# Romans 9 (New King James Version) Israel's Rejection of Christ ##### Chapter 9 ###### 1 I tell the truth in Christ, I am not lying, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit, ###### 2 that I have great sorrow and continual grief in my heart. ###### 3 For I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my countrymen according to the flesh, ###### 4 who are Israelites, to whom _pertain_ the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the service _of God,_ and the promises; ###### 5 of whom _are_ the fathers and from whom, according to the flesh, Christ _came,_ who is over all, _the_ eternally blessed God. Amen.Israel's Rejection and God's Purpose ###### 6 But it is not that the word of God has taken no effect. For they _are_ not all Israel who _are_ of Israel, ###### 7 nor _are they_ all children because they are the seed of Abraham; but, "In Isaac your seed shall be called." ###### 8 That is, those who _are_ the children of the flesh, these _are_ not the children of God; but the children of the promise are counted as the seed. ###### 9 For this _is_ the word of promise: "At this time I will come and Sarah shall have a son." ###### 10 And not only _this,_ but when Rebecca also had conceived by one man, _even_ by our father Isaac ###### 11 (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), ###### 12 it was said to her, "The older shall serve the younger." ###### 13 As it is written, "Jacob I have loved, but Esau I have hated."Israel's Rejection and God's Justice ###### 14 What shall we say then? _Is there_ unrighteousness with God? Certainly not! ###### 15 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." ###### 16 So then _it is_ not of him who wills, nor of him who runs, but of God who shows mercy. ###### 17 For the Scripture says to the Pharaoh, "For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I may show My power in you, and that My name may be declared in all the earth." ###### 18 Therefore He has mercy on whom He wills, and whom He wills He hardens. ###### 19 You will say to me then, "Why does He still find fault? For who has resisted His will?" ###### 20 But indeed, 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?" ###### 21 Does not the potter have power over the clay, from the same lump to make one vessel for honor and another for dishonor? ###### 22 _What_ if God, wanting to show _His_ wrath and to make His power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, ###### 23 and that He might make known the riches of His glory on the vessels of mercy, which He had prepared beforehand for glory, ###### 24 even us whom He called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles? ###### 25 As He says also in Hosea: "I will call them My people, who were not My people, And her beloved, who was not beloved." ###### 26 "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." ###### 27 Isaiah also cries out concerning Israel: "Though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, The remnant will be saved. ###### 28 For He will finish the work and cut _it_ short in righteousness, Because the Lord will make a short work upon the earth." ###### 29 And as Isaiah said before: "Unless the Lord of Sabaoth had left us a seed, We would have become like Sodom, And we would have been made like Gomorrah."Present Condition of Israel ###### 30 What shall we say then? That Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness of faith; ###### 31 but Israel, pursuing the law of righteousness, has not attained to the law of righteousness. ###### 32 Why? Because _they did_ not _seek it_ by faith, but as it were, by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumbling stone. ###### 33 As it is written: "Behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling stone and rock of offense, And whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame."