We're going to continue what I talked about the last time I was here, which was about two months ago. And by the way, the bulletin says Romans 9, 1 through 11. It's actually Romans 9 through 11. And I entitled the message, God is Trustworthy Because He's Sovereign. Because when you look at Romans 9 through 11, Paul anticipates a lot of questions that the people that he's writing to are going to ask. And all those questions seem to be, what happened to God? What happened to those promises he made? Didn't he fulfill them? Did God fail the nation of Israel? Did he abandon the nation of Israel? Of course, Paul says no. God is sovereign. He's got his ways of doing things based on his choices. We'll talk about that today. Are we in business here, Don? Not yet. Doesn't like your program, Bob. Oh, I guess not. Well, Romans 9 through 11 is controversial. So is your computer. What can I tell you? So let's wait until this thing comes up. But in any case, I gave you a, I'll call it an outline. It's probably more like a worksheet. But what I did was I added, it's the same thing you had last time except that I added all the things that we've discussed so far onto this. And we actually got down into the into the outline, we actually got down to part 3A, which is where we ended last week. And I didn't get all the way through part A, which is God's sovereign grace, which we'll pick up today. But I do want to review a little bit so that we can kind of get to the point where we were last time. And we started off in the first part of the outline, which we looked at God's calling and the purpose of that calling, why Israel was called. And we all know that when God called Abram, to leave the area of the Chaldees and go to a land that he was going to promise to give his descendants, that he told them that he was going to bless them, and he was going to make them a great nation. And all the peoples of the earth were going to be blessed through the nation that he created them, that he's going to create through them. And of course, when the Israelites were brought out of Egypt into the wilderness, When they got to Sinai, Moses was called up in the mountain, and God gave Moses a little bit more insight about his purposes for the nation of Israel. And in Exodus 19, 1-6, he says, now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, then you shall be a special treasure to me above all the people, for all the earth is mine. And you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. These are the words which you shall speak to the children of Israel." And David Guzik, a commentator, modern commentator, says, God intended for Israel to be a special treasure to him. He wanted them to be a people with a unique place in God's great plan, a people of great value and concern to God. It wasn't as if God ignored the rest of the world, for all the world was mine, but that he determined to use Israel to reach the earth. And we also looked at Michael Grisanti, who's a professor of Old Testament at Master Seminary. And he wrote a paper back in 1998 called Israel's Mission to the Nations, about Isaiah 40 through Isaiah 55. And Grisanti said, the Abrahamic covenant, which gives Israel an exalted place in God's program for the world, promises that Israel will be a channel of blessing to all the peoples of the earth, Genesis 12.3, which we just looked at. And in his choice of Israel to be his elect people, Yahweh bestows on them both blessings and responsibilities. He promises to give his elect people a position of power and prominence in the world. Yahweh intended to utilize Israel as his servant nation to carry out his plan for all humanity. And, of course, we pointed out last week that he intended to give Israel, a power of prominence and power, makes you, kind of clarifies for us why Romans, excuse me, Psalm chapter 2 sits here and says, why do the nations rage? Let's face it, not only do they rage against God, they rage against Christ, and Israel's the most hated nation on the face of the earth, as we know. But we do know, based on Romans chapter 11, God has a plan for Israel. So we ask the question, With Israel being so disobedient to God all the way through the wilderness, refusing to take the land, initially go into the land and be forced to wander in the wilderness until that generation passed away. Having gone in the land, still being disobedient. God having to use Assyria to take the northern kingdom into captivity and eventually the Chaldeans to take Judah into Chaldea. And then God, if you look in the last chapter of Malachi in the Old Testament where God chastises the priests for not doing their job to properly bring the people and the people being in such idolatry that he just remains silent. Remember, he took their king away, Zedekiah, through the Chaldeans. They haven't had a king. They haven't been in possession until 1948 into their nation. And there was that period of 400 years where things