserved kindness and an apostleship with a view to obedience by faith among all the nations"

## JW Usage

Watchtower teaching cites Romans 1:5 ("apostleship with a view to obedience by faith among all the nations") to support the view that genuine Christian faith is demonstrated by obedience — including specifically the obedience of accepting and preaching the message authorised by Jehovah's organisation. The verse is read as making obedience constitutive of, not merely consequent to, Christian standing.

## Protestant Usage

This is one of Paul's two bracket-verses for the entire epistle. He opens with "obedience by faith among all the nations" (1:5) and closes with the identical phrase (16:26). The Greek hupakoē pisteōs is a single concept — "the obedience that IS faith," or "obedience consisting in faith." Paul makes this explicit at Romans 10:16: "they have not all obeyed the good news. For Isaiah says: 'Lord, who has put faith in the thing heard from us?'" Obedience to the gospel and faith in the gospel are the same act. Hebrews 5:9 ("eternal salvation to all who obey him") uses the same vocabulary. The Watchtower hears "obedience" and imports a lifetime of organisational compliance; Paul means the initial obedient surrender of trust.

## NWT Issue

The NWT renders charis as "undeserved kindness" — consensus reads "grace" (ESV/NASB/NIV/KJV). The expansion makes the recipient's unworthiness explicit but flattens the relational and gift-creating dimensions of grace into merit-language ("kindness you didn't earn"). Grace in the Pauline sense creates a new covenantal status that "kindness" does not capture. The choice is consistent across the NWT (compare Rom 1:7, 5:20).

## Arguments Using This Verse

- [Eternal Salvation to All Who Obey Him](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/hebrews5-9-obey-salvation.md) — Hebrews 5:9 and the obedience of faith [Salvation]