Good News [1976], GOOD NEWS BIBLE WITH DEUTEROCANONICALS / APOCRYPHA Today's English Version (AMERICAN BIBLE SOCIETY, New York) [word count] [B15000].
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God and His People
1 I am speaking the truth; I belong
to Christ and I do not lie. My
conscience, ruled by the Holy Spirit,
also assures me that I am not lying
2 when I say how great is my sorrow,
how endless the pain in my heart
3 for my people, my own flesh and
blood! For their sake I could wish
that I myself were under God's curse
and separated from Christ.
4 They
are God's people; he made them his
sons and revealed his glory to them;
he made his covenants note with them
and gave them the Law; they have
the true worship; they have received
God's promises; note
5 they are descended
from the famous Hebrew
ancestors; and Christ, as a human
being, belongs to their race. May
God, who rules over all, be praised
forever! noteAmen.
6 I am not saying that the promise
of God has failed; for not all the people
of Israel are the people of God.
7 Nor are all of Abraham's descendants
the children of God. God said to
Abraham, “It is through Isaac that
you will have the descendants I
promised you.” note
8 This means that the
children born in the usual way note are
not the children of God; instead, the
children born as a result of God's
promise are regarded as the true descendants.
9 For God's promise was
made in these words: “At the right
time note I will come back, and Sarah
will have a son.” note
10 And this is not all. For Rebecca's
two sons had the same father, our
ancestor Isaac.
11
12 But in order that
the choice of one son might be completely
the result of God's own purpose,
God said to her, “The older
will serve the younger.” He said this
before they were born, before they
had done anything either good or
bad; so God's choice was based on
his call, and not on anything they
had done. note
13 As the scripture says, “I
loved Jacob, but I hated Esau.” note
14 Shall we say, then, that God is
unjust? Not at all.
15 For he said to
Moses, “I will have mercy on anyone
I wish; I will take pity on anyone I
wish.” note
16 So then, everything depends,
not on what man wants or
does, but only on God's mercy.
17 For
-- --
the scripture says to the king of
Egypt, “I made you king in order to
use you to show my power and to
spread my fame over the whole
world.” note
18 So then, God has mercy on
anyone he wishes, and he makes
stubborn anyone he wishes.
God's Anger and Mercy
19 But one of you will say to me, “If
this is so, how can God find fault
with anyone? Who can resist God's
will?”
20 But who are you, my friend,
to talk back to God? A clay pot does
not ask the man who made it, “Why
did you make me like this?” note
21 After
all, the man who makes the pots has
the right to use the clay as he
wishes, and to make two pots from
the same lump of clay, one for special
occasions and the other for ordinary
use. note
22 And the same is true of what
God has done. He wanted to show
his anger and to make his power
known. But he was very patient in
enduring those who were the objects
of his anger, who were doomed to
destruction. note
23 And he also wanted to
reveal his abundant glory, which
was poured out on us who are the
objects of his mercy, those of us
whom he has prepared to receive his
glory.
24 For we are the people he
called, not only from among the
Jews but also from among the Gentiles.
25 This is what he says in the
book of Hosea:
“The people who were not mine
I will call ‘My People.’
The nation that I did not love
I will call ‘My Beloved.’ note
26
And in the very place where they were told, ‘You are not my people,’
there they will be called the sons of the living God.” note
27 And Isaiah exclaims about Israel:
“Even if the people of Israel are as
many as the grains of sand by the
sea, yet only a few of them will be
saved;
28 for the Lord will quickly
settle his full account with the
world.” note
29 It is as Isaiah had said before,
“If the Lord Almighty had not
left us some descendants, we would
have become like Sodom, we would
have been like Gomorrah.” note
Israel and the Gospel
30 So we say that the Gentiles, who
were not trying to put themselves
right with God, were put right with
him through faith;
31 while God's
people, who were seeking a law that
would put them right with God, did
not find it.
32 And why not? Because
they did not depend on faith but on
what they did. And so they stumbled
over the “stumbling stone”
33 that
the scripture speaks of:
“Look, I place in Zion a stone
that will make people stumble,
a rock that will make them fall.
But whoever believes in him will not be disappointed.” note
Good News [1976], GOOD NEWS BIBLE WITH DEUTEROCANONICALS / APOCRYPHA Today's English Version (AMERICAN BIBLE SOCIETY, New York) [word count] [B15000].
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