were silent. No prophet. God had no word to send to the Israelites. So you make you wonder, well, had God's plan changed? Well, the original plan we saw, as Paul writes in Romans 1.16, for I'm not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it's a power of God to salvation to everyone who believes, for the Jews first, but also to the Greeks or the Gentiles. When that 400 years of silence was broken, with the Messiah's announcement being birthed, being announced by all the angels, who was it announced to? Lowly shepherds, lowly Jewish shepherds, tending their sheep. When Jesus started calling his apostles, as Donny's been teaching in Sunday school, 12 ordinary men, he called 12 Jews to be his apostles. on the, when Jesus was ready to go ascend into heaven after he rose from the dead and he called his disciples to him. He gave his great commission to his apostles, to Jews, to take the message of the gospel around the world. We saw on the day of Pentecost when devout Jews from all the nations around the Mediterranean were gathered in Jerusalem, for I guess it was the festival of the booths probably, estimated to be about a million devout Jews in Jerusalem at the time. And that day when those tongues of fire came on those men, they spoke the language that each one of those people knew, which amazed them. Scripture tells us 3,000 souls, 3,000 Jews were added to the church. And then when Saul of Tarsus was Encountered the risen Christ on his way to Damascus to kill Jews have them arrested He got saved. He becomes the greatest church planter and the greatest evangelist in the whole New Testament, making three missionary journeys and literally bringing the gospel to, in this case, Gentiles, while Peter went to the Jews. But the bottom line was, God's plan hadn't changed. He brought salvation to the Jews first, for all intents and purposes. Oh, yeah, there were some other Gentiles through the years that were saved, but not to the extent that the Jews were saved in the early church. Pastor Tom just talked about Romans 8. When we know Romans, we know the first eight chapters of Romans is the full-blown Gospel, where Paul really gets into the details of the Gospel and talks about how condemned man is saved through the righteousness of God. But we get to Romans 8, And we see Romans 8 opens in 8th chapter 1 that if you're in Christ there's no condemnation, as Pastor Tom just mentioned. Paul closes Romans 8 with the fact that in Christ we have eternal security. In Romans 8 1, no condemnation, where therefore there's no condemnation. For those who are in Christ Jesus who did not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit, for the law of the Spirit of life in Christ has made me free from the law of sin and death. We were condemned by the law, but Christ came and fulfilled that law. If we're in Christ, it's almost as if we have obeyed the law, although we know nobody gets saved by obeying the law or trying to do it through works. In Romans chapter 8, 38 and 39, which was just read in your hearing this morning, we have internal security in Christ. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God within Christ Jesus. Paul leaves chapter eight and goes into Romans chapter nine, where he lays out his heart, really has a concern for his kinsmen, the Israelites. Some of us, we pray every Wednesday night for family members, kids, grandkids, and whatnot, and we're grieved by the lack of them wanting to hear the gospel or embracing the gospel. Some who have embraced the gospel, like my granddaughter Arianna, considers it now a fairytale. So we might have a little bit of an appreciation for what Paul is going through relative to his heart with that greed being grieved for his kinsmen, the Israelites. He says in Romans chapter 9, 1 through 3, I tell the truth in Christ, I'm not lying, my conscious also bearing witness. In the Holy Spirit, I have great sorrow and continual grief in my heart, for I could wish that I myself were cursed for Christ for my brother and my countrymen according to the flesh. Even though it's not possible, Lord, write me out of your book of life and put the Israelites in there. I'm willing to give up my life. I'm willing to be condemned if you will save my kinsmen, the Israelites. I wonder if any of us feel that way sometimes about our loved ones. And Paul then goes on to say, they had such great blessings. They had such great blessings by their calling. He said, the Israelites who pertain or who belong, They possess the adoption, the only nation God ever adopted and made it children of God. He's never done that to any other nation. He called the nation of Israel to be his special possession. We saw that scripture. They had the Shekinah glory. They had the covenants and the promises. They were given the law. They had the ability to serve God in the temple. They were descendants of the fathers, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob. Not