Study Desk

For if you live according to your human nature, you are going to die; but if by the Spirit you put to death your sinful actions, you will live.

For creation was condemned to lose its purpose, not of its own will, but because God willed it to be so. Yet there was the hope

But it is not just creation alone which groans; we who have the Spirit as the first of God's gifts also groan within ourselves as we wait for God to make us his children and set our whole being free.

For it was by hope that we were saved; but if we see what we hope for, then it is not really hope. For who of us hopes for something we see?

But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.

Certainly not God, who did not even keep back his own Son, but offered him for us all! He gave us his Son—will he not also freely give us all things?

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.

As the scripture says, "I loved Jacob, but I hated Esau."

So then, everything depends, not on what we humans want or do, but only on God's mercy.

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?"

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?"

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.

For we are the people he called, not only from among the Jews but also from among the Gentiles.

And why not? Because they did not depend on faith but on what they did. And so they stumbled over the "stumbling stone"

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."

I can assure you that they are deeply devoted to God; but their devotion is not based on true knowledge.

But what the scripture says about being put right with God through faith is this: "You are not to ask yourself, Who will go up into heaven?" (that is, to bring Christ down).

But how can they call to him for help if they have not believed? And how can they believe if they have not heard the message? And how can they hear if the message is not proclaimed?

But not all have accepted the Good News. Isaiah himself said, "Lord, who believed our message?"

But I ask: Is it true that they did not hear the message? Of course they did—for as the scripture says: "The sound of their voice went out to all the world; their words reached the ends of the earth."