Deuteronomy 10:22

10:22 When your ancestors went down to Egypt, they numbered only seventy, but now the Lord your God has made you as numerous as the stars of the sky. ¹ 

Isaiah 51:2

51:2 Look at Abraham, your father,

and Sarah, who gave you birth. ² 

When I summoned him, he was a lone individual, ³ 

but I blessed him ⁴  and gave him numerous descendants. ⁵ 

Matthew 7:14

7:14 But the gate is narrow and the way is difficult that leads to life, and there are few who find it.

Luke 12:32

12:32 “Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father is well pleased ⁶  to give you the kingdom.

Romans 9:27-29

9:27 And Isaiah cries out on behalf of Israel, “Though the number of the children ⁷  of Israel are as the sand of the sea, only the remnant will be saved, 9:28 for the Lord will execute his sentence on the earth completely and quickly.” ⁸  9:29 Just ⁹  as Isaiah predicted,

“If the Lord of armies ¹⁰  had not left us descendants,

we would have become like Sodom,

and we would have resembled Gomorrah.” ¹¹ 

¹ tn Or “heavens.” The Hebrew term שָׁמַיִם (shamayim) may be translated “heaven(s)” or “sky” depending on the context.

² sn Although Abraham and Sarah are distant ancestors of the people the prophet is addressing, they are spoken of as the immediate parents.

³ tn Heb “one”; NLT “was alone”; TEV “was childless.”

⁴ tn “Bless” may here carry the sense of “endue with potency, reproductive power.” See Gen 1:28.

⁵ tn Heb “and I made him numerous.”

⁶ tn Or perhaps, “your Father chooses.”

⁷ tn Grk “sons.”

⁸ tc In light of the interpretive difficulty of this verse, a longer reading seems to have been added to clarify the meaning. The addition, in the middle of the sentence, makes the whole verse read as follows: “For he will execute his sentence completely and quickly in righteousness, because the Lord will do it quickly on the earth.” The shorter reading is found largely in Alexandrian mss (Ì⁴⁶ א* A B 6 1506 1739 1881 pc co), while the longer reading is found principally in Western and Byzantine mss (א² D F G Ψ 33 Ï lat). The longer reading follows Isa 10:22-23 (LXX) verbatim, while Paul in the previous verse quoted the LXX loosely. This suggests the addition was made by a copyist trying to make sense out of a difficult passage rather than by the author himself.

⁹ tn Here καί (kai) has not been translated because of differences between Greek and English style.

¹⁰ tn Traditionally, “Lord of hosts”; Grk “Lord Sabaoth,” which means “Lord of the [heavenly] armies,” sometimes translated more generally as “Lord Almighty.”

¹¹ sn A quotation from Isa 1:9.