only were they descendants of the fathers, but through those fathers came the Messiah, the Christ, Jesus Christ, who, as Paul says, is the eternal blessed God. We talked about that this morning when Thomas recognized that Christ was God. Was coming through that, but Israel missed all of that. So Paul anticipates questions. And the first question he anticipates is, well, if God gave Israel all these covenants and these promises, have they failed? And if I'm saved through Christ, I shouldn't put my hand over the mic. If I'm saved through Christ, how secure am I in Christ? So Paul anticipates these questions, and he starts off in Romans 9.6 and says, it's not that the word of God has taken no effect. Now we get into Israel's future. And this is where we started to get into last week, got so far and had to stop. We'll continue on with this review. He continues on with this Romans 6, but it's not that God's word is taken not effect. He makes a strange statement, for they are not all Israel who are Israel. And we'll open that up a little bit. We said in Romans 9, 10, 11, Paul introduces two controversial issues. issues that seem to split the Church of Christ. For some reason, I don't know, but it does. One is God's sovereign grace and the other one is, has God abandoned Israel? There are some factions of the Christian Church who don't believe God's sovereign in his election. There are other factions who believe that God's done with Israel and now has put all the blessings on the church. We'll talk about those things. Maybe not get all of it today, but we will get through those things. We looked at God's sovereign grace, and we split it up into two definitions. How is sovereign defined? What's God's sovereignty? A.W. Pink says, the sovereignty of God may be defined as the exercise of his supremacy. being infinitely elevated above the highest creature. He's the most high, Lord of heaven and earth, subject to none, influenced by none, absolutely independent. God does as He pleases, only as He pleases, always as He pleases, and none can thwart Him, and none can hinder Him. We read Psalm 115.3, and it summarizes what A.W. Pink just said. God is in heaven, and He does whatever He pleases. We look at Romans 11, Romans chapter 1, verse 11, which reads, in him we have also obtained an inheritance being predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to his counsel of his will. And we just read Romans chapter 8 this morning. at which we saw that word predestined again. For those he foreknew, he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his son. Now last week, I looked at this verse, but I didn't pull out certain names and certain words. All through Paul's epistles, Paul talks about this sovereign choice of God when it comes down to election. And he uses certain terms as he discusses it. And one of the terms that he uses is predestined. And we didn't deal with it. I know a lot of us here know what it means, but we know we got messages that go out to a radio audience, and maybe some folks here who don't know what it means. But if we look at the word, and we're going to look at the other words, too, before we get anywhere. And kind of setting the stage here for us to understand that when Paul starts talking about the Jews being saved, they have to be saved the same way as the Gentiles have to be saved. They think they can be saved through works, but no, they have to be saved through the gospel, just like everybody else. So this word predestined, if you look at the dictionary, it means to destined, to decree, to determine, to appoint, or settle beforehand. From the standpoint of God, it means to determine by advance by God's defined will. God's sovereignty determines things in advance. Sometimes we see it in scripture as the word predetermine or foreordain. Sometimes the word ordain. If we look at 1 Corinthians 2, 7 and 8 where Paul writes, but we speak We speak the wisdom of God and the mystery, the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the ages for our glory, which none of the rulers of this age had known, for had they known, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory." What's he talking about? He's talking about the gospel. He's talking about salvation through Christ, the hidden mystery of God, which wasn't revealed. until Christ came to the earth and died for sinners. God had foreordained it. He pre-tested it before the foundation of the world, long before you and I were ever born, before this universe was ever created. God had already predetermined His method, His plan for salvation, which was going to be through His Son, Jesus Christ. He foreordained that. If we go back to Ephesians chapter 111, in him we've also obtained an inheritance in Christ. So what did he foreordain? He foreordained that those he chose were going to be an inheritance, have the same inheritance that Christ had. It wasn't going to be a portion of that inheritance, it