Wednesday in the Word

Romans 11 pulls our eyes off ourselves and back onto the mercy and faithfulness of God. In this episode, we trace Paul’s argument that God has not rejected His people, that both Jews and Gentiles stand only by grace, and that spiritual pride—especially religious pride—is one of the most dangerous distortions of all. Through the image of the olive tree, we are reminded that we are not the high point of history but grafted-in branches depending entirely on ancient roots and a future God has promised to complete. 

In this week’s episode, we explore:

• How a Calvin and Hobbes strip about being “the purpose of history” exposes our own version of “chronological snobbery” and religious self-importance 
• The ways spiritual pride twists grace into entitlement: devaluing others, celebrating our own accomplishments, and quietly assuming equality with God
• Paul’s insistence that God has not rejected His people Israel, and the ongoing presence of a remnant “chosen by grace” in every generation
• What Romans 11:6 means when it says that if grace becomes something we earn or presume upon, it is “no longer grace”
• The sobering reality of hardening—a “spirit of stupor” with eyes that do not see and ears that do not hear—and how this describes much of Israel’s current spiritual state
• How Israel’s stumbling led to salvation for the Gentiles, and why that Gentile blessing is meant to stir Israel to jealousy, not to feed Gentile arrogance
• The olive tree metaphor: deep roots in God’s promises, broken-off natural branches, and wild branches grafted in by sheer mercy
• Paul’s warning to Gentile believers: “Do not be arrogant, but be afraid”—learning to behold both the kindness and severity of God
• What Paul means by “the fullness of the Gentiles” and “all Israel will be saved,” and how a richly alive Gentile church may one day awaken Jewish envy for the life of God
• The breathtaking conclusion of Romans 11: God has consigned all to disobedience so that He may have mercy on all, leading Paul into doxology rather than neat formulas

By the end of the episode, listeners will see more clearly that no group—Jew or Gentile, past or present—stands before God on any ground but mercy. You’ll be invited to let go of spiritual superiority, to see yourself as one small stretch of bank along a very long river of God’s work, to honor both the roots and the future of God’s people, and to join Paul in humble worship: “From Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever.” 

 Series: Romans: Justification by Faith

Be the first to know when it's out: What Jesus Taught by Krisan Marotta 

In my new book, I gather Jesus' teaching from all four Gospels and organize it by theme, so you can see what Jesus taught about God, himself, his followers and the kingdom, and how it all fits together. To follow the Teacher, you need to know what he taught.

Romans 10 confronts the kind of spiritual “dieting” many of us know too well: heroic religious effort, full of zeal and activity, but aimed in the wrong direction. In this episode, we look at Paul’s warning that it’s possible to be deeply serious about God and still miss Him—because instead of receiving righteousness as a gift, we try to build one of our own. Against that backdrop, Romans 10 announces wonderfully simple news: Christ has already done what we could never do, the word is near, and “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” 

In this week’s episode, we explore:

• How the dieting analogy helps us see the danger of wrong-focused zeal in the Christian life
• Why Paul can both affirm God’s sovereign choice in Romans 9 and still pray and preach earnestly for Israel’s salvation in Romans 10
• What it means that Israel had “zeal for God, but not according to knowledge,” and how sincere religious activity can actually keep us from grace
• The contrast between “righteousness based on the law” that asks, What must I do? and “righteousness based on faith” that rests in what Christ has already done
• Paul’s famous words about confessing with our mouth that Jesus is Lord and believing in our heart that God raised Him from the dead—and why pride makes both so hard
• How gratitude, not performance, becomes the true engine of disciplined, obedient lives
• The chain Paul lays out—from calling, to believing, to hearing, to preaching, to being sent—and why God delights to use ordinary messengers to carry an extraordinary message
• What Romans 10 does and doesn’t say about those who have “never heard,” and why Israel in particular stands as a warning against resisting the light already given
• How persistent unbelief ultimately exposes a heart that prefers its own strength and glory to receiving life as a sheer gift from God

By the end of the episode, listeners will see more clearly why religious busyness can never substitute for real faith, and why our best “gift” to God will never be enough to earn His favor. You’ll be invited to lay down spiritual pride, receive Christ as God’s undeserved gift, and rediscover the beauty of simply calling on His name—and of being sent out with “beautiful feet” to help others hear and believe the same good news.

