NETfree - Romans - 9

9:1  I am telling the truth in Christ (I am not lying!), for my conscience assures me in the Holy Spirit -

9:2  I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart.

9:3  For I could wish that I myself were accursed - cut off from Christ - for the sake of my people, my fellow countrymen,

9:4  who are Israelites. To them belong the adoption as sons, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the temple worship, and the promises.

9:5  To them belong the patriarchs, and from them, by human descent, came the Christ, who is God over all, blessed forever! Amen.

9:6  It is not as though the word of God had failed. For not all those who are descended from Israel are truly Israel,

9:7  nor are all the children Abraham's true descendants; rather "through Isaac will your descendants be counted."

9:8  This means it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God; rather, the children of promise are counted as descendants.

9:9  For this is what the promise declared: "About a year from now I will return and Sarah will have a son."

9:10  Not only that, but when Rebekah had conceived children by one man, our ancestor Isaac -

9:11  even before they were born or had done anything good or bad (so that God's purpose in election would stand, not by works but by his calling) -

9:12  it was said to her, "The older will serve the younger,"

9:13  just as it is written: "Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated."

9:14  What shall we say then? Is there injustice with God? Absolutely not!

9:15  For he says to Moses: "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion."

9:16  So then, it does not depend on human desire or exertion, but on God who shows mercy.

9:17  For the scripture says to Pharaoh: "For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I may demonstrate my power in you, and that my name may be proclaimed in all the earth."

9:18  So then, God has mercy on whom he chooses to have mercy, and he hardens whom he chooses to harden.

9:19  You will say to me then, "Why does he still find fault? For who has ever resisted his will?"

9:20  But who indeed are you - a mere human being - to talk back to God? Does what is molded say to the molder, "Why have you made me like this?"

9:21  Has the potter no right to make from the same lump of clay one vessel for special use and another for ordinary use?

9:22  But what if God, willing to demonstrate his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience the objects of wrath prepared for destruction?

9:23  And what if he is willing to make known the wealth of his glory on the objects of mercy that he has prepared beforehand for glory -

9:24  even us, whom he has called, not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles?

9:25  As he also says in Hosea:"I will call those who were not my people, 'My people,' and I will call her who was unloved, 'My beloved.'"

9:26  "And in the very place where it was said to them, 'You are not my people,' there they will be called 'sons of the living God.'"

9:27  And Isaiah cries out on behalf of Israel, "Though the number of the children of Israel are as the sand of the sea, only the remnant will be saved,

9:28  for the Lord will execute his sentence on the earth completely and quickly."

9:29  Just as Isaiah predicted,"If the Lord of armies had not left us descendants, we would have become like Sodom, and we would have resembled Gomorrah."

9:30  What shall we say then? - that the Gentiles who did not pursue righteousness obtained it, that is, a righteousness that is by faith,

9:31  but Israel even though pursuing a law of righteousness did not attain it.

9:32  Why not? Because they pursued it not by faith but (as if it were possible) by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone,

9:33  just as it is written,"Look, I am laying in Zion a stone that will cause people to stumble and a rock that will make them fall, yet the one who believes in him will not be put to shame."