Romans 9 :: New International Version (NIV)

Paul’s Anguish Over Israel

Rom 9:1I speak the truth in Christ—I am not lying, my conscience confirms it through the Holy Spirit—

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

Rom 9:3For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my people, those of my own race,

Rom 9:4

Rom 9:4the people of Israel. Theirs is the adoption to sonship; theirs the divine glory, the covenants, the receiving of the law, the temple worship and the promises.

Rom 9:5

Rom 9:5Theirs are the patriarchs, and from them is traced the human ancestry of the Messiah, who is God over all, forever praised![fn] Amen.

God’s Sovereign Choice

(Gen 25:19–23 )

Rom 9:6

Rom 9:6It is not as though God’s word had failed. For not all who are descended from Israel are Israel.

Rom 9:7

Rom 9:7Nor because they are his descendants are they all Abraham’s children. On the contrary, “It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.”[fn]

Rom 9:8

Rom 9:8In other words, it is not the children by physical descent who are God’s children, but it is the children of the promise who are regarded as Abraham’s offspring.

Rom 9:9

Rom 9:9For this was how the promise was stated: “At the appointed time I will return, and Sarah will have a son.”[fn]

Rom 9:10

Rom 9:10Not only that, but Rebekah’s children were conceived at the same time by our father Isaac.

Rom 9:11

Rom 9:11Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad—in order that God’s purpose in election might stand:

Rom 9:12

Rom 9:12not by works but by him who calls—she was told, “The older will serve the younger.”[fn]

Rom 9:13

Rom 9:13Just as it is written: “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”[fn]

Rom 9:14

Rom 9:14What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all!

Rom 9:15

Rom 9:15For he says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”[fn]

Rom 9:16

Rom 9:16It does not, therefore, depend on human desire or effort, but on God’s mercy.

Rom 9:17

Rom 9:17For Scripture says to Pharaoh: “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.”[fn]

Rom 9:18

Rom 9:18Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.

Rom 9:19

Rom 9:19One of you will say to me: “Then why does God still blame us? For who is able to resist his will?”

Rom 9:20

Rom 9:20But who are you, a human being, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’ ”[fn]

Rom 9:21

Rom 9:21Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes and some for common use?

Rom 9:22

Rom 9:22What if God, although choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath—prepared for destruction?

Rom 9:23

Rom 9:23What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory—

Rom 9:24

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

Rom 9:25

Rom 9:25As he says in Hosea: “I will call them ‘my people’ who are not my people; and I will call her ‘my loved one’ who is not my loved one,”[fn]

Rom 9:26

Rom 9:26and, “In the very place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’ there they will be called ‘children of the living God.’ ”[fn]

Rom 9:27

Rom 9:27Isaiah cries out concerning Israel: “Though the number of the Israelites be like the sand by the sea, only the remnant will be saved.

Rom 9:28

Rom 9:28For the Lord will carry out his sentence on earth with speed and finality.”[fn]

Rom 9:29

Rom 9:29It is just as Isaiah said previously: “Unless the Lord Almighty had left us descendants, we would have become like Sodom, we would have been like Gomorrah.”[fn]

Israel’s Unbelief

Rom 9:30

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

Rom 9:31

Rom 9:31but the people of Israel, who pursued the law as the way of righteousness, have not attained their goal.

Rom 9:32

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

Rom 9:33

Rom 9:33As it is written: “See, I lay in Zion a stone that causes people to stumble and a rock that makes them fall, and the one who believes in him will never be put to shame.”[fn]