Study Desk

Brothers, my heart's desire and my prayer to God for them is, that they may get salvation.

For I give witness of them that they have a strong desire for God, but not with knowledge.

Because, not having knowledge of God's righteousness, and desiring to give effect to their righteousness, they have not put themselves under the righteousness of God.

Because, if you say with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and have faith in your heart that God has made him come back from the dead, you will have salvation:

So I say, Has God put his people on one side? Let there be no such thought. For I am of Israel, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin.

God has not put away the people of his selection. Or have you no knowledge of what is said about Elijah in the holy Writings? how he says words to God against Israel,

But what answer does God make to him? I have still seven thousand men whose knees have not been bent to Baal.

As it was said in the holy Writings, God gave them a spirit of sleep, eyes which might not see, and ears which have no hearing, to this day.

For, if by their putting away, the rest of men have been made friends with God, what will their coming back again be, but life from the dead?

For, if God did not have mercy on the natural branches, he will not have mercy on you.

See then that God is good but his rules are fixed: to those who were put away he was hard, but to you he has been good, on the condition that you keep in his mercy; if not, you will be cut off as they were.

And they, if they do not go on without faith, will be united to the tree again, because God is able to put them in again.

As far as the good news is in question, they are cut off from God on account of you, but as far as the selection is in question, they are loved on account of the fathers.

For as you, in time past, were not under the rule of God, but now have got mercy through their turning away,

So in the same way these have gone against the orders of God, so that by the mercy given to you they may now get mercy.

For God has let them all go against his orders, so that he might have mercy on them all.

O how deep is the wealth of the wisdom and knowledge of God! no one is able to make discovery of his decisions, and his ways may not be searched out.

For this reason I make request to you, brothers, by the mercies of God, that you will give your bodies as a living offering, holy, pleasing to God, which is the worship it is right for you to give him.

And let not your behaviour be like that of this world, but be changed and made new in mind, so that by experience you may have knowledge of the good and pleasing and complete purpose of God.

But I say to every one of you, through the grace given to me, not to have an over-high opinion of himself, but to have wise thoughts, as God has given to every one a measure of faith.