Romans 10:1–13
“Brothers, my heart’s desire and my prayer to God is for Israel, that they may be saved. For I testify about them that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. For being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and seeking to establish their own righteousness, they didn’t subject themselves to the righteousness of God. For Christ is the fulfillment of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.
“For Moses writes about the righteousness of the law, ‘The one who does them will live by them.’ But the righteousness which is of faith says this, ‘Don’t say in your heart, “Who will ascend into heaven?”’ (that is, to bring Christ down); ‘or, “Who will descend into the abyss?”’ (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead.) But what does it say? ‘The word is near you, in your mouth, and in your heart;’ that is, the word of faith which we preach: that if you will confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart, one believes resulting in righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made resulting in salvation.
“For the Scripture says, ‘Whoever believes in him will not be disappointed.’ For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, and is rich to all who call on him. For, ‘Whoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved.’”
Paul has identified the reason Israel failed to attain righteousness: “they didn’t seek it by faith, but as it were by works of the law.” Romans 10 develops that explanation without diminishing either Paul’s love for Israel or Israel’s zeal for God. Paul desires their salvation, acknowledges their zeal, and identifies the problem as ignorance of God’s righteousness and an attempt to establish their own.
Against that attempt Paul places Christ: “Christ is the fulfillment of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.” The righteousness Israel sought through the law is found in Christ and received through faith. Paul does not present Christ as repudiating what God had previously revealed but as the one in whom the law reaches its goal with respect to righteousness.
Paul develops the contrast through Moses himself, drawing from Leviticus and Deuteronomy. Righteousness pursued through law rests upon doing, while the righteousness of faith rests upon what God has already accomplished in Christ. No one must ascend into heaven to bring Christ down or descend into the abyss to bring him up from the dead. The word is near, announcing the crucified and risen Lord so that he may be believed and confessed.
The result is a saving promise without ethnic distinction. Jew and Gentile stand before the same Lord and receive righteousness in the same way. “Whoever believes in him will not be disappointed,” and “whoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved.”
My Heart’s Desire Is That They May Be Saved
Romans 10:1
“Brothers, my heart’s desire and my prayer to God is for Israel, that they may be saved.”
Paul again expresses his concern for Israel in explicitly soteriological terms. His desire and prayer are “that they may be saved.”
The statement prevents Israel’s covenant privileges from being confused with salvation itself. Paul has affirmed the adoption, glory, covenants, law, worship, promises, patriarchs, and Israelite ancestry of Christ. Those privileges are genuine, but they do not allow him to regard unbelieving Israel as already possessing the salvation found in Christ.
Paul therefore prays for them. His arguments concerning divine sovereignty have not made either Israel’s response or his own intercession meaningless. He desires their salvation and brings that desire before God.
His fellow Israelites remain Israelites according to the flesh, but ancestry does not settle their standing before God. Paul’s grief over them is therefore joined by prayer that they may be saved.
Zeal Without Knowledge
Romans 10:2
“For I testify about them that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge.”
Paul does not accuse Israel of religious indifference. He testifies to their “zeal for God.”
He knew such zeal personally. Before proclaiming Christ, Paul had been deeply committed to the traditions of his people and zealous enough to persecute the church:
Galatians 1:13–14
“For you have heard of my way of living in time past in the Jews’ religion, how that beyond measure I persecuted the assembly of God, and ravaged it. I advanced in the Jews’ religion beyond many of my own age among my countrymen, being more exceedingly zealous for the traditions of my fathers.”
Paul’s own history demonstrates that zeal does not establish the truth of the convictions producing it. He acted from intense religious commitment while opposing the Messiah.
Israel’s problem is therefore not a shortage of religious intensity. Their zeal is “not according to knowledge.” The ignorance Paul has in view is not a complete absence of knowledge about God. Israel possessed the Scriptures and the law. The problem concerns the righteousness God has provided: in pursuing a righteousness of their own, they failed to recognize and submit to his.
Sincerity and zeal cannot substitute for receiving what God has revealed in Christ.
Seeking to Establish Their Own Righteousness
Romans 10:3
“For being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and seeking to establish their own righteousness, they didn’t subject themselves to the righteousness of God.”
