So [as I said, and, as you see, Isaiah corroborates] belief cometh of [is born of, or grows out of] hearing, and hearing by [by reason of, because of] the word [saying, behest, command. See Luke 5:5; Hebrews 11:3; Romans 1:3] of Christ. [And so, briefly paraphrasing the apostle's thought, it runs thus: Can God's glorious purpose and inimitable means fail to accomplish the universal glorification of man? Assuredly they can, for Isaiah so predicted. To accomplish universal salvation there must be a universal heed-hearing. But Isaiah complained, "Lord, who hath believed that which we have caused them to hear?" meaning that very few gave a heed-hearing. So we see from Isaiah that it is precisely as I said (Romans 10:14-15); namely, that belief comes of hearing, and hearing is caused by the command or commission of Christ, as is made apparent by the fact that Isaiah reports back to Christ (whom he calls Lord) that men have not heard what Christ sent, or commissioned, him to tell them. How culpable, then, was Israel as foreseen in the visions of Isaiah and as literally seen by the eyes of Paul! A message commanded by Christ the Lord! How could they be excused for not giving it a heed-hearing, an obedience? Only in two ways: first, by showing that they had never heard it; second, by proving that they were misled by their Scriptures so that they could not recognize it as coming from their Lord--and the point where they would assert and attempt to prove the misleading was this very one now mooted; namely, universality, for the Jew regarded the reception of the Gentile as contrary to all that God had ever revealed, or caused to be written down. Therefore the apostle takes these two excuses in order, and exposes their emptiness.]

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Old Testament