Romans 9–11

Chapter 9

Solicitude for Israel

^1aI am telling the truth in Christ, I am not lying, my conscience testifies with me in the Holy Spirit,

²that I have great sorrow and unceasing grief in my heart.

³For ^aI could ¹wish that I myself were ^baccursed, separated from Christ for the sake of my brethren, my kinsmen ^caccording to the flesh,

⁴who are ^aIsraelites, to whom belongs ^bthe adoption as sons, and ^cthe glory and ^dthe covenants and ^ethe giving of the Law and ^fthe temple service and ^gthe promises,

⁵whose are ^athe fathers, and ^bfrom whom is ¹the Christ according to the flesh, ^cwho is over all, ^dGod ^eblessed ²forever. Amen.

⁶But it is not as though ^athe word of God has failed. ^bFor they are not all Israel who are descended from Israel;

⁷nor are they all children ^abecause they are Abraham’s ¹descendants, but: “^2bthrough Isaac your descendants will be named.”

⁸That is, it is not the children of the flesh who are ^achildren of God, but the ^bchildren of the promise are regarded as ¹descendants.

⁹For this is the word of promise: “^aAt this time I will come, and Sarah shall have a son.”

^10aAnd not only this, but there was ^bRebekah also, when she had conceived twins by one man, our father Isaac;

¹¹for though the twins were not yet born and had not done anything good or bad, so that ^aGod’s purpose according to His choice would ¹stand, not ²because of works but because of Him who calls,

¹²it was said to her, “^aThe older will serve the younger.”

¹³Just as it is written, “^aJacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”

^14aWhat shall we say then? ^bThere is no injustice with God, is there? ^cMay it never be!

¹⁵For He says to Moses, “^aI will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”

¹⁶So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who ^aruns, but on ^bGod who has mercy.

¹⁷For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “^aFor this very purpose I raised you up, to demonstrate My power in you, and that My name might be proclaimed ¹throughout the whole earth.”

¹⁸So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He ^ahardens whom He desires.

^19aYou will say to me then, “^bWhy does He still find fault? For ^cwho resists His will?”

²⁰On the contrary, who are you, ^aO man, who ^banswers back to God? ^cThe thing molded will not say to the molder, “Why did you make me like this,” will it?

²¹Or does not the potter have a right over the clay, to make from the same lump one vessel ¹for honorable use and another ²for common use?

²²¹What if God, although willing to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much ^apatience vessels of wrath ^bprepared for destruction?

²³And He did so to make known ^athe riches of His glory upon ^bvessels of mercy, which He ^cprepared beforehand for glory,

²⁴even us, whom He also ^acalled, ^bnot from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles.

²⁵As He says also in Hosea,

“^aI will call those who were not My people, ‘My people,’

And her who was not beloved, ‘beloved.’ ”

²⁶“^aAnd it shall be that in the place where it was said to them, ‘you are not My people,’

There they shall be called sons of ^bthe living God.”

²⁷Isaiah cries out concerning Israel, “^aThough the number of the sons of Israel be ^blike the sand of the sea, it is ^cthe remnant that will be saved;

^28afor the Lord will execute His word on the earth, ¹thoroughly and ²quickly.”

²⁹And just as Isaiah foretold,

“^aUnless ^bthe Lord of ¹Sabaoth had left to us a ²posterity,

^cWe would have become like Sodom, and would have ³resembled Gomorrah.”

^30aWhat shall we say then? That Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, attained righteousness, even ^bthe righteousness which is ¹by faith;

³¹but Israel, ^apursuing a law of righteousness, did not ^barrive at that law.

³²Why? Because they did not pursue it ¹by faith, but as though it were by works. They stumbled over ^athe stumbling stone,

³³just as it is written,

“^aBehold, I lay in Zion ^ba stone of stumbling and a rock of offense,

^cAnd he who believes in Him ^dwill not be ¹disappointed.”

Chapter 10

¹Brethren, my heart’s desire and my prayer to God for them is for their salvation.

²For I testify about them that they have ^aa zeal for God, but not in accordance with knowledge.

³For not knowing about ^aGod’s righteousness and ^bseeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God.

⁴For ^aChrist is the ¹end of the law for righteousness to ^beveryone who believes.

⁵For Moses writes that the man who practices the righteousness which is ¹based on law ^ashall live ²by that righteousness.

⁶But ^athe righteousness ¹based on faith speaks as follows: “^bDo not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?’ (that is, to bring Christ down),

⁷or ‘Who will descend into the ^aabyss?’ (that is, to ^bbring Christ up from the dead).”

