it follows immediately after what he said about jesus being a stumblingstone, and then he said in chapter 10, verse 1, "brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to god for israel is, that they might be saved. for i bear them record that they have a zeal of god, but not according to knowledge", and then he begins to start showing you that they do not have relationship with god. these are talking about the religious jews who were still trusting in their genealogy and in their observance of the feast days and jewish rituals and they thought that that's what was going to grant them salvation, and he's saying, they have a zeal for god, but it's not according to knowledge and therefore, they are not accepted with god. they are not going to go to heaven. so, here's another way of saying this, that there are religious people today who are actually seeking to have god's acceptance but not obtaining it, not because they don't have the desire for it, but because they aren't seeking it properly. they are trying to earn relationship with god instead of receive it as a gift, and i'm telling you, that thi

it says, "as it is written, behold, i lay in sion a stumblingstone and rock of offence: and whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed." so, paul gave these prophecies, showing that in the old testament it predicted that the jews, as a whole, would reject their messiah, and therefore, salvation would turn to the gentiles, and he says, so, what am i saying? he says, the gentiles which weren't following after righteousness... in other words, they weren't trying to keep all of the jewish feasts, they weren't circumcising their children, they weren't observing all of the rituals and the laws, they didn't observe the ten commandments, none of these things. these pagans came along and they started receiving right relationship with god, not based on their performance and adherence to the law, but instead they received right standing with god by just simply putting faith in jesus as having paid for their sins and...and relationship with god being available as a gift, and boy, this was super offensive to the religious jews because again, they believed in their nationality. they believed i