God's love

DEVOTION

ROMANS

GOD’S LOVE

Rom 9:6-13

6 It is not as though God's word had failed. For not all who are descended from Israel are Israel. 7 Nor because they are his descendants are they all Abraham's children. On the contrary, "It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned."   8 In other words, it is not the natural children who are God's children, but it is the children of the promise who are regarded as Abraham's offspring. 9 For this was how the promise was stated: "At the appointed time I will return, and Sarah will have a son."   

10 Not only that, but Rebekah's children had one and the same father, our father Isaac. 11 Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad — in order that God's purpose in election might stand: 12 not by works but by him who calls — she was told, "The older will serve the younger."   13 Just as it is written: "Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated."  

NIV

We have come to the place the reformers place all their election doctrine on. That means they believe God decides who will be saved and who will perish. This doctrine has been debated by the best of theologians throughout the years since it was written. To best understand it we first have to deal with the idea of the Jews saying they are the elect because of being the seed of Abraham. But Ishmael was also the seed of Abraham and so Paul is making the distinction between Ishmael and Isaac, and that Isaac is the seed by which they are descendants. This matters because Isaac is the son of the promise, while Ishmael was the son of human decision. But since Isaac also had two sons, Jacob and Esau there had to be a distinction by God as to what nation would be his chosen people and what nation would not, so he choose Jacob, or the nation of people who came from the loins of Jacob. It is evident God was not speaking about two people, but two nations of people. The prophet Malachi makes that clear.

Mal 1:1-5

:1 An oracle: The word of the LORD to Israel through Malachi.  

2 "I have loved you," says the LORD. "But you ask, 'How have you loved us?' "Was not Esau Jacob's brother?" the LORD says. "Yet I have loved Jacob, 3 but Esau I have hated, and I have turned his mountains into a wasteland and left his inheritance to the desert jackals." 4 Edom may say, "Though we have been crushed, we will rebuild the ruins." But this is what the LORD Almighty says: "They may build, but I will demolish. They will be called the Wicked Land, a people always under the wrath of the LORD. 5 You will see it with your own eyes and say, 'Great is the LORD-even beyond the borders of Israel!' 

NIV

The whole discourse of the prophet gives way to God using the names of Jacob and Esau as nations, the descendants of the two men. There is evidence that some of the nation of Esau served God and some of the nation of Jacob became reprobates. Just because the people were descendants of Jacob didn't mean they served God and were saved. This also bears out that Esau the older never served Jacob the younger as men. What this all boils down to is that God did determine that the descendants of Jacob would be his chosen people. It is not that he hated Esau the man, or loved Jacob the man. Consider Jacob was the deceiver, he lied with the help of his mother, to his father and stole the blessing of Esau the firstborn. If people want to hang their hat on the fact God loved the liar, the deceiver, rather than the rightful firstborn, they hang they hat on the wrong hat stand. This is all about nations not individual people and it is about God having chosen a nation to call his own, for the express reason to reveal who he is to the whole of his creation. We have to remember although God loved Jacob, chose the children of Jacob, the Jews as his people, they rejected him, killed his Son. Likewise as he said he hated Esau, or the gentiles, he offers his salvation, his Son to the descendants of Esau, the gentiles and we as gentiles accepted that salvation. So then Jacob rejects Jesus and Esau accepts Jesus. Who now does God love? Who is the real Israel? Who are the children of the promise? Because we are not from the line of Jacob, but rather Esau, being not Jewish, but gentile, we still are children of the promise made to Abraham and through the line of Isaac and his firstborn son Esau. Therefor it is not about God choosing a person, but a nation of people, Israel. But who is Israel? As we already know it is not by the circumcision of the flesh, for Abraham also circumcised Ishmael even before Isaac was born. Israel is made up of the people who have circumcised their heart. So a circumcised Jew may well not be Israel, and we who were born a gentile, uncircumcised in that sense, become Israel because of our heart being circumcised. We are the children of Abraham, the children of the promise, the children of faith, we believe God, as Abraham did, and because he believed it was credited onto him as righteousness. That is the story of people of faith, we believe God, we believe in Jesus and it is credited unto us as righteousness. We are the people God loves, even though we physically come through the line of Esau, not Jacob. So where is this election?