New Living Translation

New American Standard Bible 1995

1With Christ as my witness, I speak with utter truthfulness. My conscience and the Holy Spirit confirm it.

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

2My heart is filled with bitter sorrow and unending grief

2that I have great sorrow and unceasing grief 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 accursed, separated from Christ for the sake of my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh,

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.

4who are Israelites, to whom belongs the adoption as sons, and the glory and the covenants and the giving of the Law and the temple service 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.

5whose are the fathers, and from whom is the Christ according to the flesh, who is over all, God blessed forever. 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!

6But it is not as though the word of God has failed. For they are not all Israel who are descended from 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 are they all children because they are Abraham's descendants, but: "THROUGH ISAAC YOUR DESCENDANTS WILL BE NAMED."

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.

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

9For God had promised, “I will return about this time next year, and Sarah will have a son.”

9For this is the word of promise: "AT THIS TIME I WILL COME, AND SARAH SHALL HAVE A SON."

10This son was our ancestor Isaac. When he married Rebekah, she gave birth to twins.

10And not only this, but there was Rebekah also, when she had conceived twins 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;

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

12he calls people, but not according to their good or bad works.) She was told, “Your older son will serve your younger son.”

12it was said to her, "THE OLDER WILL SERVE THE YOUNGER."

13In the words of the Scriptures, “I loved Jacob, but I rejected Esau.”

13Just as it is written, "JACOB I LOVED, BUT ESAU I HATED."

14Are we saying, then, that God was unfair? Of course not!

14What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there? May it never be!

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 the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has 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, "FOR THIS VERY PURPOSE I RAISED YOU UP, TO DEMONSTRATE MY POWER IN YOU, AND THAT MY NAME MIGHT BE PROCLAIMED THROUGHOUT THE WHOLE 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.

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

19Well then, you might say, “Why does God blame people for not responding? Haven’t they simply done what he makes them do?”

19You will say to me then, "Why does He still find fault? For who resists 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?”

20On the contrary, who are you, O man, who answers back to God? The thing molded will not say to the molder, "Why did you make me like this," will it?

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?

21Or does not the potter have a right over the clay, to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use 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, although willing to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience vessels of 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.

23And He did so to make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory,

24And we are among those whom he selected, both from the Jews and from the Gentiles.

24even us, whom He also called, not from among Jews only, but also from among 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 also in Hosea, "I WILL CALL THOSE WHO WERE NOT MY PEOPLE, 'MY PEOPLE,' AND HER WHO WAS NOT BELOVED, '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.’”

26"AND 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 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 SONS OF ISRAEL BE LIKE THE SAND OF THE SEA, IT IS THE REMNANT THAT WILL BE SAVED;

28For the LORD will carry out his sentence upon the earth quickly and with finality.”

28FOR THE LORD WILL EXECUTE HIS WORD ON THE EARTH, THOROUGHLY AND QUICKLY."

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

29And just as Isaiah foretold, "UNLESS THE LORD OF SABAOTH HAD LEFT TO US A POSTERITY, WE WOULD HAVE BECOME LIKE SODOM, AND 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 shall we say then? That Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, attained righteousness, even the righteousness which 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, pursuing a law of righteousness, did not arrive at that law.

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? Because they did not pursue it by faith, but as though 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.”

33just as it is written, "BEHOLD, I LAY IN ZION A STONE OF STUMBLING AND A ROCK OF OFFENSE, AND HE WHO BELIEVES IN HIM WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED."

Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

New American Standard Bible Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation, La Habra, Calif. All rights reserved. For Permission to Quote Information visit //www.lockman.org