was going to be the full inheritance, the full glory of heaven that Christ would know and realize, as Christ said in John 17, I want those you gave to me to be where I am so they can see my glory. we are going to have a share of that glory. We're going to see that full glory and participate in that full glory. And he did that according to his will. If we rewrote that word predestined based on the definition we just saw, we could say, in him we have obtained an inheritance, which was determined in advance according to the purpose of God, who works all things according to the counsel of his own will. We got that into grace. And grace is defined as unmerited or undeserving favor of God to those who are under condemnation. Romans 3, 20 through 24, this righteousness is given through faith in Christ Jesus to all who believe. There's no difference between Jew and Gentile for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. All are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came through Christ Jesus. There's the fact that Jews and Gentiles, Jews and Greeks, have to be redeemed through Jesus. And it comes through this free gift, this free gift of grace. We see that over in Ephesians chapter 2, verse 8. For by grace you save through faith that's not of yourselves. It's a gift of God, not of works. Least anyone should boast. The Jews need that as well as the Gentiles. Charles Spurgeon, who says, our opponents say salvation belongs to the free will of man. If not to man's merit, at least to man's will. But we hold and teach that salvation from first to last. Every iota of it belongs to the Most High God. It is God that chooses His people. He calls them by His grace. He quickens them by His Spirit. And He keeps them by His power. Ephesians chapter 1, 4 through 6. I don't remember if we looked at this last time, but there's something here that we have to pull out and define a little bit better. Ephesians chapter 1 verse 4-6, 4-6, just as He chose us in Him, chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good will of His pleasure, pleasure of His will, and to the praise of the glory of His grace by which He made us accepted in the beloved. Now, we looked at predestined already, but let's take a look at another term that Paul defines when it comes down to God's sovereign choice in our salvation. Over in Ephesians chapter 4, verse 1, he chose us in him before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and without blemish before him in love. And that phrase is chose us. The word shows us, the Greek word shows us means to select or pick out or elect. There's that word election. God makes the choice. Out of all people, he picks out certain ones for a specific purpose. When you look at Strong's God strong says this word choose or this word election means a highly deliberate choice with a definite outcome. Go back to that verse four in Ephesians chapter one. He chose us. He elected us in Christ before the foundation of the world. That's the choice he made. He elected some people. He chose some people. He picked certain people out for an outcome. What was the definite outcome? That they should be holy and blameless without blemish before him in love. That was the outcome. That's why he did the choice. And Christ went to that cross and died for us so that outcome could be achieved so that when we stand in Christ in front of God, we're considered holy and without blemish. in love. We get to Romans 8. This is where we stopped last time. I said we didn't have time to talk about it. We'll get into it now and then we'll continue. But in the meantime, I just did a lot of overview. Let's pray because I haven't done that yet. Father, we do thank you for your great sovereignty when it comes down to our salvation. Father, we thank you for your great love. We thank you for what Christ did on the cross. And Father, we do in fact know that you do have a plan for Israel and that you haven't cast them away. And we thank you that Paul has put so much detail in Romans 9, 10, and 11 to show us that Israel will be saved. Israel will be used again by you to bring you glory and honor. We pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen. We get to Romans chapter 8, verses 29 through 30. For whom he foreknew, he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn of many brethren. Christ firstborn of the dead, who are the many brethren? We are, if we're in Christ. Moreover, whom he predestined, those he also called, whom he called, He also justified whom he justified, he also glorified. Paul introduces yet another term in here, and that's for whom he foreknew. Foreknowledge, part of Dave's prayer a couple weeks ago when Dave used the word foreknowledge. Well, foreknowledge means to have previous knowledge of or be aware of an event before it happens. Well, God knows the beginning from the end. He knows everything that's going to happen, not only to countries, but to us