Featured Romans 9:11, A calling, not one's works, precedes the election.

I agree the passage isn’t about salvation specifically, but about God making sovereign choices to accomplish His purposes.

Included in the context is the truth that election comes before faith. God creates two types of vessels… vessels of wrath and vessels of mercy. Both demonstrate the riches of His glory.

Paul identifies the vessels of mercy as “even us” which refers to Christians.

peace to you

 

Rom 9 is about Salvation

 

Eph 2:3 Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.

 

I disagree... The story is true but if that is all it is then the Bible is just like any other book... There is no spiritual application for the child of God... Tell the story of the resurrection, to a non believer and tell them after Christ gave up the ghost and died, that on the third day he rose from the dead, they would tell you, your out of your mind... As a Christian Mitch you need to dig out the gems of God rightly dividing the word of truth, if not its just another story... Brother Glen

2 Timothy 2:15 Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.

 

I have to say I have no idea what you are talking about.

 

How do you reconcile this passage which th Romans 9?

Paul is clear we all begin with a corrupt nature and under the wrath of God.

But God!!! Elected us for something else. We are created to be vessels of mercy that will demonstrate the riches of His glory.

Election comes before faith. Faith comes before salvation. Salvation comes before sanctification. Sanctification comes before glory.

God is good.

peace to you

 

I reconcile it by using a biblical definition of election with regards to salvation:

Eph 1:4 According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:


It is "in Him" that we are elect. We have to first be in Him and then being in Him we are elected to be Holy, without blame. We must first be in Him as that passage says. Election is then in reference to the condition after salvation.

 

And this “choosing” takes place “before the foundation of the world” according to the text you cited. Your own example disproves your assertion.

The choosing “election” is prior to faith. Faith is prior to salvation.

peace to you

 

So the choosing is not individualistic. Nothing in scripture says so what He has done is prior to anyone being saved God chose to elect those who are in Him. That is what Ephesians 1:4 says. He chose that those who believe would become holy and without blame also being predestined to the adoption of children by Jesus Christ Himself.

 

But that view doesn’t reconcile Romans 9 which very clearly states that God creates “vessels or wrath” and “vessels of mercy” as a potter molds clay for the purpose of demonstrating the riches of His glory.

The “choosing” is of individuals. This is confirmed by Jesus in John 10 when He says, as the Good Shepherd, He calls His sheep “by name”, they hear Him and follow Him. He has already named His sheep before He calls and before they follow.

Election is prior to faith.

Thanks for the civil response.

peace to you

 

Why not? are you assuming that the word "make" (ESV) imposes before creation. If so that is not necessarily true. Further the rest of the context of that passage and the entire book doesn't support that.

You are missing the context of that passage. Its context is that Jesus is the true shepherd sent by God. The context is not individualistic election.

There has been no evidence to support this.

 

Note that the text does not say that we were chosen “to be” in Him (Christ), but rather that we were chosen “in Him.” Jesus Christ is the primary elect one, "My Elect One in whom My soul delights!" [Isa_42:1 NKJV] and believers are chosen, or elect, because of our connection with Jesus.
If one is not in Christ through faith, which only happens in time, then they are not part of the "elect".

 

"(1) Objection that election takes place when we are saved
because we are elected "in" Christ.

"This is stated in Eph. 1:4, which we have just quoted. But note that this same passage makes election eternal; "before the foundation of the world".

"Why will men thus array a single passage of Scripture against itself? The statement that we were elected "in" Christ means no more than that Christ was the ground of our election (election being on the basis of His saving work), and that we were foreknown as being in Christ in the purpose of God.

"The language here is the language of Him who, in His purpose,
"calleth things that are not, as though they were" (Rom. 4:17).

"We have another example of this in Rom. 8:29,30, where the calling, justification, and glorification of all the elect are put in the past tense. We were not actually and experientially in Christ in eternity, nor were we actually and experientially called, justified, and glorified in eternity; but we were in the purpose of God, and this is the meaning of the passage just cited.

"(2) Objection that we are elected when we are saved on the ground that the Scripture never applies the term "elect" to any except the saved.

"It is true that the term "elect," in some places in the Scripture, has exclusive reference to saved persons. Such a use of the term may be seen in Matt. 22:24; Luke 18:7; Rom. 8:23; 1 Peter 1:2.

