Paul on the Oracle of Jacob s Election to Salvation (Gen 25.19-34 in Rom 9.10-18) WestminsterReformedChurch.org Pastor Ostella June 28, 2015 And not only so, but also when Rebekah had conceived children by one man, our forefather Isaac, 11 though they were not yet born and had done nothing either good or bad-- in order that God's purpose of election might continue, not because of works but because of him who calls-- 12 she was told, "The older will serve the younger." 13 As it is written, "Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated." 14 What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God's part? By no means! 15 For he says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion." 16 So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy. 17 For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, "For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth." 18 So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills. (Rom 9.10-18) Introduction The title for this message is Paul on the oracle of Jacob s election to salvation. From the apostle in Romans 9.10-18, we get NT perspective on Genesis 25.19-34. By way of introduction, let s consider why Paul cites Genesis 25. The opening words of 9.10 show that he is now adding a point to what was said to Abraham about God s choice of Isaac and not Ishmael (for he said, in Isaac shall thy offspring be named, Rom 9.7 quoting Gen 21.12). Thus, what was said regarding Isaac is not only so but also there are the things said to Rebekah regarding her son Jacob. The words regarding Isaac and Jacob teach that God has not failed to keep His covenant with Abraham despite the lost condition of his descendants on a national scale. This lost condition is the great burden that weighs heavily on Paul s heart when he speaks of the great sorrow and unceasing anguish (9.2) of his soul for his brothers according to the flesh (9.3) who are Israelites to whom belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises (9.4). And to top it off, Christ, who is God blessed forever, has come from them according to the flesh (9.5). With all of that privilege, they are lost. So, the question arises: has God failed to keep His word to them? Well, Paul says, God has not failed to keep His word because, as has always been the case in redemptive history, the covenant Lord accomplishes His will by choosing some and passing over others. His first proof was the difference God made between Ishmael and Isaac in support of the fact that not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel (9.6) and not all are children of Abraham because they are his offspring but "Through Isaac shall your offspring be named (9.7). Then, he explains what this means in terms of salvation: 8 This means that it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as offspring (9.8). 1 So, the context shows that in 9.10-18, Paul is discussing this point of the election of some to salvation. He has two main ideas; both thought-provoking and thought demanding. He affirms and then he confirms the purpose of the oracle of Jacob s election to salvation. To be sure, these are challenging thoughts. They challenge your minds and hearts. They make you think biblically with the important goal of bringing all your thinking captive to Christ and obedient to His will. Let me encourage you to roll up your sleeves for some work to saturate your heart with the patterns of thought presented by Paul here in Romans 9. I. The first main idea: Paul affirms the purpose of the oracle of Jacob s election to salvation The last phrase emphasizes the lineage to Christ that comes through Isaac and not Ishmael; therefore, the electing 1 determination of God decides both the salvation of individuals and the privilege of which descendants will be the ancestors of Christ according to the flesh. These truths are not in tension with one another; together they make the sovereign differentiation by God all the more clear.
!2 As we discovered last week in Genesis 25, when Rebekah was pregnant with the twins, Jacob and Esau, the Lord made it known to her that the older will serve the younger (25.23). In Romans 9, Paul comments on the timing of this revelation to the mother: when Rebekah had conceived children by one man, our forefather Isaac, 11 though they were not yet born and had done nothing either good or bad-- in order that God's purpose of election might continue, not because of works but because of him who calls-- 12 she was told, "The older will serve the younger (9.10-12). The oracle of Jacob s election was given to Rebekah when they were not yet born and had done nothing either good or bad. It was given at that time to reveal God s purpose of election. His electing purpose is His plan to save the people He has chosen, as Ephesians 1.11 states: In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined [i.e. chosen, 1.4] according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will. Those predestined (the elect) have an inheritance; they have it in accord with God s plan by which He is working out His will in all things. So, the phrase that it might continue (in Rom 9.11) refers to the realization of this plan in the history of redemption. Rebecca was told of the election of Jacob to salvation while he and Esau were yet unborn and had done nothing good or evil to cause God's purpose of election to continue, to abide, to be accomplished and thus to be understood in a specific way. That way is not by man who works but by God who calls. It has a negative and a positive side to it. A. Negatively stated, it is not because of [out of ] works, that is, it is not due to works or out from works as its source (9.11). God s purpose of election is revealed before Jacob and Esau were born to show that His saving grace is not governed in any way by anything that man does. The decision of electing grace is totally and completely God s decision. God chooses which descendants of Isaac will be saved and thereby He decides which will not be saved. As Vos puts it, the giving of the oracle to the mother before the birth of her children eliminates all factors tending to obscure the moral issue of the absolute sovereignty of God and thus, no conceivable way remained of accounting for this differentiation except to attribute it to the sovereign choice of God (BT, Vos, 109). B. Positively stated, God accomplishes His purpose of election by His call. Everything shifts back from human action to divine action. It is God s call that causes the realization of electing grace: it is because of [out of] him who calls (9.11). Human action is not the source; God is the source, specifically, by His act of calling. The point here is quite sweeping. Mentioning that God's decision is not determined by anything man does, good or bad, excludes even the good act of faith. It is not just works and justification by works that is denied by Paul here, but a faith contribution is completely denied as well. There is no cooperation between God and man in determining who will be called to eternal life because the call is to faith, not from it. God decides who will be called, and when God calls, then those called come to faith by which they are justified and receive eternal life. Clearly, according to Romans 8.30, every person that God calls will be justified and glorified: And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified. This is the unbreakable golden chain of saving grace. The golden chain is contextual for understanding God s call in Romans 9.11. Therefore, the purpose of the oracle of Jacob s election is to reveal and affirm the truth of God s election of some to salvation and the passing by of others. In the rest of the paragraph, Paul confirms this truth. II. The second main idea: Paul confirms the truth taught in the oracle of Jacob s election In 9.13-18, Paul s confirmation is totally and richly biblical. He cites God s word to Israel, to Moses, and to Pharaoh. As he moves forward in thought, he incorporates a question about justice in a particular way.