as individuals. If we look at this word for knowledge, though, two different points of view, depending on whether you're a Calvinist or whether you're a believer in Joseph, what's his name, Arminius? Jonas Arminius. Are you an Arminian or are you a Calvinist? We're hoping if you believe in the doctrines and positions of this church, we're Calvinists. But if we're an Arminian, we've got a different view of what foreknowledge means. And it means those who would accept Christ as their savior. In other words, God looked down in the annals of time, and he saw everybody, and he decided that He was going to predestine anybody that was going to accept Christ as Savior. In other words, he looked at Donnie Jackson. And he saw that Donnie Jackson turned on a TV program one time. And it was a football game or a baseball game. And there was some guy sitting behind home plate or between the goal posts with a rainbow wig on a John 316 sign. And every time Donnie watched a sporting event, there was that guy with his wig and his John 316. And Donnie got curious, picked up a Bible, started studying it, and threw that. became saved, he accepted Christ. So God said, oh, based on what Donnie did, that he accepted Christ, he's going to be preordained to be conformed to the image of my son. And Pastor Tom keeps talking about every time. He was a young kid. He kept going up the aisle with, what was your name, Ida? Ida. Ida. Him and Ida kept wearing out the rug between the pews and the thing. But Pastor Tom was saved. Oh yeah, based on that faithfulness of Pastor Tom going up and down the aisles, I'm going to predestine him to be conformed to the image of God. Does God work that way? No, of course not. God doesn't work that way. If we're an Arminian, yeah, we believe that. But we've got a problem with that belief. Because if you look at Ephesians chapter 2.1, it says, you he made alive. You, God, quickened your spirit because your spirit had to be quickened because you were dead in your trespasses and sins. You had no ability to recognize you needed to be saved until God made you alive in the spirit. The Holy Spirit made you alive. Joseph Benson says you were dead. Not only diseased, but dead. Absolutely devoid of all spiritual life. And as incapable of quickening yourselves as persons literally dead are of restoring their bodies to life. You were dead. You had to be spiritually made alive by the Holy Spirit to recognize that you needed to accept Christ. And that wasn't of your will. That was the doing of God through his spirit. So going back to Romans 8, for those he foreknew, we have to ask, well, what does that mean then? What does foreknow mean? Well, I'm going to give a little plug here. Because I took all the information here on foreknowledge, and I went to two sites. I know Pastor Thomas talked about Precept Austin a lot. If you do Bible study and you want to do some studies and see a lot about almost every topic in Scripture and a lot of commentaries and messages and definitions and whatnot, you go to Precept Austin. It is an awesome site. It's got a lot of stuff in there. And you can also go to Grace Quotes. which is another site this individual called Bruce Hurt has developed. Bruce Hurt's a retired doctor. He lives in Austin, Texas, and his life work has been putting together these two sites. Write them down and go look at them. They're just fabulous. I used both of them to come up with some of the quotes and other stuff I have here relative to free will versus God's choice in our election. And the first thing we're going to look at, we're going to look at a quote by Charles Spurgeon, where Spurgeon says, it always seems inexplicable to me that those who claim free will so very boldly for man should not also allow some free will to God. Why should not Christ Jesus have the right to choose his own bride? That's a pretty insightful sentence. But Spurgeon goes on to say, here's the free will doctrine. He defines the free will doctrine. And this is what Spurgeon says the free will doctrine is. It magnifies man into God. It declares God's purposes nullity or void. It declares God's purposes void since they cannot be carried out unless man Men are willing. It makes God's will a waiting servant to the will of man, and the whole covenant of grace dependent upon human action. Denying election on the ground of injustice, it holds God to be a debtor to sinners, so that if he gives grace to one, he's bound to do it to all. It teaches that the blood of Christ was shed equally for all men, and since some are lost, this doctrine ascribes a difference to man's own will. thus making the atonement itself a powerless thing until the will of man gives it efficacy. Those sentiments dilute the scriptural description of man's depravity and by imputing its strength to fallen humanity, robbed the spirit of the glory of his effectual grace. This theory, in effect, says that it is of him that willeth, of him