Romans
Chapter 9
1 I speak the truth in Christ, I am not lying, my own conscience confirms it in the Holy Spirit.
2 I have great sadness and never-ending sorrow in my heart.
3 I could wish to be cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my own family by blood.
4 They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption as God’s children, the glory, the agreements, the law, the worship of God, and the promises.
5 The fathers belong to them, and as a human, Christ came from them. He is above all, God forever praised. Amen.
6 It’s not that God’s message has failed. Not everyone from Israel truly belongs to Israel.
7 Just because they are Abraham’s descendants doesn’t mean they are all his true children. Instead, “Your true descendants will be through Isaac.”
8 Those born from human desire are not God’s children; only those born because of God’s promise are considered true descendants.
9 This is the promised message: I will come at this time, and Sarah will have a son.
10 Not only that, but when Rebecca became pregnant by our father Isaac;
11 Before the children were born and had done anything good or bad, God’s plan was based on his choice, not their actions, but on his call.
12 Someone told her, “The older will serve the younger.”
13 It is written that I loved Jacob but did not love Esau.
14 What can we say? Is God unjust? No way.
15 God told Moses, “I will show mercy to those I choose, and I will show compassion to those I choose.”
16 It is not about one’s own desire or effort, but about God who gives mercy.
17 The Bible says to Pharaoh, I made you a leader for this reason: to show my power through you, so that my name would be known everywhere on earth.
18 So God shows mercy to whom he chooses, and he makes stubborn those he decides.
19 You might then ask me, why does he still blame us? Who has been able to resist his will?
20 No, but human, who are you to argue with God? Can the creation ask the creator, Why did you make me like this?
21 Doesn’t the potter have the right to make from the same lump of clay one pot for special use and another for common use?
22 What if God wanted to show his anger and power but was very patient with those who deserved punishment?
23 God wanted to show the wealth of his glory to those he had chosen for mercy, whom he had prepared for glory.
24 Even us, whom God has called, not only from the Jews but also from the non-Jews?
25 In Osee, God also says, “I will name those ‘my people’ who were not my people; and those ‘loved one’ who were not loved.”
26 It will happen that in the place where it was told to them, “You are not my people,” there they will be called “children of the living God.”
27 Isaiah also cries out about Israel, saying, even if the people of Israel are as many as the sand by the sea, only a small part will be saved.
28 God will complete the work and quickly do it with fairness; for God will carry out a brief task on the earth.
29 As Isaiah said earlier, if God had not left us some descendants, we would have become like Sodom and Gomorrah.
30 What can we say then? The non-Jews, who did not pursue being right with God, have achieved it through faith.
31 Israel, which chased the law of right living, did not reach the law of right living.
32 Why? Because they did not seek it with faith, but as if it could be earned by following the law. They tripped over that stone that makes people stumble.
33 It is written, “Look, I put in Zion a stone that makes people fall, and a rock that makes them trip: but anyone who trusts in him will not feel shame.”