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Romans 9:16-33
New Life Version
Romans 9:16-33
New Life Version
16 These good things from God are not given to someone because he wants them or works to get them. They are given because of His loving-kindness. 17 The Holy Writings say to Pharaoh, “I made you leader for this reason: I used you to show My power. I used you to make My name known over all the world.” (A) 18 So God has loving-kindness for those He wants to. He makes some have hard hearts if He wants to.
19 But you will ask me, “Why does God blame men for what they do? Who can go against what God wants?” 20 Who are you to talk back to God? A pot being made from clay does not talk to the man making it and say, “Why did you make me like this?” 21 The man making the pots has the right to use the clay as he wants to. He can make two pots from the same piece of clay. One can have an important use. The other one can be of little use. 22 It may be that God wants to show His power and His anger against sin. He waits a long time on some men who are ready to be destroyed. 23 God also wanted to show His shining-greatness to those He has given His loving-kindness. He made them ready for His shining-greatness from the beginning. 24 We are the ones He chose. He did not only choose Jews. He also chose some from among the people who are not Jews. 25 In the Book of Hosea He says, “Those who are not My people, I will call, ‘My people.’ Those who are not loved, I will call, ‘My loved ones.’” (B) 26 “And where it said, ‘You are not my people,’ they will be called sons of the living God.” (C) 27 Isaiah says this about the Jews, “Even if there are as many Jews as the sand by the sea, only a few of them will be saved from the punishment of sin. 28 For the Lord will do on earth what He says in His Word. He will work fast when He says what will happen here.” (D) 29 Isaiah said also, “If God had not left some of the Jews, we would have all been destroyed like the people who lived in the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah.” (E)
30 What are we to say about these things? The people who are not Jews were not made right with God by the Law. They were made right with God because they put their trust in Him. 31 The Jews tried to be right with God by obeying the Law, but they did not become right with God. 32 Why? Because they did not put their trust in God. They tried to be right with God by working for it. They tripped over the most important Stone (Christ). 33 The Holy Writings say, “See! I put in Jerusalem a Stone that people will trip over. It is a Rock that will make them fall. But the person who puts his trust in the Rock (Christ) will not be put to shame.” (F)
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Romans 9:16-33
New International Version
Romans 9:16-33
New International Version
16 It does not, therefore, depend on human desire or effort, but on God’s mercy.(A) 17 For 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.”[a](B) 18 Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.(C)
19 One of you will say to me:(D) “Then why does God still blame us?(E) For who is able to resist his will?”(F) 20 But who are you, a human being, to talk back to God?(G) “Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it,(H) ‘Why did you make me like this?’”[b](I) 21 Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes and some for common use?(J)
22 What if God, although choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience(K) the objects of his wrath—prepared for destruction?(L) 23 What if he did this to make the riches of his glory(M) known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory(N)— 24 even us, whom he also called,(O) not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles?(P) 25 As he says in Hosea:
“I will call them ‘my people’ who are not my people;
and I will call her ‘my loved one’ who is not my loved one,”[c](Q)
26 and,
“In the very place where it was said to them,
‘You are not my people,’
there they will be called ‘children of the living God.’”[d](R)
27 Isaiah cries out concerning Israel:
“Though the number of the Israelites be like the sand by the sea,(S)
only the remnant will be saved.(T)
28 For the Lord will carry out
his sentence on earth with speed and finality.”[e](U)
29 It is just as Isaiah said previously:
“Unless the Lord Almighty(V)
had left us descendants,
we would have become like Sodom,
we would have been like Gomorrah.”[f](W)
Israel’s Unbelief
30 What then shall we say?(X) That the Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have obtained it, a righteousness that is by faith;(Y) 31 but the people of Israel, who pursued the law as the way of righteousness,(Z) have not attained their goal.(AA) 32 Why not? Because they pursued it not by faith but as if it were by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone.(AB) 33 As it is written:
Footnotes
- Romans 9:17 Exodus 9:16
- Romans 9:20 Isaiah 29:16; 45:9
- Romans 9:25 Hosea 2:23
- Romans 9:26 Hosea 1:10
- Romans 9:28 Isaiah 10:22,23 (see Septuagint)
- Romans 9:29 Isaiah 1:9
- Romans 9:33 Isaiah 8:14; 28:16
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