| 1 | I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience bearing witness 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 anathema from Christ for my brethren's sake, my kinsmen according to the flesh: |
| 4 | who are Israelites; whose is the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service [of God], and the promises; |
| 5 | whose are the fathers, and of whom is Christ as concerning the flesh, who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen. |
| 6 | But [it is] not as though the word of God hath come to nought. For they are not all Israel, that are of Israel: |
| 7 | neither, because they are Abraham's seed, are they all children: but, In Isaac shall thy seed be called. |
| 8 | That is, it is not the children of the flesh that are children of God; but the children of the promise are reckoned for a seed. |
| 9 | For this is a word of promise, According to this season will I come, and Sarah shall have a son. |
| 10 | And not only so; but Rebecca also having conceived by one, [even] by our father Isaac-- |
| 11 | for [the children] 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 that calleth, |
| 12 | it was said unto her, The elder shall 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? God forbid. |
| 15 | For he saith 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 that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that hath mercy. |
| 17 | For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, For this very purpose did I raise thee up, that I might show in thee my power, and that my name might be published abroad in all the earth. |
| 18 | So then he hath mercy on whom he will, and whom he will be hardeneth. |
| 19 | Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he still find fault? For who withstandeth his will? |
| 20 | Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why didst thou make me thus? |
| 21 | Or hath not the potter a right over the clay, from the same lump to make one part a vessel unto honor, and another unto dishonor? |
| 22 | What if God, willing to show his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering vessels of wrath fitted unto destruction: |
| 23 | and that he might make known the riches of his glory upon vessels of mercy, which he afore prepared unto glory, |
| 24 | [even] us, whom he also called, not from the Jews only, but also from the Gentiles? |
| 25 | As he saith also in Hosea, I will call that my people, which was not my people; And her beloved, that was not beloved. |
| 26 | And it shall be, [that] in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people, There shall they be called sons of the living God. |
| 27 | And Isaiah crieth concerning Israel, If the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, it is the remnant that shall be saved: |
| 28 | for the Lord will execute [his] word upon the earth, finishing it and cutting it short. |
| 29 | And, as Isaiah hath said before, Except the Lord of Sabaoth had left us a seed, We had become as Sodom, and had been made like unto Gomorrah. |
| 30 | What shall we say then? That the Gentiles, who followed not after righteousness, attained to righteousness, even the righteousness which is of faith: |
| 31 | but Israel, following after a law of righteousness, did not arrive at [that] law. |
| 32 | Wherefore? Because [they sought it] not by faith, but as it were by works. They stumbled at the stone of stumbling; |
| 33 | even as it is written, Behold, I lay in Zion a stone of stumbling and a rock of offence: And he that believeth on him shall not be put to shame. |