!3 A. The first point of confirmation is God s word to Israel As it is written, "Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated (9.13). This is a statement in the book of Malachi (1.1-5) regarding the nations of Israel and Edom hundreds of years after the events of Gen 25. Paul applies the statement to their individual forefathers, Jacob and Esau. Just as we cannot omit the collective reference from the oracle in Genesis 25; likewise, Paul shows us that we cannot omit the individual reference from these words in Malachi. Therefore, election to salvation before one s birth is an expression of God s love for specific individuals of whom he says these I love Furthermore, this has implications for those not elect: these, the Lord says, I hate. To be sure, this is difficult to absorb (clear as crystal but not easy to take in). A helpful way to try to understand the language of God s love and hatred is that to think of these as matters of action. They are not the gushy feelings called "love" nor the feelings of malice and disdain that we commonly associate with hatred. We can make do here if we think of loving actions as blessing and hating actions as judging. The actions of love and hatred, of blessing and cursing, fulfilled the oracle to Rebekah. The word of God to Israel many years after the oracle confirms the truth, Paul states, that God chooses some people to salvation in the fullest sense of being personally loved by the Lord. Election is electing love. Being passed by means to be hated (i.e. judged) by the Lord, to be given over to judgment by Him personally. So, the quote from Malachi confirms the truth of election to salvation by defining it as electing love that yields rich blessings untold. 2 B. The second point of confirmation (of this strong medicine) is God s word to Moses Paul continues to confirm the truth of sovereign election (the truth taught in the oracle) in 9.14-16: 14 What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God's part? By no means! 15 For he says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion." 16 So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy. Considering what has been said about Jacob s election to be saved while Esau is left to himself and considering the confirmation of this truth in Malachi that election is to salvation in the fullest blessing of being loved by God while those not elect have the fullest cursing of being hated by God (i.e. judged to the fullest extent), the question arises: Is there injustice on God's part? We should note how this question fits into this context. It is a question about fairness, which Paul categorically denies, By no means! May God forbid the very thought from our minds! Interestingly, the word to Moses is not an explanation or defense regarding fairness or justice. It is a confirmation of election to salvation that is from God, from within Himself and not from any source such as human action (just as stated in 9.11, not because of works). So, the inquiry about justice is a variation of the question has God s word failed? Thus, the issue of justice is an issue of faithfulness. That is why it should not surprise us that Paul does not answer the question in the way we might anticipate. He does not defend the fairness of sovereign electing grace. Instead, he states its truth even more strongly in terms of God s word to Moses: For he says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion"(9.15). This is a quote from Exodus 33.19: And he said, "I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name 'The LORD.' And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy (Ex 33.19). God s name (as in Ex 3.14-15), refers to His attribute of self-existence: He says of Himself I am and thus we say of Him, literally, 2 A way of contrasting God's love and hatred here is to say that His love is active in His choice to bless particular sinners (Genesis shows that Jacob is an undeserving sinner as is Esau) and that His hatred is active in His choice to pass over others leaving them to the just deserts of their sins (from the book of Malachi we learn that God judged many undeserving Israelites, just as He judged the undeserving Edomites). Human sin is presupposed by Paul, but it is not necessary to the point He is making about election and reprobation that are not grounded in human good or bad.
