| New Living Translation | Berean Study Bible |
| 1With Christ as my witness, I speak with utter truthfulness. My conscience and the Holy Spirit confirm it. | 1I speak the truth in Christ; I am not lying, as confirmed by my conscience in the Holy Spirit. |
| 2My heart is filled with bitter sorrow and unending grief | 2I have deep sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. |
| 3for my people, my Jewish brothers and sisters. I would be willing to be forever cursed—cut off from Christ!—if that would save them. | 3For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my own flesh and blood, |
| 4They are the people of Israel, chosen to be God’s adopted children. God revealed his glory to them. He made covenants with them and gave them his law. He gave them the privilege of worshiping him and receiving his wonderful promises. | 4the people of Israel. Theirs is the adoption as sons; theirs the divine glory and the covenants; theirs the giving of the law, the temple worship, and the promises. |
| 5Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are their ancestors, and Christ himself was an Israelite as far as his human nature is concerned. And he is God, the one who rules over everything and is worthy of eternal praise! Amen. | 5Theirs are the patriarchs, and from them proceeds the human descent of Christ, who is God over all, forever worthy of praise! Amen. |
| 6Well then, has God failed to fulfill his promise to Israel? No, for not all who are born into the nation of Israel are truly members of God’s people! | 6It is not as though God’s word has failed. For not all who are descended from Israel are Israel. |
| 7Being descendants of Abraham doesn’t make them truly Abraham’s children. For the Scriptures say, “Isaac is the son through whom your descendants will be counted,” though Abraham had other children, too. | 7Nor because they are Abraham’s descendants are they all his children. On the contrary, “Through Isaac your offspring will be reckoned.” |
| 8This means that Abraham’s physical descendants are not necessarily children of God. Only the children of the promise are considered to be Abraham’s children. | 8So it is not the children of the flesh who are God’s children, but it is the children of the promise who are regarded as offspring. |
| 9For God had promised, “I will return about this time next year, and Sarah will have a son.” | 9For this is what the promise stated: “At the appointed time I will return, and Sarah will have a son.” |
| 10This son was our ancestor Isaac. When he married Rebekah, she gave birth to twins. | 10Not only that, but Rebecca’s children were conceived by one man, our father Isaac. |
| 11But before they were born, before they had done anything good or bad, she received a message from God. (This message shows that God chooses people according to his own purposes; | 11Yet before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad, in order that God’s plan of election might stand, |
| 12he calls people, but not according to their good or bad works.) She was told, “Your older son will serve your younger son.” | 12not by works but by Him who calls, she was told, “The older will serve the younger.” |
| 13In the words of the Scriptures, “I loved Jacob, but I rejected Esau.” | 13So it is written: “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.” |
| 14Are we saying, then, that God was unfair? Of course not! | 14What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Certainly not! |
| 15For God said to Moses, “I will show mercy to anyone I choose, and I will show compassion to anyone I choose.” | 15For He says to Moses: “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” |
| 16So it is God who decides to show mercy. We can neither choose it nor work for it. | 16So then, it does not depend on man’s desire or effort, but on God’s mercy. |
| 17For the Scriptures say that God told Pharaoh, “I have appointed you for the very purpose of displaying my power in you and to spread my fame throughout the earth.” | 17For the 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.” |
| 18So you see, God chooses to show mercy to some, and he chooses to harden the hearts of others so they refuse to listen. | 18Therefore God has mercy on whom He wants to have mercy, and He hardens whom He wants to harden. |
| 19Well then, you might say, “Why does God blame people for not responding? Haven’t they simply done what he makes them do?” | 19One of you will say to me, “Then why does God still find fault? For who can resist His will?” |
| 20No, don’t say that. Who are you, a mere human being, to argue with God? Should the thing that was created say to the one who created it, “Why have you made me like this?” | 20But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? Shall what is formed say to Him who formed it, “Why did You make me like this?” |
| 21When a potter makes jars out of clay, doesn’t he have a right to use the same lump of clay to make one jar for decoration and another to throw garbage into? | 21Does not the potter have the right to make from the same lump of clay one vessel for special occasions and another for common use? |
| 22In the same way, even though God has the right to show his anger and his power, he is very patient with those on whom his anger falls, who are destined for destruction. | 22What if God, intending to show His wrath and make His power known, bore with great patience the vessels of His wrath, prepared for destruction? |
| 23He does this to make the riches of his glory shine even brighter on those to whom he shows mercy, who were prepared in advance for glory. | 23What if He did this to make the riches of His glory known to the vessels of His mercy, whom He prepared in advance for glory— |
| 24And we are among those whom he selected, both from the Jews and from the Gentiles. | 24including us, whom He has called not only from the Jews, but also from the Gentiles? |
| 25Concerning the Gentiles, God says in the prophecy of Hosea, “Those who were not my people, I will now call my people. And I will love those whom I did not love before.” | 25As He says in Hosea: “I will call them ‘My People’ who are not My people, and I will call her ‘My Beloved’ who is not My beloved,” |
| 26And, “Then, at the place where they were told, ‘You are not my people,’ there they will be called ‘children of the living God.’” | 26and, “It will happen that in the very place where it was said to them, ‘You are not My people,’ they will be called ‘sons of the living God.’ ” |
| 27And concerning Israel, Isaiah the prophet cried out, “Though the people of Israel are as numerous as the sand of the seashore, only a remnant will be saved. | 27Isaiah cries out concerning Israel: “Though the number of the Israelites is like the sand of the sea, only the remnant will be saved. |
| 28For the LORD will carry out his sentence upon the earth quickly and with finality.” | 28For the Lord will carry out His sentence on the earth thoroughly and decisively.” |
| 29And Isaiah said the same thing in another place: “If the LORD of Heaven’s Armies had not spared a few of our children, we would have been wiped out like Sodom, destroyed like Gomorrah.” Israel’s Unbelief | 29It is just as Isaiah foretold: “Unless the Lord of Hosts had left us descendants, we would have become like Sodom, we would have resembled Gomorrah.” |
| 30What does all this mean? Even though the Gentiles were not trying to follow God’s standards, they were made right with God. And it was by faith that this took place. | 30What then will we say? That the Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have obtained it, a righteousness that is by faith; |
| 31But the people of Israel, who tried so hard to get right with God by keeping the law, never succeeded. | 31but Israel, who pursued a law of righteousness, has not attained it. |
| 32Why not? Because they were trying to get right with God by keeping the law instead of by trusting in him. They stumbled over the great rock in their path. | 32Why not? Because their pursuit was not by faith, but as if it were by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone, |
| 33God warned them of this in the Scriptures when he said, “I am placing a stone in Jerusalem that makes people stumble, a rock that makes them fall. But anyone who trusts in him will never be disgraced.” | 33as it is written: “See, I lay in Zion a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense; and the one who believes in Him will never be put to shame.” |
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