that runneth, and not of God who shows mercy. That's a good view of what you might have if, in fact, you are Arminian and you think you can become saved because you got up some morning and decided, ah, I think that this morning's going to be the day I accept Christ as Savior. But that's not the view that God teaches us in Scripture. Foreknowledge. Are we talking about foreknowledge or are we talking about foresight? They're two different things. Here's a definition we saw about foreknowledge. To have previous knowledge of, to be aware of an event before it happens. Now we know that God has foreknowledge. He knows everything that happens, everything that's going to go on with the nations, everything that's going to go on with each individual. God determines the future. But what happens if we have foresight? Well, there's foresight. We go to a fortune cookie and we open up a fortune cookie and we see a fortune that says, oh, you're going Michael Anthony, if you guys remember the millionaire years ago, Michael Anthony who would walk up to somebody and give them a million dollar check, as long as they didn't reveal where they got it, then they could use that million dollar. Oh, Michael Anthony is going to visit you and give you a million dollar check tomorrow. Or maybe you go to a fortune teller who has their candles and their cards and what not to give you your fortunes. And, or, if we were, when we were kids, remember we had that little magic eight ball that some of us had, where we could ask it a question and turn it upside down and the cube would come up and say, well, yes, no, possibility, can't determine now, ask me again later, whatever those cubes said, that is God doesn't predict the future. God has determined the future. John MacArthur says a common explanation of election is that the elect were chosen because God knew beforehand what they would do, like Donnie, seeing that guy on TV with that John 3.16 sign. That defines foreknowledge as foresight. I've heard it explained that God looked down through eons of history, saw by virtue of his omniscience that you and I, what you and I would do, and then he chose or didn't choose us based on what we did or what we didn't believe. That at first sounds like a good explanation, but it's not true. There are several reasons wanting to believe that God is, yet God's foreknowledge just means forsake. Our fallen nature desperately wants some responsibility for our salvation. Likewise, our fallen perspective makes God's sovereign choice appear unfair. But because our minds are so polluted by sin, we are in no position to exalt our pride and call ourselves virtuous or pull down the justice of God and call him unfair. You look at precepts also, and here's how they define foreknowledge. Foreknowledge describes God's knowledge of future events, including future free human choices. In his omniscience, God knows what the future holds for both individuals and nations. He knows and sees everything in advance, and his will is carried out in accord with his plans and purposes. Foreknowledge does not just describe the truth that God knew something would happen before it happened, although that is true that he did. but that he gave prior consent to it happening. A common misconception is to conclude that God knew beforehand who would believe on his son and then predestined those individuals for salvation. Probably the best definition for knowledge comes from Warner Worsby. I know a lot of you probably remember Warner Worsby. He wrote a lot of books. He was very prominent on the radio 20 years ago. He passed away this past May. I don't know if you knew that or not. But he did pass away. The Lord took him home. Wordsby says, foreknowledge does not suggest that God merely knew ahead of time that we would believe, and therefore he chose us. This would raise the question, who or what made us decide for Christ, and would take our salvation completely out of the hands of God. In the Bible, to foreknow means to set one's love on a person or persons in a personal way. When you see the word foreknowledge, when God says for those he foreknew, means he set his love on you. He didn't set it on everybody, but he elected certain people to set his love upon. In Deuteronomy chapter 7, verse 7 and 8, the Lord did not set his love on you, talking about the nation of Israel, the Lord did not set his love on you or the Lord did not foreknow you, or elect you to be his special possession because you were more in number than any of your people, but you were the fewest of all people, but because the Lord loved you and kept the earth, which we swore to your forefathers, he brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery from the hand of Pharaoh, king of Egypt. Over in John 15.6, there's Christ talking to his disabled. I did not choose you, or excuse me, you did not choose me, You didn't choose me. I chose you. I elected you. For what intent? So I could