Romans 9:6-13
Last week we started Romans 9 and saw that Paul has shifted his major focus off Christians and is now dealing directly with Israel. Paul has spent the previous chapters of this letter building his case for salvation is by faith and that we can be assured of the eternal significance of that based on God’s promises. Now in Romans 9 Paul is going to deal with the problem of Israel’s rejection. This is a real problem for any argument based on promises of God, since it can be made to look like God did not keep his promises to the nation Israel. If that could be shown, then that would potentially nullify and promise in the New Testament to believers.
Romans 9:6 immediately addresses this with the clear statement that God’s word did not fail. This is a critical statement, because if God’s word did fail, then we are all lost. It is only because God’s word cannot fail that we can have hope.
The next phrase in Romans 9:6 is key to understanding the whole passage. It says, “not all [are] Israel who are descended from Israel; nor are they all children because they are Abraham’s descendants” (Rom. 9:6, NASB). To understand this we have to remember that Paul is talking about the nation of Israel and not a specific person. He is arguing against the commonly held belief at the time that anyone born a Jew is automatically saved by virtue of their birth. Paul is saying that their physical family has no impact on it at all.
To show his point he gives the example of Jacob and Esau. Jacob and Esau were twins both born to Isaac who was the child of Abraham. This means in the Jewish mind that both should have been covered by the promise as they had direct unbroken linage to the child of promise. There was nothing different between them with regards to blood family history, yet that is not how it turned out. Malachi 1:2-3 tells us that God loved Jacob, but hated Esau. Gen 25:23 tells us that before the twins were even born God decreed that the eldest would serve the younger. We have two children, both with the exact same family linage, yet one is obviously part of the promise and one is not.
Now it is important to stop here and clear up one minor detail. When Paul speaks of Jacob and Esau here, he is still referring to the nations they represent. When God said, “I hated Esau” he is referring to the idolatrous nation that he fathered, known as Edom. If you read through the Old Testament you will see that Edom caused constant problems for the nation of Israel (who was fathered by Jacob), and that they rejected God as whole.
This is a great example of God’s foreknowledge at play. While Esau was still in his mother’s womb God saw that he would father a nation (Gen. 5:23) and that nation would be against Israel. He saw that they would turn to idols and as a whole reject Him. Based on that foreknowledge he elected Jacob over Esau and set him up as the one with authority. He did all of this before either one of them had done any work to merit this ruling.
This was a massive blow to the Jewish idea of how the world works, and it comes from their own scripture. Under their concept of the birthright, Esau could not be hated. Esau had a more direct line to claim a birthright then any Jew alive in that day. Also the Jewish religion as practiced is a works based religion and Paul is clearly pointing out to them that works had nothing to do with Esau and Jacob’s position since that was decided before they were even born.
The point Paul is driving home here is that the promise of God for salvation has nothing to do with your bloodline. It never has and if you stop and think about it, it never could. Every human that is alive today has a common ancestor in Noah. That means regardless of birthplace, skin color, or any other dividing factor you could imagine we are all one family. We all claim the same birthright, going all the way back to Adam to whom the whole world was given. I may not be able to claim that Abraham is my physical father, but I can claim that Abraham and I share the same father in Noah. That means I have as much physical birthright as Abraham did. If it was merely about blood ties, then everyone in the world is saved by birth.
Now, my prior paragraph would get me stoned for blasphemy in some circles, but the logic is sound. The problem with it is that it has never been about physical bloodlines; rather it has always been about spiritual bloodlines. Paul says “it is the children of the promise that are considered offspring.” (Romans 9:6). We who are born again Christians, we are children of the promise and we can claim the birthright of being children of Abraham. Those who are not, cannot, regardless of whether or not they are physical descendants of Abraham.
Paul writes in Galatians 3:6 that Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness. Then in Galatians 3:7 he writes, “Therefor, be sure it is those who are of faith who are sons of Abraham.” Then in Galatians 3:9 he writes, “So then those who are of faith are blessed with Abraham, the believer.” This clearly shows that Christians are just as much of the linage of Abraham as are Jews who are faithful believers of God. The promises made to the nation of Israel have not failed, they hold true today.
What this means for Christians is that we can trust in the promises of God because they are unchanged. They did not fail, and God has not rejected any of His children through out all of history. The nation of Israel did fail in its mission, but all the believers in the nation are still under the promise and are not rejected. As Christians, those believers are our kinfolk. We all share the same father in Abraham, and the same promise from God.
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