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I tell the truth in Christ, I am not lying, my conscience also bearing witness with me in the Holy Spirit,
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that I have great sorrow and continual grief in my heart.
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For I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ on behalf of my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh,
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who are Israelites, to whom pertain the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the Law, the service of God, and the promises;
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of whom are the fathers and from whom, according to the flesh, is Christ, being God over all, blessed forever. Amen.
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Moreover, it is not as though the Word of God has fallen away. For not all those of Israel are Israel,
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nor are they all children because they are the seed of Abraham; but, In Isaac your Seed shall be called.
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That is, those who are the children of flesh, these are not the children of God; but the children of the promise are accounted as seed.
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For this is the Word of promise: At this time I will come and Sarah shall have a son.
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And not only this, but when Rebecca also had conceived by one man, even by our father Isaac
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(for the children not yet being born, nor having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works but of Him who calls),
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it was said to her, The elder shall serve the younger.
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As it is written, Jacob I have loved, but Esau I have hated.
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What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? Let it not be!
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For He says to Moses, I will have mercy on whomever I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whomever I will have compassion.
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So then it is not of him who wills, nor of him who runs, but of God who shows mercy.
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For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show My power in you, and that My name might be declared in all the earth.
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Therefore He has mercy on whom He wills, and whom He wills He hardens.
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You will say to me then, Why does He yet find fault? For who has resisted His will?
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No, rather, O man, who are you to reply against God? Will the thing formed say to him who formed it, Why have you made me like this?
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Does not the potter have authority over the clay, from the same lump to make one vessel unto honor and another unto dishonor?
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What if God, determining to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath rendered fit unto destruction,
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and that He might make known the riches of His glory on vessels of mercy, which He had prepared beforehand unto glory,
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whom He also called, not only of us Jews, but also of the Gentiles?
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As He says also in Hosea: I will call them My people, who were not My people, and her beloved, who was not beloved.
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And it shall come to pass in the place where it was said to them, You are not My people, There they shall be called, Sons of the living God.
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Isaiah also cries out concerning Israel: Though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, a remnant will be saved.
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For He is fulfilling the Word and executing it quickly in righteousness, because the Lord will quickly execute the Word upon the earth.
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And as Isaiah said before: Unless the Lord of Hosts had left us a seed, we would have become like Sodom, and we would have been made like Gomorrah.
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What shall we say then? That Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have taken hold of righteousness, even the righteousness of faith;
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but Israel, pursuing the Law of righteousness, has not arrived at the Law of righteousness.
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Why? Because it was not by faith, but as out of works of the Law. For they stumbled at the stumbling stone.
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As it is written: Behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling stone and rock of offense, and everyone believing on Him will not be put to shame.
