Romans 9

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¹I speak the truth in Christ; I am not lying, as confirmed by my conscience in the Holy Spirit. ✦ ²I have deep sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. ✦ ³For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my own flesh and blood, ✦ ⁴the people of Israel. Theirs is the adoption as sons; theirs the divine glory and the covenants; theirs the giving of the law, the temple worship, and the promises. ✦ ⁵Theirs are the patriarchs, and from them proceeds the human descent of Christ, who is God over all, forever worthy of praise! Amen. ✦ ⁶It is not as though God’s word has failed. For not all who are descended from Israel are Israel. ✦ ⁷Nor because they are Abraham’s descendants are they all his children. On the contrary, “Through Isaac your offspring will be reckoned.” ✦ ⁸So it is not the children of the flesh who are God’s children, but it is the children of the promise who are regarded as offspring. ✦ ⁹For this is what the promise stated: “At the appointed time I will return, and Sarah will have a son.” ✦ ¹⁰Not only that, but Rebecca’s children were conceived by one man, our father Isaac. ✦ ¹¹Yet before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad, in order that God’s plan of election might stand, ✦ ¹²not by works but by Him who calls, she was told, “The older will serve the younger.” ✦ ¹³So it is written: “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.” ✦ ¹⁴What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Certainly not! ✦ ¹⁵For He says to Moses: “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” ✦ ¹⁶So then, it does not depend on man’s desire or effort, but on God’s mercy. ✦ ¹⁷For the 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.” ✦ ¹⁸Therefore God has mercy on whom He wants to have mercy, and He hardens whom He wants to harden. ✦ ¹⁹One of you will say to me, “Then why does God still find fault? For who can resist His will?” ✦ ²⁰But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? Shall what is formed say to Him who formed it, “Why did You make me like this?” ✦ ²¹Does not the potter have the right to make from the same lump of clay one vessel for special occasions and another for common use? ✦ ²²What if God, intending to show His wrath and make His power known, bore with great patience the vessels of His wrath, prepared for destruction? ✦ ²³What if He did this to make the riches of His glory known to the vessels of His mercy, whom He prepared in advance for glory— ✦ ²⁴including us, whom He has called not only from the Jews, but also from the Gentiles? ✦ ²⁵As He says in Hosea: “I will call them ‘My People’ who are not My people, and I will call her ‘My Beloved’ who is not My beloved,” ✦ ²⁶and, “It will happen that in the very place where it was said to them, ‘You are not My people,’ they will be called ‘sons of the living God.’” ✦ ²⁷Isaiah cries out concerning Israel: “Though the number of the Israelites is like the sand of the sea, only the remnant will be saved. ✦ ²⁸For the Lord will carry out His sentence on the earth thoroughly and decisively.” ✦ ²⁹It is just as Isaiah foretold: “Unless the Lord of Hosts had left us descendants, we would have become like Sodom, we would have resembled Gomorrah.” ✦ ³⁰What then will we say? That the Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have obtained it, a righteousness that is by faith; ✦ ³¹but Israel, who pursued a law of righteousness, has not attained it. ✦ ³²Why not? Because their pursuit was not by faith, but as if it were by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone, ✦ ³³as it is written: “See, I lay in Zion a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense; and the one who believes in Him will never be put to shame.” ✦

Tap any verse for its study page. Underlined terms mark a concept, person, or place; ✦ marks verses with cross-references.

Where this chapter connects

Rom 9 ·13 Rom 11 ·12 Gal 3 ·11 Rom 4 ·10 Eph 2 ·10 Rom 3 ·9 Rom 10 ·9 Rom 1 ·7

Christ at the center

Paul unfolds the gospel in full: Christ our righteousness received by faith, the second Adam in whom many are made righteous, in whose death and resurrection we are buried and raised.

How Romans 9 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.

Resources, by level

Lay

★ Start hereVideoBibleProject — video overviews & word studiesBibleProject · 5–10 min · Free · evangelical
Free animated overviews of every book of the Bible, plus themes and Hebrew/Greek word studies — the best visual on-ramp to any book. (Biblical-theology, broadly evangelical, not distinctly Reformed.)
★ Start hereAudioThrough the WordThrough the Word · ~10 min/chapter · Free · evangelical
A clear ~10-minute audio teaching for every one of the Bible's 1,189 chapters — the most systematic free way to study chapter by chapter.
VideoMike Winger — BibleThinkerMike Winger · Free · reformed
Free verse-by-verse studies through whole books plus careful apologetics — "learn to think biblically about everything." (Reformed-leaning, non-denominational.)

Pastoral

★ Start hereSermonMLJ Trust — Martyn Lloyd-Jones sermonsMartyn Lloyd-Jones · Free · reformed
1,600+ free sermons from "the Doctor," including landmark verse-by-verse series (Romans, John, Ephesians, Acts) — a gold standard of expository preaching.
SermonGrace to You — John MacArthurJohn MacArthur · Free · reformed
Decades of careful verse-by-verse expository sermons, especially through the New Testament. (MacArthur, d. 2025; archive remains free.)
SermonGospel in Life — Tim KellerTim Keller · Free · reformed
Tim Keller's gospel-centered preaching — sermons stream free (the complete downloadable archive is paid).
ArticleRecommended NT commentaries (9Marks / Schreiner)Thomas R. Schreiner · Free · reformed
A trusted pastor-oriented guide to the best commentary on each New Testament book.
SermonChuck Smith — C2000 SeriesChuck Smith · Free · evangelical
Free verse-by-verse audio through the entire Bible from the founder of Calvary Chapel.
VideoVerse By Verse Ministry InternationalVerse By Verse Ministry Int'l · Free · evangelical
In-depth, verse-by-verse expository teaching book-by-book — strong for working straight through a whole New Testament book.
VideoLook at the Book — John PiperJohn Piper · Free · reformed
Watch Piper trace the logic of a passage phrase by phrase on screen — a model of close reading.

Commentaries & study tools

VideoBibleProject — Romans videosBibleProject · Lay · Free · evangelical
Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.
VideoWatch teaching on Romans 9YouTube · Lay · Free
Sermons and chapter teaching from across YouTube.
CommentaryEnduring Word — Romans 9David Guzik · Lay · Free · evangelical
Readable, verse-by-verse exposition of the whole chapter.
CommentaryMatthew Henry on RomansMatthew Henry · Pastoral · Free · evangelical
The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).
ReferenceBlue Letter Bible — Romans 9Blue Letter Bible · Seminary · Free
Interlinear, lexicon, and study tools across the chapter.

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