"These passages refer only to those in whom election has been applied and made experiential. But it is not to these only that the term "elect" and its equivalents are applied.

"In Eph. 1:4 and 2 Thess. 2:13, as we have seen, the elect are said to have been such from eternity. Then the term "sheep" is equivalent to the term "elect," and in John 10:16 we have Christ's application of the term "sheep" to the lost Gentiles that were yet to be saved. This passage reads:

"Other sheep I have, which are not of this fold (the Jewish nation):
them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice;
and there shall be one flock, one shepherd."

"But, to the further discomfiture of Arminians, we find that 2 Tim. 1:10 applies the term "elect" in its possessive form to those who were not yet saved.

"The passage reads. "I endure all things for the elect's sake,
that they also may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus
with eternal glory."

(3) Objection that we are elected when we are saved
on the ground that the Scripture puts calling before election.

"It is a fact that sometimes the Scripture, in referring to both the calling and election of believers, or in alluding to the called and elected, mentions the former first. See Matt. 22:14; 2 Pet. 1:10; Rev. 17:14.

"The "called" of Matt. 22:14 (the Greek word being an adjective used substantively) are those to whom only the general, external, and, for the most part, ineffectual call, through the preaching of the gospel, is sounded. This class is composed of many. But of these only a few, comparatively speaking, belong to the chosen, elect, as evidenced by the fact that only the few believe the gospel.

"The other two passages cited mention calling and election in the order in which they are realized in the experience. One knows his election only by the calling (quickening) that he has received of the Holy Spirit.

"That the passages given above do not fix the chronological or even the logical, order of calling and election is evident from the proofs that have been given of the eternity of election, and from Rom. 8:29,30, where the order is manifestly the true logical order.

"There foreknowledge and predestination, which involve election, are placed before calling. Then Rom. 8:28 asserts that we are called (particularly, internally, and effectually)

"according to His" (God's) "purpose."

"And this purpose involves election.

"Thus election must precede calling,
just as the purpose to call must precede the actual call
since the calling is according to the divine purpose.

"Those who urge this objection against the eternity of election
need to note that the Scripture does not always name things
in either their logical or chronological order.

"For instance, 2 Tim. 1:9 puts salvation before calling.

"(4) Objection that election takes place when we are saved
on the ground that we are elected
through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth.

This objection is based on the King James translation
of 2 Thess. 2:13 and 1 Pet. 1:2.

"This first passage says, in the King James version, that we were elected
"to salvation through the sanctification of the Spirit
and belief of the truth."

"The second passage says, according to the same version, that we are
"elect . . . through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience
and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ."

"The Greek preposition translated "through" by the King James translators is "en." And it is rather disconcerting to Arminians to note that the Revised Version translates this preposition "in" instead of "through." But it is ruining to them to note that N. M. Williams says of this preposition:

"It expresses a state, not an act; not 'through,' but 'in.'
The Greek preposition seldom expresses instrumentality"
(An American [Baptist] Commentary on the New Testament).

"The Greek preposition alludes to the state the people addressed
were in at the time they were addressed, and does not signify
the means by which they became the elect of God."

from: A Systematic Study of Bible Doctrine
by Thomas Paul Simmons.

Chapter 20 The Doctrine of Election.


See New thread: Comprehensive references to The Triune Godhead's Eternal Concern toward Their Elect children.

 

Believers were in Christ before the foundation of the world Eph 1:4 that is why they become believers.

 

It doesn't disprove anything. Gd decided that all who would believe in Jesus would be saved. Not individually as in God decided that Candyjd would believe but in the corporate sense that God was providing salvation to all who believe. One is never described as elect until one is saved in scripture.

 

Call it what you like.

 

BF read what you just posted, it is illogical. One is only in Christ if and when they believe. And they can only believe in time "
If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved." Rom 10:9

By your logic they do not need to believe to be in Christ they do not need to repent. The bible says we are made new in Christ, but new from what in your theology? What old things are cast away? "Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come." 2Co 5:17

But perhaps I am just not understanding your theology and in your view believers are not saved. Being "in Christ" means something different in your calvinist view. Or perhaps you just have a different bible text than the rest of us.

 

BF one either believes the bible or they do not, and it appears you have chosen the latter.