 Series: Romans: Justification by Faith

Be the first to know when it's out: What Jesus Taught by Krisan Marotta 

In my new book, I gather Jesus' teaching from all four Gospels and organize it by theme, so you can see what Jesus taught about God, himself, his followers and the kingdom, and how it all fits together. To follow the Teacher, you need to know what he taught.

Romans 9:14–33 forces us to ask questions many of us quietly carry: Is God fair? Can a sovereign God still hold us responsible? In this episode, we walk through Paul’s stark language about mercy and hardening and discover that Scripture does not shrink back from these questions—but it also refuses to let us treat God as our equal. Instead, we are led to see that we begin life already condemned, and that our only hope is the sovereign mercy of a God who chooses to save. 

In this week’s episode, we explore:

• The travel-soccer analogy that sets the stage: why “not treating everyone the same” is not automatically injustice, and how that helps us think about God’s freedom to act
• Paul’s central question in Romans 9:14: “Is there injustice on God’s part?” and why his first answer is to quote God’s own words to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy”
• What it means that salvation “does not depend on human will or exertion, but on God who has mercy,” and why that is both humbling and profoundly comforting
• The contrast between Moses and Pharaoh—one of the “best” and one of the “worst”—and why neither deserved anything but judgment, yet God used both to display His glory
• How the Exodus story shows God hardening Pharaoh in order to make His name known, and why this does not turn Pharaoh into a puppet but confirms his chosen rebellion
• The reminder that we do not start neutral but already condemned in Adam, and that election is God’s rescue of some from a race that would otherwise universally resist Him
• Paul’s four-part response to the objection, “Why does He still find fault?”—including the potter-and-clay image, our limited credentials to challenge God, and the possibility of purposes we cannot yet see
• The picture of God enduring “vessels of wrath” with much patience to make known the riches of His glory to “vessels of mercy,” and why this pushes us to trust His wisdom rather than our logic
• How Hosea and Isaiah prepare us for a remnant Israel and a surprising flood of Gentile believers—showing that Scripture had always anticipated this pattern
• The “testing point” of election: Jesus as the stone in the path—some stumble over Him in self-reliance, while others stand on Him in faith and will never be put to shame

By the end of the episode, listeners will see that Romans 9 is not a cold puzzle about fate, but a searching invitation to let God be God. You’ll be encouraged to lay down the instinct to put God in the dock, to recognize your very desire for Christ as evidence of His prior mercy, and to rest in the One who freely chooses, patiently endures, and unfailingly keeps those who stand on the stumbling stone who has become their Rock.

 Series: Romans: Justification by Faith

Be the first to know when it's out: What Jesus Taught by Krisan Marotta 

In my new book, I gather Jesus' teaching from all four Gospels and organize it by theme, so you can see what Jesus taught about God, himself, his followers and the kingdom, and how it all fits together. To follow the Teacher, you need to know what he taught.

Romans 9:1–13 raises a piercing question: is the gospel of Romans 1–8 simply too good to be true, and has God’s word failed when His own covenant people reject their Messiah? In this episode, we walk with Paul as he grieves over unbelieving Israel, honors their extraordinary privileges, and then begins to show that God’s promises have not collapsed—because from the beginning, He has always worked through His own gracious choice, not through human pedigree, effort, or worthiness. 