appoint you so you might go bear fruit and that your fruit might last. I chose you. You didn't choose Christ. Christ chose us. So going back to Romans 8, chapter 9, for those who he loved, he predestined them to be conformed to the images of his son. And if he predestined us, he called us. If he called us, he justified us. If he justified us, he glorified us. We didn't do anything. We didn't do anything other than recognize that we needed Christ once the Holy Spirit quickened our spirit, that we were sinners. And if we get in and study the Bible, we will know that everything relative to our salvation is God's doing and has nothing to do with how good we are, what kind of works we do, or what kind of church we go to. It has everything to do with God quickening our spirit and putting his love on us. So the truth is that salvation of every believer is known to determine the mind of God before its relation to time. This is heavy theology. That's what the priest at Boston says. And I believe cannot be fully comprehended by infinite man. And we can't understand why God did it, but we can accept the fact that God did it and love God back for what he has done for us. So instead of complaining that God is not fair, and we see that Paul talks about that a lot here in Romans 9, 10, 11, where he anticipates those questions, why God's not being fair to Israel. So instead of complaining that God's not fair, as some who think too much of this attribute do, we should bow to the incredible truth that in eternity past, before Adam and Eve even sinned, God planned the redemption of undeserving sinners through Jesus Christ. But Paul gets now into this strange wording, we're not all Israel who are Israel. He explains that a little bit as we go in further into Romans 9, 6 through 9, where he says, they are not all Israel who are of Israel, nor are they children, because they are the seed of Abraham. But in Isaac, your seed shall be called. That is, those who are the children of flesh, these are not the children of God, but the children of the promised are counted as seed. For this is the word of promise, at this time I will come and shall have a son. We know Abraham had two sons, one through Hagar, the slave woman. One through the woman of promise, Sarah. Ishmael, the son of the slave woman, the son of the flesh, the son of the promise, Isaac. God's blessing and love was on the son of the flesh, not on the son of the slave woman. Although he promised to make the son of the slave woman a great nation, The seed of Abraham came through the child of promise, came through Isaac. In Galatians chapter 3, verses 29, it says, if you are Christ, then you are Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise. If we are redeemed, if we're in Christ, we are part of that promise. We are related for all intents and purposes to the promises made through Abraham. And we are heirs according to the promise that was made to Abraham. David Goethe says, if you are Christ, then you are Abraham's seed, since all Christians belong to Christ, the Messiah. All Christians are spiritual descendants of Abraham and heirs of God. This place of high privilege comes according to the promise, not according to the law or works. We are connected with a long line of God's people assembled through all the ages. John Stott says it enables me to answer the most basic of all human questions, who am I? and to say, in Christ, I am the Son of God. In Christ, I'm united with all the redeemed people of God, past, present, and future. In Christ, I discover my identity. In Christ, I find my feet. In Christ, I come home. Paul goes on then to talk beyond Isaac. He talks about Rebecca having two children in her room through Isaac. And we know those two children are Esau, and Jacob. We know that Esau was born first. We know Jacob, when he was born, he came out, he was holding Esau's heel. And Paul says, Not only this, but when Rebecca was also conceived by one man, even by our father Isaac, for the children not yet being born, nor having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him who calls, it was said to her, the older shall serve the younger. The older being Esau would serve Isaac. We know the scripture. It says, Jacob, I have loved. I mean, Jacob was younger. Jacob, I have loved. Esau, I have hated. Jacob, I foreknew. Esau, I didn't. Jacob, I have elected. Esau, I didn't. Jacob is of the promise. Esau is not. God's sovereign choice. They weren't even born yet. God's sovereign choice in election. All of which Paul uses now to talk about the Romans. Here's Goethe again. For they are not all Israel who are Israel. One meaning of the name Israel is governed by God. Paul says that not all Israel is really governed by God. Did God's word fail? No. Instead, they are not all governed by God who are Israel. Chuck Smith says, Paul tells us that no one is truly Israel unless he's governed by God. We have a parallel situation with the