Paul places “God’s righteousness” against the righteousness Israel sought to establish for itself. The problem is not the desire to be righteous but the attempt to establish that standing through human achievement rather than receiving what God provides.
This is the failure Paul identified at the end of Romans 9. Israel pursued a law of righteousness but did not attain it because they sought it through works rather than faith. Romans 10:3 describes the same pursuit as an attempt “to establish their own righteousness.”
Paul has rejected that basis for justification throughout Romans. Abraham could not boast before God because righteousness was counted to him through faith. David described the blessedness of the person to whom God counts righteousness apart from works. What God gives in grace cannot simultaneously be treated as a debt owed for performance.
Israel’s zeal cannot change the nature of that problem. Intense effort directed toward establishing one’s own righteousness remains a refusal to submit to the righteousness God provides.
Christ Is the Fulfillment of the Law for Righteousness
Romans 10:4
“For Christ is the fulfillment of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.”
Paul identifies Christ as the answer to Israel’s pursuit of righteousness through the law.
The Greek word telos can carry the sense of end, goal, culmination, or completion. In this context Paul’s concern is specifically righteousness. Israel pursued righteousness through the law but failed to attain it because they sought it through works rather than faith. Christ is the one in whom the law reaches its goal with respect to the righteousness Israel sought.
This does not make the law evil or mistaken. Paul has already called it holy, righteous, and good. Its inability to justify arises from sinful humanity rather than from a defect in God’s revelation. What sinners cannot establish through the law is found in Christ.
The qualification “to everyone who believes” determines how that righteousness is received. Neither ethnicity nor possession of the law provides it. Jew and Gentile alike depend upon Christ, and both receive righteousness through faith in him.
The One Who Does Them Will Live by Them
Romans 10:5
“For Moses writes about the righteousness of the law, ‘The one who does them will live by them.’”
Paul quotes Leviticus 18:5:
Leviticus 18:5
“You shall therefore keep my statutes and my ordinances, which if a man does, he shall live in them. I am Yahweh.”
The law speaks in terms of doing. Its commandments are not merely propositions to be known but commands to be obeyed.
Earlier Paul wrote:
Romans 2:13
“For it isn’t the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law will be justified.”
Possessing or hearing the law therefore provides no basis for boasting. The person who appeals to doing as the ground of righteousness must actually do what the law requires.
Yet Paul has already established that Jews and Gentiles alike are under sin and that “by the works of the law, no flesh will be justified in his sight.” The problem is not that the law demanded obedience but that sinful human beings attempt to establish righteousness through a law they fail to keep.
The Righteousness Which Is of Faith
Romans 10:6–8
“But the righteousness which is of faith says this, ‘Don’t say in your heart, “Who will ascend into heaven?”’ (that is, to bring Christ down); ‘or, “Who will descend into the abyss?”’ (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead.) But what does it say? ‘The word is near you, in your mouth, and in your heart;’ that is, the word of faith which we preach”
Paul draws his language from Deuteronomy 30:
Deuteronomy 30:11–14
“For this commandment which I command you today is not too hard for you or too distant. It is not in heaven, that you should say, ‘Who will go up for us to heaven, bring it to us, and proclaim it to us, that we may do it?’ Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, ‘Who will go over the sea for us, bring it to us, and proclaim it to us, that we may do it?’ But the word is very near to you, in your mouth and in your heart, that you may do it.”
Moses emphasizes the nearness of God’s word. Israel does not need someone to ascend into heaven or cross the sea to obtain what God has made known. The word has already been brought near.
Paul takes that language and applies it to Christ. No one needs to ascend into heaven “to bring Christ down,” because Christ has come. No one needs to descend into the abyss “to bring Christ up from the dead,” because God has raised him.
The contrast with establishing one’s own righteousness is sharp. Salvation does not depend upon accomplishing an impossible religious achievement. The decisive acts are God’s acts. He sent Christ and raised him from the dead.
The word announcing those acts is therefore near, “in your mouth, and in your heart.” Paul identifies it as “the word of faith which we preach.” The gospel proclaims what God has accomplished so that Christ may be believed and confessed.