In this week’s episode, we explore:

• How Paul can move from the exultant assurance of Romans 8 to “great sorrow and unceasing anguish” over his fellow Israelites in Romans 9:1–3
• What Israel’s unique privileges really were—adoption, glory, covenants, Law, worship, promises, patriarchs, and even Christ’s human lineage—and why those advantages did not guarantee salvation 
• The central question of the chapter: if many Jews have rejected the Messiah, has God’s word failed, and can we still trust His promises?
• Paul’s shocking claim that “not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel,” and what that means for our ideas of spiritual heritage and entitlement
• Why salvation is never based on natural advantages—family background, spiritual history, religious exposure, or national identity
• How the stories of Isaac and Ishmael, Jacob and Esau illustrate that God’s saving work rests on His promise and call, not on our performance or even our future choices 
• What “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated” does and does not mean—and how it points to God giving undeserved mercy rather than withholding kindness from those who never wanted Him
• Why original sin and our “broken choosers” make God’s electing grace astonishing good news rather than a cold abstraction
• Practical implications: humility instead of presumption, gratitude instead of entitlement, and confidence that our hope ultimately rests on God’s faithfulness, not our stability

By the end of the episode, listeners will see that Romans 9 does not undercut the good news of Romans 8; it undergirds it. You’ll be invited to face hard questions about God’s sovereignty without charging Him with injustice, to let go of spiritual privilege as a safety net, and to rest in the miracle of grace—that God freely chooses, pursues, and keeps people who could never have earned their way in. 

 Series: Romans: Justification by Faith

Be the first to know when it's out: What Jesus Taught by Krisan Marotta 

In my new book, I gather Jesus' teaching from all four Gospels and organize it by theme, so you can see what Jesus taught about God, himself, his followers and the kingdom, and how it all fits together. To follow the Teacher, you need to know what he taught.

Romans 8:26–39 brings us to the solid ground of Christian assurance: our future glory is not hanging on our wisdom, willpower, or ability to “get it right,” but on God’s unshakable commitment to finish what He began. In this episode, we look at how the Spirit prays for us in our weakness, how God weaves everything in our lives toward our inheritance, and why nothing—absolutely nothing—can separate us from the love of God in Christ. 

In this week’s episode, we explore:

• What Paul means by “our weakness,” and why not even knowing how to pray is part of the evidence that we cannot make ourselves holy
• How the Spirit intercedes for us with “groanings too deep for words,” praying wisely and precisely for what we truly need when all we can manage is “God, help”
• How Romans 8:28–29 has been misunderstood—and why “all things work together for good” means God is committed to our inheritance and holiness, not our comfort or ease
• The “golden chain” of foreknown, predestined, called, justified, and glorified believers, and how the past tense “glorified” highlights the absolute certainty of our future
• Why this passage dismantles the anxiety of trying to stay on God’s one “perfect will” track, and instead shows that God is present and at work in every circumstance we face
• Paul’s courtroom logic: if God has justified us and Christ Himself intercedes for us, there is no one left with the authority to successfully accuse or condemn us
• How Paul’s list—tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril, sword—along with Psalm 44, shows that suffering, even unto death, is not a sign of abandonment
• The sweeping promise that nothing in life or death, no spiritual power, no present or future event, no place we can go, and no created thing can sever us from God’s love in Christ
• How all of this ties back to Paul’s larger argument against legalism: self-reliance gains us nothing, while resting in God’s Spirit secures everything we most deeply long for

By the end of the episode, listeners will see that their glory really is guaranteed—not because they have avoided all the “wrong turns,” but because God Himself is weaving every step, every sorrow, and every failure into the path that leads to their inheritance. You’ll be invited to release the burden of legalism, let go of fear that you might somehow fall outside God’s plan, and rest in the Spirit’s perfect intercession and the relentless love of Christ that nothing can break.

 Series: Romans: Justification by Faith

Be the first to know when it's out: What Jesus Taught by Krisan Marotta 

In my new book, I gather Jesus' teaching from all four Gospels and organize it by theme, so you can see what Jesus taught about God, himself, his followers and the kingdom, and how it all fits together. To follow the Teacher, you need to know what he taught.