word Christian. Not everyone who's called a Christian is truly a follower of Christ. I call them Chinos, Christians in name only. Like we heard Rhinos, Republicans in name only. There are Christians in name only who are not truly followers of Christ. Again, Paul. anticipates a question. And that question he throws forth, he puts out in Romans 9, 14 through 16. What shall we say then? Is therefore unrighteousness in God? And his answer, certainly not. For he says to Moses, I'll have mercy on whomever I have mercy. I will have compassion on whoever I have compassion. So then it is not of him who wills or him who runs, but of God who shows mercy. Totally opposite than what Spurgeon showed in the free will doctrine definition we saw before, which was determined on what man wills and not on God who shows mercy. So if we look at Romans 9, 8 through 11, according to gotquestions.org, Here's what they say, God in his sovereign grace has chosen to save those on whom he has set his love. There's where we see foreknowledge, election, and predestination. Foreknowledge, those he set his love on. Election, he chose those people he set his love on. The predestination, it's not in this verse, but the bottom line, saved. Saved, so we're not under His wrath anymore. Saved through Christ. Just right there in Romans 9, 8 through 11. And they also say in 9, 14 through 23, why did God bestow His sovereign grace on believers? Not because we deserve salvation, but to demonstrate the riches of His glory. So instead of complaining that God's not fair, we saw this before, as some think too much is out to do, we should bow to the incredible truth that eternity passed before Adam and Eve was even sinned. God planned the redemption of non-deserving sinners through Christ. That's an application for us. They also say it's our only proper response is to proclaim, blessed be God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed in every spiritual blessing in heavenly places within Christ, Ephesians 1, 3. But that doesn't finish. Let's take a couple more minutes and just finish this whole subject of God's sovereign grace. Because Paul continues it in Romans chapter 10. He starts Romans chapter 10 off with the same thing he started Romans 9 off with. I wish my brethren, the Israelites, could be saved. Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer for God is for Israel that they may be saved. For they, being ignorant of God's righteousness, seeking to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted to the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness for everyone who believes. In other words, they tried to establish their own righteousness. They tried to follow a law. They tried to follow so many laws that they stumbled over the law. when they had the gospel presented to them and it just went right over their heads. They missed the gospel. In other words, Israel needs the gospel just like we do, but yet Israel has rejected the gospel. And he goes on to say in Romans 10, 16 through 17, would they have not obeyed the gospel? And he quotes Isaiah. For Isaiah says, Lord, who has believed our report? So then faith comes from hearing and hearing by the word of God. Lord, we went out there. I went out there as a prophet. And I gave them the truth. I preached to them. But they just kept trying to follow the law. They wouldn't listen to anything I said. They didn't have faith because they kept trying to follow something which wouldn't give them faith. It was the word of God that would give them the faith, but they stayed trying to obey the law. They wouldn't listen to what I was trying to preach to them. The Gentiles did, and the Gentiles will. But Isaiah is very bold and says, I was found by those who did not seek me. I was made manifest to those who did not ask for me. But to Israel he says, all day long I have stretched out my hands to disobedient and contrary people. That ends at least what we wanted to talk about on God's sovereign grace, but now gets us into this other topic of, has God abandoned Israel? Is he done with Israel? Has he given the promises to the church? Obviously, we don't have time to do that today, or else we'll be here at one o'clock. So we'll do that in part three the next time I'm up. So let's bow and write a prayer. Father, we do thank you that you have chosen us in you, that you have foreknown us, you have put your love on us. And by putting that love on us, you've predestined us to be conformed to the image of your son so that we could stand in front of you without blemish on that day. We don't know why you did it. It's your sovereign choice. We certainly don't feel as though you were worthy of that calling, but Father, we thank you for what you've done. And might we Remember that every time we come to the table, once a month, that we remember what you did for us and what you did through Christ on that cross. And we pray these things in Jesus' name, amen.