⁸But what does it say? “^aThe word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart”—that is, the word of faith which we are preaching,

⁹¹that ^aif you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and ^bbelieve in your heart that ^cGod raised Him from the dead, you will be saved;

¹⁰for with the heart a person believes, ¹resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, ²resulting in salvation.

¹¹For the Scripture says, “^aWhoever believes in Him will not be ¹disappointed.”

¹²For ^athere is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is ^bLord of ^call, abounding in riches for all who call on Him;

¹³for “^aWhoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved.”

¹⁴How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe in Him ^awhom they have not heard? And how will they hear without ^ba preacher?

¹⁵How will they preach unless they are sent? Just as it is written, “^aHow beautiful are the feet of those who ^1bbring good news of good things!”

¹⁶However, they ^adid not all heed the ¹good news; for Isaiah says, “^bLord, who has believed our report?”

¹⁷So faith comes from ^ahearing, and hearing by ^bthe word ¹of Christ.

¹⁸But I say, surely they have never heard, have they? Indeed they have;

“^aTheir voice has gone out into all the earth,

And their words to the ends of the ¹world.”

¹⁹But I say, surely Israel did not know, did they? First Moses says,

“^aI will ^bmake you jealous by that which is not a nation,

By a nation without understanding will I anger you.”

²⁰And Isaiah is very bold and says,

“^aI was found by those who did not seek Me,

I became manifest to those who did not ask for Me.”

²¹But as for Israel He says, “^aAll the day long I have stretched out My hands to a disobedient and obstinate people.”

Chapter 11

Israel Is Not Cast Away

¹I say then, God has not ^arejected His people, has He? ^bMay it never be! For ^cI too am an Israelite, ¹a descendant of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin.

²God ^ahas not rejected His people whom He ^bforeknew. ^cOr do you not know what the Scripture says in the passage about Elijah, how he pleads with God against Israel?

³“Lord, ^athey have killed Your prophets, they have torn down Your altars, and I alone am left, and they are seeking my life.”

⁴But what ¹is the divine response to him? “^aI have kept for Myself seven thousand men who have not bowed the knee to Baal.”

⁵In the same way then, there has also come to be at the present time ^aa remnant according to God’s ¹gracious choice.

⁶But ^aif it is by grace, it is no longer ¹on the basis of works, otherwise grace is no longer grace.

⁷What then? What ^aIsrael is seeking, it has not obtained, but ¹those who were chosen obtained it, and the rest were ^bhardened;

⁸just as it is written,

“^aGod gave them a spirit of stupor,

Eyes to see not and ears to hear not,

Down to this very day.”

⁹And David says,

“^aLet their table become a snare and a trap,

And a stumbling block and a retribution to them.

¹⁰“^aLet their eyes be darkened to see not,

And bend their backs forever.”

^11aI say then, they did not stumble so as to fall, did they? ^bMay it never be! But by their transgression ^csalvation has come to the Gentiles, to ^dmake them jealous.

¹²Now if their transgression is riches for the world and their failure is riches for the Gentiles, how much more will their ^1afulfillment be!

¹³But I am speaking to you who are Gentiles. Inasmuch then as ^aI am an apostle of Gentiles, I magnify my ministry,

¹⁴if somehow I might ^amove to jealousy ^bmy ¹fellow countrymen and ^csave some of them.

¹⁵For if their rejection is the ^areconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance be but ^blife from the dead?

¹⁶If the ^afirst piece of dough is holy, the lump is also; and if the root is holy, the branches are too.

¹⁷But if some of the ^abranches were broken off, and ^byou, being a wild olive, were grafted in among them and became partaker with them of the ¹rich root of the olive tree,

¹⁸do not be arrogant toward the branches; but if you are arrogant, remember that ^ait is not you who supports the root, but the root supports you.

^19aYou will say then, “Branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in.”

²⁰Quite right, they were broken off for their unbelief, but you ^astand by your faith. ^bDo not be conceited, but fear;

²¹for if God did not spare the natural branches, He will not spare you, either.

²²Behold then the kindness and severity of God; to those who fell, severity, but to you, God’s ^akindness, ^bif you continue in His kindness; otherwise you also ^cwill be cut off.

²³And they also, ^aif they do not continue in their unbelief, will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again.

²⁴For if you were cut off from what is by nature a wild olive tree, and were grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these who are the natural branches be grafted into their own olive tree?

²⁵For ^aI do not want you, brethren, to be uninformed of this ^bmystery—so that you will not be ^cwise in your own estimation—that a partial ^dhardening has happened to Israel until the ^efullness of the Gentiles has come in;

²⁶and so all Israel will be saved; just as it is written,

“^aThe Deliverer will come from Zion,

He will remove ungodliness from Jacob.”

²⁷“^aThis is ¹My covenant with them,

^bWhen…