Jesus Is Lord
Romans 10:9–10
“that if you will confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart, one believes resulting in righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made resulting in salvation.”
The word of faith has specific content. Saving faith is not generic religious conviction or confidence in personal sincerity. It centers upon Jesus Christ.
Paul joins confession that “Jesus is Lord” with belief that God raised him from the dead. The Jesus who was crucified has been raised, and faith receives God’s testimony concerning him and entrusts itself to the risen Lord.
Confession gives outward expression to that faith. Paul does not present the words “Jesus is Lord” as a formula whose recitation mechanically produces salvation. Mouth and heart belong together: the mouth confesses what the heart believes.
Neither does the parallel between righteousness and salvation divide the response into two independent stages, as though faith earns one benefit and verbal confession earns another. Paul is describing a unified response through the same mouth-and-heart language taken from Deuteronomy. The word is near in both.
The person who believes and confesses therefore does not establish his own righteousness. He receives the salvation God has accomplished in the crucified and risen Christ.
Whoever Believes in Him
Romans 10:11
“For the Scripture says, ‘Whoever believes in him will not be disappointed.’”
Paul returns to Isaiah 28:16, the text he has just used to identify Christ as the stone laid in Zion. The promise attached to that stone is stated in terms of faith: “Whoever believes in him will not be disappointed.”
“Whoever” is especially significant within Paul’s discussion of Israel and the Gentiles. The promise establishes no separate requirement for either group. Faith is not a Gentile means of salvation alongside another arrangement for Israel.
The object of faith is the same Christ, and the promise belongs to whoever believes in him.
No Distinction Between Jew and Greek
Romans 10:12
“For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, and is rich to all who call on him.”
Paul used the same language when establishing the universal need for justification:
Romans 3:22–23
“even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ to all and on all those who believe. For there is no distinction, for all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God”
There was no distinction in humanity’s condition under sin, and there is no distinction in access to the Lord through whom salvation comes.
This does not erase the historical distinction between Jews and Gentiles. Paul has repeatedly acknowledged Israel’s unique privileges and covenant history. The absence of distinction concerns salvation. Neither group possesses a separate means of righteousness or an ethnic advantage before Christ.
The reason is Christological: “the same Lord is Lord of all.” Jew and Gentile do not approach different saviors or different gospels. The one Lord is “rich to all who call on him.”
Whoever Calls on the Name of the Lord
Romans 10:13
“For, ‘Whoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved.’”
Paul quotes Joel 2:32:
Joel 2:32
“It will happen that whoever will call on Yahweh’s name shall be saved; for in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there will be those who escape, as Yahweh has said, and among the remnant, those whom Yahweh calls.”
Joel promises salvation to whoever calls upon the name of Yahweh. Paul has just identified Jesus as Lord, declared that the same Lord is Lord of all, and spoken of all who call upon him. He then applies Joel’s promise concerning calling upon Yahweh to the salvation proclaimed in Christ.
The Christological force is substantial. Jesus, confessed as Lord, stands within the divine identity and saving work associated with Yahweh in Israel’s Scriptures.
The scope of the promise is equally clear. “Whoever” corresponds to Paul’s declaration that there is “no distinction between Jew and Greek.” Neither ancestry nor possession of the law determines who may call upon the Lord. Salvation belongs to those who call upon him in faith.
Christ Is the End of the Law for Righteousness
Paul’s desire for Israel is that they be saved. Their zeal cannot substitute for salvation because zeal directed toward establishing one’s own righteousness remains a refusal to submit to the righteousness God provides.
Christ is the fulfillment of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes. The contrast Paul draws through Moses is therefore between righteousness pursued on the basis of doing and righteousness received through faith in what God has accomplished. The sinner does not bring Christ down from heaven or raise him from the dead. God has acted, and the gospel brings the word of that accomplished work near.
That word is received in the heart and confessed with the mouth: Jesus is Lord, and God raised him from the dead. The same confession stands before Jew and Gentile because the same Lord is Lord of all.
Israel’s covenant history supplies no alternate righteousness, and Gentile ancestry creates no barrier to the righteousness found in Christ. The promise is stated in the broadest terms Paul can give it: “Whoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved.”