Romans 9

Has the Potter No Right Over the Clay?

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Paul’s Sorrow for Israel

9:1I speak truth in Christ; I do not lie, my conscience bearing witness with me in the Holy Spirit,

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

9:3For I could wish that I myself were accursed, away from Christ, for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen according to the flesh,

9:4who are Israelites, whose are the adoption as sons and the glory and the covenants and the giving of the law and the worship and the promises,

9:5whose are the fathers, and from whom is the Christ according to the flesh, who is over all, God blessed unto the ages. Amen.

The Children of the Promise

9:6But it is not as though God’s word has failed. For not all who are from Israel are Israel;

9:7neither, because they are Abraham’s seed, are they all children; but, “In Isaac your seed will be called.”

9:8That is, the children of the flesh are not thereby God’s children, but the children of the promise are reckoned as seed.

9:9For this is a word of promise: “At this time I will come, and Sarah will have a son.”

9:10And not only this, but also Rebecca, having conceived by one man, Isaac our father—

9:11for when they had not yet been born or practiced anything good or bad, so that God’s purpose according to election might remain,

9:12not from works but from the One who calls, it was said to her, “The older will serve the younger,”

9:13just as it is written, “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”

Is There Unrighteousness with God?

9:14What, then, shall we say? Is there unrighteousness with God? May it never be!

9:15For He says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whomever I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whomever I have compassion.”

9:16So then, it is not of the one who wills, nor of the one who runs, but of God who has mercy.

9:17For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “For this very purpose I raised you up, so that I might demonstrate My power in you, and so that My name might be proclaimed in all the earth.”

9:18So then, He has mercy on whom He wills, and whom He wills He hardens.

The Potter and the Clay

9:19You will then say to me, “Why, then, does He still find fault? For who has resisted His purpose?”

9:20O man, on the contrary, who are you who answers back to God? Will what is formed say to the One who formed it, “Why did You make me this way?”

9:21Or does the potter not have authority over the clay, from the same lump to make one vessel for honor and another for dishonor?

9:22But what if God, willing to demonstrate wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath fitted for destruction,

9:23and did so to make known the wealth of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory,

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

A People Called from Jews and Gentiles

9:25As He also says in Hosea, “I will call the one not My people My people, and the one not beloved beloved;

9:26and in the place where it was said to them, ‘You are not My people,’ there they will be called sons of the living God.”

9:27But Isaiah cries out concerning Israel, “Though the number of Israel’s sons be like the sand of the sea, the remnant will be saved;

9:28for the Lord will carry out a word on the earth, completing it and cutting it short.”

9:29And just as Isaiah has said beforehand, “Unless the Lord Sabaoth had left us seed, we would have become like Sodom and would have been made like Gomorrah.”

Gentiles Who Did Not Pursue Righteousness

9:30What, then, shall we say? That Gentiles who were not pursuing righteousness attained righteousness, namely the righteousness from faith;

9:31but Israel, pursuing a law of righteousness, did not attain law.

9:32Why? Because it was not from faith, but as though from works. They stumbled against the stone of stumbling,

9:33just as it is written, “Behold, I lay in Zion a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense, and the one who believes in Him will not be put to shame.”

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Saints Translation · Liturgical reading edition · V1 · working draft awaiting specialist review.