Title: Romans 09:1-18 God's Election
Romans 9:1-18 / God's Choice
As we can see from the words of verse 3, Paul's worries were for his relatives in the flesh. In verse 4, Paul refers to Israel as a relative of bone and flesh. It means that the people of Israel, chosen as God's chosen people, reject Christ and do not believe in Him, causing sorrow and pain in their hearts.
Do any of us feel troubled or painful because our brothers, relatives, parents, or neighbors do not believe in Jesus? Or, if you are busy with life, what is there to worry about? do you think Looking at the words of verse 3, Paul says that even if he is cursed and cut off by Christ, it would be better if he could fall into hell on behalf of Israel, so that they could believe in Christ.
I am thinking like this because my heart is overflowing with love for the soul. Of course, it is impossible for someone to go to hell for someone and someone to go to heaven for someone. Because it is not according to our will, but according to God's will.
When Paul uses this expression in verse 3, he expresses his earnest desire to do so if God allows it. The Holy Spirit is testifying that Paul's heart was not at all false. Because of this earnestness, Paul's suffering is even greater. Also, listing the privileges given to Israel, despite the abundance of grace God has bestowed upon them, it is even more regrettable that they distrust Christ.
In the words of verse 4, there are eight kinds of what the riches of grace that Israel received from God were. He says we have adoption. This statement is based on Exodus 4:22; This is because God said, “Israel is my firstborn son” through Hosea 11:1, “I am the father of Israel” through Jeremiah 31:9.
Also, to say that we have the glory of God means that God is seated in glory among the cherubim on the ark of the covenant in the Most Holy of the tabernacle and temple.
As for the covenant, it refers to the countless new covenants through Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, and David, and the unchanging guidance of those promises.
To establish the law means to say that there is a unique revelation of God (the Ten Commandments engraved on stone tablets) that God spoke with His own voice and written by His hand.
Worship and Promise refers to all the provisions stipulated for the priests and sacrifices, and the promises related to the Messiah to come as prophets, priests and kings.
In verse 5, the phrase “theirs are theirs” refers to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, the fathers of the twelve tribes, and great men such as Moses, Joshua, Samuel, and David. It is telling us that Israel is the descendant of the heroes of the times God used to hear.
Definitively, if we do it in the flesh, it means that Christ was born of us. How can we not believe in the incarnate Christ, even though God, who is above all things and who is to be praised throughout the ages, took the form of a flesh and was born among us? How can Israel explain this hardening?
We are looking for answers to these difficult-to-understand problems through four questions.
Today we will only look at that first question. Verses 6-13 can be the first question and its answer.
The first question is, is God's promise to Israel broken? As you can see through 4-5, Israel is a people who have received amazing grace from God. Nevertheless, how can they deny the Lord of redemption who came to this earth as the Messiah when the time was fulfilled in God's promise? How could they have crucified the Christ they had so longed for and waited for? Did they not do this by breaking God's promise to them? These are the questions.
The answer here is that it is not. It is not that the promise was broken, but that all those who were born of Israel are not Israel. Of Israel, but Christ was rejected by non-Israelites.
is that
How do you know that? You can see how God's promises were given to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
*** Reference
Verse 7 says that only those born of Isaac will be called your offspring. Why is he saying this? In Genesis 25:1-3, after Abraham's death with Sarah, he got a second wife named Keturah. He had six sons (Zimran, Jokshan, Medan, Midian, Ishbak, and Shua) from his second wife, and the sons they had had also had children. If God did not give the promise that the one born of Isaac will be called your offspring, there is no way to know whether it was through Ishmael or the son he received from his second wife.
Isaac had two sons, Esau and Jacob, and God was good to Jacob. Therefore, only the children born by promise following Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob can be called true Israel.
Paul shows that God chose Jacob, not Esau, just as God chose Isaac, not Ishmael, to be the recipient of the promise. God's decision here is that he acted according to God's will, regardless of his or her personal qualifications.
These standards of God are equally applied in this age. (Explanation) Isaac and Ishmael were born to different mothers, but Jacob and Esau were born as twins to the same mother. Even before they were even born, God made a decision.
This intentional decision of God was to establish God's eternal purpose, which operates according to the principle of election, as verse 11 says.
(Read verse 11) God's will according to his election means that the choice of Isaac over Ishmael and Jacob over Esau was not because of their actions, but because of the heart and will of the caller.
It is not so easy to understand the word of God's choice. As a result, some people say that God is unfair. For those who have such thoughts, Paul will ask the next question. This is verse 14 (read and explain).
Instead of applying God's choices to others, apply them to me in this moment. You cannot say that it is unfair that God has chosen and called you.
If we realize that the God who chose Isaac and not Ishmael, and the God who chose Jacob and not Esau, chose me, not anyone else, and called me to the Church of Always Love. .
If God saw my evil deeds, how could I not be here today? If you think about it, you will have no choice but to humble yourself before Him. If we realize that our salvation is entirely by the love of God and the grace of Christ, then we will know that we deserve praise and honor and glory to Him forever.