Chapter 9
1 I tell the truth in Christ . I am not lying , my conscience testifying with me in the Holy Spirit
2 that I have great sorrow and unceasing pain in my heart .
3 For I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brothers’ sake , my relatives according to the flesh
4 who are Israelites ; whose is the adoption , the glory , the covenants , the giving of the law , the service , and the promises ;
5 of whom are the fathers , and from whom is Christ as concerning the flesh , who is over all , God , blessed forever . Amen.
6 But it is not as though the word of God has come to nothing . For they are not all Israel that are of Israel .
7 Neither , because they are Abraham’s offspring, are they all children . But , " your offspring will be accounted as from Isaac ."
8 That is , it is not the children of the flesh who are children of God , but the children of the promise are counted as heirs.
9 For this is a word of promise : " At the appointed time I will come , and Sarah will have a son ."
10 Not only so , but Rebekah also conceived by one , by our father Isaac .
11 For being not yet born , neither having done anything good or bad , that the purpose of God according to election might stand , not of works , but of him who calls ,
12 it was said to her , " The elder will serve the younger ."
13 Even as it is written , " Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated ."
14 What shall we say then ? Is there unrighteousness with God ? May it never be !
15 For he said to Moses , " I will have mercy on whom I have mercy , and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion ."
16 So then it is not of him who wills , nor of him who runs , but of God who has mercy .
17 For the Scripture says to Pharaoh , " For this very purpose I caused you to be raised up , that I might show in you my power , and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth ."
18 So then , he has mercy on whom he desires , and he hardens whom he desires .
19 You will say then to me , " Why does he still find fault ? For who withstands his will ?"
20 But indeed , O man , who are you to reply against God ? Will the thing formed ask him who formed it , " Why did you make me like this ?"
21 Or hasn’ t the potter a right over the clay , from the same lump to make one part a vessel for honour , and another for dishonour?
22 What if God , willing to show his wrath and to make his power known , endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction,
23 and that he might make known the riches of his glory on vessels of mercy , which he prepared beforehand for glory —
24 us , whom he also called , not from the Jews only , but also from the Gentiles ?
25 As he says also in Hosea , " I will call them ‘ my people ,’ which were not my people ; and her ‘beloved,’ who was not beloved."
26 " It will be that in the place where it was said to them , ‘ You are not my people ,’ there they will be called ‘ children of the living God .’"
27 Isaiah cries concerning Israel , " If the number of the children of Israel are as the sand of the sea , it is the remnant who will be saved ;
28 for he will finish the work and cut it short in righteousness, because the Lord will make a short work upon the earth ."
29 As Isaiah has said before , " Unless the Lord of Armies had left us a seed , we would have become like Sodom , and would have been made like Gomorrah ."
30 What shall we say then ? That the Gentiles , who didn’ t follow after righteousness , attained to righteousness , even the righteousness which is of faith ;
31 but Israel , following after a law of righteousness , didn’t arrive at the law of righteousness .
32 Why ? Because they didn’ t seek it by faith , but as it were by works of the law. They stumbled over the stumbling stone ,
33 even as it is written , " Behold , I lay in Zion a stumbling stone and a rock of offence ; and no one who believes in him will be disappointed ."