Romans Part Tres (I think)

Starting where I left off with Chapter 9.

9:19-20  Are you going to object, "So how can God blame us for anything since he's in charge of everything?  If the big decisions are already made, what say do we have in it?"  Who in the world do you think you are to second-guess God?  Do you for one moment suppose any of us knows enough to call God into question?  Clay doesn't talk back to the fingers that mold it, saying, "Why did you shape me like this?"

9:31-32  And Israel, who seemed so interested in reading and talking about what God was doing, missed it.  How could they miss it?  Because instead of trusting God, they took over.  They were absorbed in what they themselves were doing.  They were so absorbed in their "God projects" that they didn't notice God right in front of them, like a huge rock in the middle of the road.  And so they stumbled into him and went sprawling.

10:9-14  Say the welcoming word to God--"Jesus is my Master"--embracing, body and soul, God's work of doing in us what he did in raising Jesus from the dead.  That's it.  You're not "doing" anything; you're simply trusting him to do it for you.  That's salvation.  With your whole being you embrace God setting things right, and then you say it, right out loud: "God has set everything right between him and me!"  Scripture reassures us, "No one who trusts God like this--heart and soul--will ever regret it."  It's exactly the same no matter what a person's religious background may be:  the same God for all of us, acting the same incredibly generous way to everyone who calls out for help.  "Everyone who calls, 'Help God!'  gets help."  But how can people call for help if they don't know who to trust?  And how can they know who to trust if they haven't heard of the One who can be trusted?  And how can they hear if nobody tells them"

11:6  And since it is through God's kindness, then it is not by their good works.  For in that case, God's grace would not be what it really is--free and undeserved.

11:18  But you must not brag about being grafted in to replace the branches that were broken off.  You are just a branch, not the root.

I think that's good for today.  I am finished reading Romans, but I am re-reading the bookmarks I saved.  There are several from the last four chapters.