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1 Brothers and sisters, the deepest desire of my heart and my prayer on their behalf to God is for their salvation.
2 I can certainly attest that they are zealous for God, although not in an appropriately understanding fashion.
3 By ignoring the deliverance from God, and seeking to establish their own, they fail to subject themselves to the deliverance that comes from God himself.
4 The Messiah is the goal of the Torah, ultimately so that everyone who believes can receive deliverance.
5 So Moses writes about the deliverance which is achieved through the Torah, ‘the person who does these things, by means of them, will live.’”[i]
6 But God’s great act of deliverance, which is effected “through faith,” speaks in this way: ‘Do not say in your heart, “Who will ascend into heaven?”, which is to bring the Messiah down, 7 or, ‘Who will descend into the abyss,’ which is to bring the Messiah up from the dead. 8 What does it go on to say? ‘The Word is very near you, both in your mouth and in your heart’—the Word about that faith which we also declare—9that when you confess with your mouths that Jesus is our divine ruler, and you believe in your hearts that God has raised him from the dead [to that place], you are saved; 10 for all this is believed in the heart resulting in deliverance, and it is confessed with the mouth leading to salvation.
11 But as Scripture also says, ‘Everyone believing in him will never be put to shame.’ 12 So there is no difference here whether you are a Jew or a pagan. The same person is the divine ruler of everyone, and enriches everyone who calls out to him. 13 ‘Everyone who calls on the name of our divine ruler will be saved.’
14 Speaker 1: “So then, how will they call upon one in whom they have not believed? And how can they believe in someone whom they haven’t heard about? And how can they hear about him apart from someone proclaiming him? 15 And how will anyone proclaim him without people being commissioned and sent to do so?”
Speaker 2: Well, “as it is written [in Scripture], ‘how beautiful the feet are of those proclaiming the good news [right now]!”
16 Speaker 1: “But not everyone submitted to this proclamation.”
Speaker 2: “Indeed, Isaiah the prophet says ‘Lord, who has believed in what they have heard from us?!’ So this all proves that believing comes from hearing, and hearing comes through the Word that speaks of the Messiah.[ii]”
17 Speaker 1: “But I would say in response to this, surely they did not hear?”
18 Speaker 2: “Surely they did. [As Scripture says again] ‘Their tongues have gone out to the ends of the earth, their words to the very boundaries of the empire.’”
19 Speaker 1: “But against this again I would say that surely Israel did not really understand.”
Speaker 2: “Well, first of all, Moses says, ‘I will make you envious by way of a people who are not [my people]; and by means of a foolish nation I will positively enrage you.’ 20 And then, second, Isaiah is even bold enough to say [on behalf of God], ‘I have been found by those who have not been looking for me; I have become apparent to those who were not even asking about my whereabouts,’ 21 whereas about Israel he says [again, speaking for God], that ‘I have been reaching out my hands ceaselessly to a disobedient and defiant people.’”
[i] Possibly Paul is picking up here the way the text of Leviticus points toward “life,” and therefore claiming this as evidence that the way of faith does fulfill the goal of the Torah because it leads to life.
[ii] “Word of the Messiah” or “Word of God”? Cf. 4x here: Rom 10:8 (2x), 17, 18 (); 2 Cor 12:4; 13:1 (); Eph 5:26; 6:17.