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9:1 Truth I say in Christ, I lie not, my conscience bearing testimony with me in the Holy Spirit, 9:2 that I have great grief and unceasing pain in my heart -- 9:3 for I was wishing, I myself, to be anathema from the Christ -- for my brethren, my kindred, according to the flesh, 9:4 who are Israelites, whose [is] the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the lawgiving, and the service, and the promises, 9:5 whose [are] the fathers, and of whom [is] the Christ, according to the flesh, who is over all, God blessed to the ages. Amen. 9:6 And it is not possible that the word of God hath failed; for not all who [are] of Israel are these Israel; 9:7 nor because they are seed of Abraham [are] all children, but -- `in Isaac shall a seed be called to thee;' 9:8 that is, the children of the flesh -- these [are] not children of God; but the children of the promise are reckoned for seed; 9:9 for the word of promise [is] this; `According to this time I will come, and there shall be to Sarah a son.' 9:10 And not only [so], but also Rebecca, having conceived by one -- Isaac our father -- 9:11 (for they being not yet born, neither having done anything good or evil, that the purpose of God, according to choice, might remain; not of works, but of Him who is calling,) it was said to her -- 9:12 `The greater shall serve the less;' 9:13 according as it hath been written, `Jacob I did love, and Esau I did hate.' 9:14 What, then, shall we say? unrighteousness [is] with God? let it not be! 9:15 for to Moses He saith, `I will do kindness to whom I do kindness, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion;' 9:16 so, then -- not of him who is willing, nor of him who is running, but of God who is doing kindness: 9:17 for the Writing saith to Pharaoh -- `For this very thing I did raise thee up, that I might shew in thee My power, and that My name might be declared in all the land;' 9:18 so, then, to whom He willeth, He doth kindness, and to whom He willeth, He doth harden. 9:19 Thou wilt say, then, to me, `Why yet doth He find fault? for His counsel who hath resisted?' 9:20 nay, but, O man, who art thou that art answering again to God? shall the thing formed say to Him who did form [it], Why me didst thou make thus? 9:21 hath not the potter authority over the clay, out of the same lump to make the one vessel to honour, and the one to dishonour? 9:22 And if God, willing to shew the wrath and to make known His power, did endure, in much long suffering, vessels of wrath fitted for destruction, 9:23 and that He might make known the riches of His glory on vessels of kindness, that He before prepared for glory, whom also He did call -- us -- 9:24 not only out of Jews, but also out of nations, 9:25 as also in Hosea He saith, `I will call what [is] not My people -- My people; and her not beloved -- Beloved, 9:26 and it shall be -- in the place where it was said to them, Ye [are] not My people; there they shall be called sons of the living God.' 9:27 And Isaiah doth cry concerning Israel, `If the number of the sons of Israel may be as the sand of the sea, the remnant shall be saved; 9:28 for a matter He is finishing, and is cutting short in righteousness, because a matter cut short will the Lord do upon the land. 9:29 and according as Isaiah saith before, `Except the Lord of Sabaoth did leave to us a seed, as Sodom we had become, and as Gomorrah we had been made like.' 9:30 What, then, shall we say? that nations who are not pursuing righteousness did attain to righteousness, and righteousness that [is] of faith, 9:31 and Israel, pursuing a law of righteousness, at a law of righteousness did not arrive; 9:32 wherefore? because -- not by faith, but as by works of law; for they did stumble at the stone of stumbling, 9:33 according as it hath been written, `Lo, I place in Sion a stone of stumbling and a rock of offence; and every one who is believing thereon shall not be ashamed.'