TRUST IN JESUS

Romans 9:19-33 / Keywords 9:33

As it is written: "See, I lay in Zion a stone that causes men to stumble and a rock that makes them fall, and the one who trusts in him will never be put to shame.

 

9:19 One of you will say to me: “Then why does God still blame us? For who is able to resist his will?” 20 But who are you, a human being, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’”[h] 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?

22 What if God, although choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath—prepared for destruction? 23 What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory— 24 even us, whom he also called, not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles? 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,”[i]

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.’”[j]

27 Isaiah cries out concerning Israel:

“Though the number of the Israelites be like the sand by the sea,

    only the remnant will be saved.

28 For the Lord will carry out

    his sentence on earth with speed and finality.”[k]

29 It is just as Isaiah said previously:

“Unless the Lord Almighty

    had left us descendants,

we would have become like Sodom,

    we would have been like Gomorrah.”[l]

Israel’s Unbelief

30 What then shall we say? That the Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have obtained it, a righteousness that is by faith; 31 but the people of Israel, who pursued the law as the way of righteousness, have not attained their goal. 32 Why not? Because they pursued it not by faith but as if it were by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone. 33 As it is written:

“See, I lay in Zion a stone that causes people to stumble

    and a rock that makes them fall,

    and the one who believes in him will never be put to shame.”[m]

Footnotes

h. Romans 9:20 Isaiah 29:16; 45:9

i. Romans 9:25 Hosea 2:23

j. Romans 9:26 Hosea 1:10

k. Romans 9:28 Isaiah 10:22,23 (see Septuagint)

l. Romans 9:29 Isaiah 1:9

m. Romans 9:33 Isaiah 8:14; 28:16

1. God is the Creator who made each person for his purpose. He bore the rejection of men with great patience in order to reveal the riches of his glory, not just to Jews, but also to Gentiles. The Gentile world was under God’s wrath and was destined for destruction because of their rejection. But when some responded in faith, they too became his people and the objects, the recipients, of God’s mercy. This fulfilled the will of God expressed in prophecy. Being one of God’s people is not a matter of lineage. When the Gentiles believed God, they were called “God’s people.” Only a remnant of the Israelites would be saved, and that by God’s mercy.

 

2. Righteousness is from God. The Gentiles received it by faith in God’s mercy. The Jews pursued it as if they could attain it by their own works, but they stumbled. Jesus is the stone God laid in Zion. All who trust in him will never be put to shame.

 

Prayer Sovereign Lord, thank you for displaying the riches of your mercy in the gospel. Help me to trust only in Jesus.

One Word A stone in Zion