!4 He is by calling Him Yahweh. He is Yahweh, the One who is gracious to whom He will be gracious, showing compassion on whom He wills to show compassion. We then get this result: because He simply is, because He is self-determining and independent of everything outside of Himself, the bestowal of grace and compassion arises from within God and is not determined by outside influences. As Vos puts it, His name Yahweh accents His sovereignty, that He acts with unfettered freedom (Biblical Theology, 134). Accordingly, Paul confirms the point he has been making throughout: So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy (9.16). He is not defending the justice of God s free election; He is stating it in the strongest of terms: election to salvation does not depend on a human act of will or the exertion of any human action; it depends on God who has mercy and grants it to whomsoever He wills. C. The third point of confirmation is God s word to Pharaoh The word to Pharaoh also confirms the truth of the election of some to salvation and the passing by of the rest: For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, "For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth." 18 So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills (9.17-18). Again nothing here explains or seeks to give an apologetic for sovereign election. Two new subjects are introduced to confirm electing grace not defend it, they are the subjects of God s glory and His action of hardening. Hardening (he hardens whomever he wills, 9.18) is an example of sovereign severity in judgment on sinners already on the path of sin and rebellion against the Lord. Pharaoh shows us this in stages. We are told that Pharaoh hardened his own heart; he was already unbelieving, sinful, and perishing. But to fulfill a specific purpose, God intensified Pharaoh's self-hardening in the most absolute and final sense. God accelerated the hardening process making him harder still until his heart, arteries, and veins were all petrified into a solid mass of stone! The truth of hardening shows that election and reprobation go hand in hand. Election is God's choice to save particular sinners and reprobation is His choice to leave the rest to the just punishment of their sins. You cannot have one without the other. Election is the choosing of some and the passing over of others; reprobation or hardening is simply an amplification of what it means to pass over those who are not elect. Thus, the truth of electing grace is clearly taught in Scripture in the word to Pharaoh: So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills. The other new subject is the glory of God: For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth (9.17). This is the most that we get regarding an explanation of election: it is for the glory of God for if hardening is for His glory then its opposite, election, is even more for His glory! Application Paul affirms and then confirms the doctrine of the election of specific individuals to salvation that is at the core of the oracle to Rebekah. He brings up the doctrine of election to show that God s covenant word has not failed because He fulfills His saving purposes by a principle of differentiation. He is the one who makes the difference between children of the flesh and children of God. He chooses Isaac over Ishmael, Jacob over Esau, and thus by extension He chooses which descendants of Abraham will become His children and which will remain in the flesh without the blessings of saving grace. This leads to many questions. A. Why, we may ask, does Paul spend so much time on this theme of a saving election? This is important to Paul because God s faithfulness is at stake. It is thus the reverse of what we might think: God s trustworthiness is defended by the fact of His sovereignty in
!5 election. Faithfulness is supported by sovereignty. This shapes and explains the nature of the text as affirmation and confirmation of sovereignty in salvation, not a defense of it. For Paul, the better we grasp the principle of sovereign differentiation the better we get a handle on the covenant of redemption and the trustworthiness of the covenant Lord. B. What is the obvious truth for Paul per this text? For Paul, what is most obvious from the Scriptures is the sovereign election of individuals to salvation as the truth that goes hand in hand with the election of Israelites in a to a special national status in a collective sense. The apostle roots his entire discussion in this solid truth. So, his thoughts go deeper and deeper; his reasoning about sovereignty displayed in the election of Jacob grows deeper with each line. Beginning with the oracle of election before Jacob s birth, he clarifies election as an expression of love in action (Jacob have I loved). Then, he digs deeper into God s self-existence that yields the conclusion of 9.16: So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy. Then Paul digs deeper still to the tap root fact that God hardens whomever He wills to harden by a higher principle than human action, good or bad, namely, by the principle of what serves the glory of God. In an ultimate sense, Pharaoh was hardened not because of his sin (that is there and judgment is just) but because of God s purpose to show His name in him in the display of righteous judgment. Thus the conclusion of 9.18; So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills. C. How can we say, reprobation is not because of sin? We have to think carefully here. The reasoning of Paul by the Spirit put the entire discussion into a distinct orbit of thought. The thoughts are elevated, wonderful; even too wonderful for me being so high and lifted up above me as the heavens are above the earth. Thus, the unique orbit of thought here is that all rests in God who maintains His existence from eternity to eternity without any necessary reference to anything outside of Himself. Therefore, His mercy and His hardening does not depend on human works good or bad. If we open our hearts to what Scripture says, we can easily see that God s purpose in the election of some to salvation and the passing by of the rest cannot be based on human good or none would be saved and it cannot be based on human sin or all would perish. All depends on God s action of calling. Everything depends on God s free decision to show mercy. It all depends on God s decision to show mercy to whomever He wills and to harden whomever He wills. D. Why then is the complaint of unfairness irrelevant to sovereign electing love? Injustice cannot apply to the showing of mercy to whomever His will; nor can it apply to the hardening of whomever He wills because none deserve mercy and all deserve hardening. So the source of our salvation, thankfully is not to be found in ourselves in any way, shape, or form. The source is God s independence, His free will; His self-existence; His own purpose and His own counsel into which we only see glimpses. That is why all our thoughts on this subject must finally come to rest in a sense of mystery and with worship in reverence and awe. We rest in what Scripture says. May we fall down before the majesty of God and say what we sing: teach me O Lord thy holy way and give me an obedient mind that in thy presence I may find my soul s delight from day to day ; may the Holy Spirit saturate our hearts with the truth of sovereign grace and the redemption that is ours in union with the risen Lord Jesus; to the glory of the triune God, forever, amen!