Chapters 9 through 12, Paul addresses a different theme: The “Jewish” question. While the Israelites are God’s “chosen” people, most of them failed to recognize Jesus as Messiah. They thought that by following the Law of Moses they would be saved. They missed the message that the way to salvation is through faith.
Paul also presents what at first glance appears to be a harsher side of God. He portrays God as one who chooses one person over another without apparent rhyme or reason. Soon we will discover that this is certainly not the case. Unlike God, we don’t have the benefit of foresight–that is, when we make our choices, we cannot make them with the benefit of certainty of the outcome, as can God. So God’s choices are all perfect to God’s purposes, since God knows our each thought and action before we do.
Romans 9:1-5
I speak the truth in Christ–I am not lying, my conscience confirms it in the Holy Spirit–I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut of from Christ for the sake of my brothers and sisters, those of my own race, the people of Israel. Theirs is the adoption as sons and daughters, theirs the divine glory, the covenants, the receiving of the Law, the temple worship and the promises. Theirs are the patriarchs, and from them is traced the human ancestry of Christ, who is God over all, forever praised! Amen.
Paul is very upset–grieving that so many of his people have failed to recognize Jesus as Messiah. He’s so upset he’s almost ready to offer himself to be banished away from Jesus, if he thought it would bring them to Christ. He recalls the many things that God has provided them as the “chosen people”: They were the first to be made the children of God; God made covenants with them; God gave them the Law; God gave them a way to worship; God made promises to them. God gave them ancestors who provided guidance and direction as well as a relationship with God. And most of all, the Israelites has the right to claim Jesus, the Messiah, as one of their own. Yet, so many failed to accept what God offered them. Most especially, they failed to recognize and accept Jesus as Messiah.
Romans 9:6-18
It is not as though God’s word had failed. For not all who are descended from Israel are Israel. 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.” (Gen. 21:12) 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. For this was how the promise was stated: “At the appointed time, I will return, and Sarah will have a son.” (Gen. 18:10, 14) Not only that, but Rebekah’s children had one and the same father, our father Isaac. Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad–in order that God’s purpose in election might stand: Not by works, but by the one who calls–she was told, “The older will serve the younger,” (Gen. 25:23) Just as it is written, “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.” (Mal. 1:2,3)
What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! For God says to Moses, “I will have Mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” (Exodus 33:19) It does not, therefore, depend on human desire or effort, but on God’s mercy. For the scripture says to Pharaoh: “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display My power in you and that My name might be proclaimed in All the Earth.” (Ex. 19:16) Therefore God has mercy on whom God wants to have mercy, and God hardens whom God wants to harden.
Paul points out that though the Jewish people are the chosen people, not all of them are. In the history of the Jewish people, there were specific people set aside for the mission of creating and guiding the nation of the chosen. These are the people whom Paul designates as the “Children of the Promise.”
For example, Abraham had two sons, Ishmael (born to Hagar, Sarah’s servant) and Isaac. It was Sarah’s son, Isaac, who would be the “Child of the Promise.” Ishmael’s descendants became those we know as Arabs. Not only that, but Isaac and Rebekah had twin boys–Jacob and Esau, but the “Child of the Promise” in this instance was Jacob, not Esau.
Let me be quick to point out that the phrase “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated,” does not contain the same connotation that we would understand those words to mean in today’s language. Paul was quoting the Prophet Identified as Malachi 1:3. The quoted passage was more an expression of the author to the evidence of history. Jacob, whose name was changed to Israel, was the “Child of the Promise.” Esau’s descendants became the people of Edom who, because of their evil ways, were destroyed.
Paul indicates that the choice of Jacob over Esau had nothing to do with earning God’s favor. Indeed, God had told Rebekah before they were born–before either of them had done anything good or bad–that Esau would serve Jacob. God was creating a nation of people through one couple in each generation and was simply choosing one person instead of another, and no one should draw any conclusions about those chosen, or those not chosen.
Paul asks the question everyone is thinking: “Is God unjust?” the question begs the unasked question, “Does God have favorites?” or “How could God have favorites?” In response Paul quotes Exodus 33:19 where God tells Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”
One of the stumbling blocks many Christians have over the question of the acceptability of homosexual in God’s realm finds its nemesis in this particular statement. The fundamentalist Christian forgets, ignores, or simply doesn’t believe that fact that God is ultimately the one who decides who is acceptable and who isn’t. Over and over again we have seen in these pages as we have studied Romans that the answer for all of us, even for those who are the worst of sinners, is that we are saved by faith in Jesus Christ, Nothing else.
We all want to understand the reasons why God does things–we get furious at God when things happen that don’t fit our understanding of what is fair and just and/or “Godlike.” I’m reminded of the righteous Job having to face a series of sudden catastrophes. After defending God and his own innocence of wrongdoing, he begins to rail at God, searching for answers to his sufferings. God’s response to Job is that Job cannot possibly know the inner workings of the universe of how God’s perfect plan is unfolding. In short, God tells Job, “You can’t possibly know my ways. Yours is not to know, but to trust that I know, and that I work for your highest good.”
Knowing the kind of person he was, God was able to use even Pharaoh, who didn’t believe in God, to promote God’s agenda, and to further God’s plan for the nation of Israel. God knew in advance that Pharaoh would resist Moses’ requests. God also knew that the accumulation of the ten plagues, culminating in the death of the first-born, would be the breaking point for Pharaoh. The plagues would be the beginning of the evidence of God’s power to save an enslaved people and lead them to the Promised Land.