Romans 9:32

Wherefore? [Why, then, did the Jews fail to find any law of life? Answer: Because there is but one such law, and they sought another.] Because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by works. [In interpreting, we have contrasted the law of works with what we have called "the law of faith," but the apostle does not use this latter term: with him life it attained by "faith," though he treats it as a working principle in that he contrasts it with the other active principle, or law of works. In this verse, however, he drops the abstract altogether, and places the concrete "faith" and "works" in vivid opposition. It is not so much a question of law against law, and principle against principle; it is one of faith which appropriates the perfect righteousness of Christ, and of Jewish works which, scorning the garment of the purity of God, revealed in his Son, still clings to the filthy rags of self-righteousness, self-sufficiency, Phariseeism, etc.-- Philippians 3:4-14] They stumbled at the stone of stumbling [The language here still follows the metaphor of the race-course. The Jew, running with his eye on an imaginary, non-existing, phantom goal, and blind as to the real goal, stumbles over it and falls. The picture presented by the apostle suggests the sad truth that the Jew has run far enough and fast enough to win, but, as he has rejected the terms and rules of the race, his efforts are not counted by the Lord of the race. Christ was placed of God as a goal, and not as a stumbling-block; as a Saviour, not as a source of condemnation; but he is indeed either man's salvation or his ruin-- Matthew 21:42-45];