Your 2 Timothy verse is awesome, yes anyone who sets their hearts on Gods ways will be blessed, but again Paul is speaking of the deeper
Although I probably disagree with Me4Him about a number of things, I think you are missing his point about vessels of wrath and mercy not being static categories. In fact, the allusion in Romans 9 is to Jeremiah, where God warns Israel that he will fashion it into a vessel for destruction if it continues upon the same path.
Paul's opposition is not concerned about the Western individualism that so many people bring to the text. Rather, he is concerned that God's promise to Israel/Abraham's children has failed. Paul counters that the true children of Abraham are not "according to the flesh," but are those to believe in Christ. Israel, therefore, is cast in the role of Esau and Pharaoh.
Here's something I once posted in another forum that covers more ground (A couple of the Scripture references are messed up, but I don't have time to fix them at this time):
In the Second Temple period, saying "elect," or "child of Abraham" were to say that same thing. Paul's opposition is defending their identity as God's chosen people.
Paul's purpose is to attack the Jewish belief in their exclusive right-standing before God based upon their physical descent from Abraham. He has to show that although Israel is physically descended from Abraham, that physical descent was itself based upon a "
promise" made. If God fulfills his word through promises, we need to ask what promise stands behind the issue at hand. We'll discover that Romans begins (1:1-3) and ends (16:25-27) by telling us exactly what that promise was. Read carefully, the verses in question are shown to dismantle the Jewish mind-set involving the belief that they are God’s people based upon bloodline and that the “works of the law” mark them out as such.
We have to back up a bit and understand that Paul has already established that Abraham is the forefather of the Gentile Christains, too, and this has to be defended. If the Gentiles are included as Abraham's children through faith, the objecting Jew would have to conclude that God's word had failed, since from their perspective God's promise was to the Jews - the natural decedents of Abraham.
First, we must observe how Paul argues that those of faith are Abraham's "children of the promise." What is the identity of “the children of the promise”?
Romans 4
What then shall we say that Abraham, our forefather, discovered in this matter? If, in fact, Abraham was justified by works, he had something to boast about—but not before God. What does the Scripture say? "Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness."...It was not through law that Abraham and his offspring received the promise that he would be heir of the world, but through the righteousness that comes by faith....Therefore, the promise comes by faith, so that it may be by grace and may be guaranteed to all Abraham's offspring—not only to those who are of the law but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham. He is the father of us all
Likewise…
Romans 4
Understand, then, that those who believe are children of Abraham.
The point to take note of here is that it is twice repeated that the promise was received
through faith - not that faith was received through the promise. Those who trust God become Abraham's children, and like him they become righteous. The promise ----> comes by faith. The promise is the ground of election, on which faith stands.
In case some doubt remains, we see the same idea in Galatians:
Galatians
The promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed. The Scripture does not say "and to seeds," meaning many people, but "and to your seed," meaning one person, who is Christ. What I mean is this: The law, introduced 430 years later, does not set aside the covenant previously established by God and thus do away with the promise. For if the inheritance depends on the law, then it no longer depends on a promise; but God in his grace gave it to Abraham through a promise. ...You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise
Here, again, those who trust Christ are heirs to the promise: heaven. The promise was made only to one Person. Those "clothed" in that Person, the "Seed," become "seeds" in his likeness. He was the only one to whom the promise was made.
Returning to Romans 9, since Paul has already argued the idea that Gentiles are Abraham's children through faith, he needs to dismantle other Jewish constructs concerning their status as God’s people. He does so with the example of Rebekah's two children.
But before look at that, we must understand that the nation which resulted from God's selection via Abraham --> Isaac --> Jacob was the result of promises, but was not saved apart from faith. Apart from faith, what advantage is there to being a Jew?
Romans 9:4-5
What advantage, then, is there in being a Jew, or what value is there in circumcision? Much in every way! First of all, they have been entrusted with the very words of God ... Theirs is the adoption as sons; 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!
The Jews are the bearers of all those things that led up to Christ. Having established that the Jews have been entrusted with the very things that bear witness to Christ -who is their true hope salvation- Paul’s basis for faith-based salvation has come full circle. The Jews themselves are heirs to all that is mentioned above, but not apart from faith.
Paul doesn't stop there, however. He puts the final nail in the coffin by proving that the promise made to Abraham (the promise that he would be the father of many nations and inherit the world) was fulfilled through Israel’s patriarchs via a promise, so that no one could claim that it was fulfilled through fleshly descent from Abraham.
Romans 9:8-9
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."
What was the
promise? “…Sarah will have a son.”
Again,What
was the promise? “…Sarah will have a son.” That is how it was stated, before the child was even born. He was the son through whom Israel would come.
A promise!
Israel's own identity comes via a promise, so why do they object that God's promise to Abraham is fulfilled by including Gentiles who believe via a promise? This son that was born to Rebekah, after all, was due to a promise, so the identity of Israel itself is based upon a promise. Isaac and Jacob were not even in existence when the promise was made, so it could not be argued that they “had it coming” due to their
bloodline? In fact, they had not even assumed Jewish cultic practice (“done anything good or bad” - i.e., “the works of the law") which the Jews claimed gave them their identity as God’s people –
that which set them apart! In other words, just as Abraham was uncircumcised when he was justified by faith proved his justification was not based upon his Jewishness, the election of Israel to be the bearers of the things of Christ was not based upon their Jewishness, but on a “promise,” that God’s purpose in electing Israel might stand.
Paul knows his Scriptures. He knows his Jewish audience understands that (as someone has already mentioned) the OT verses in question are about "two nations are in your womb." It was through one child that Israel would come, but not the other. Jacob was not saved by tricking his father with an animal skin, nor was that the first day Jacob believed. Rather, it was through him that Israel’s birthright/identity came. Again:
Romans 9:4-5
What advantage, then, is there in being a Jew, or what value is there in circumcision? Much in every way! First of all, they have been entrusted with the very words of God ... Theirs is the adoption as sons; 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!
So, if Israel concedes that its identity comes through a promise, how can they object that the Gentiles are included via a promise? If the Jews believe, they too will partake of the fulfillment of all that is mentioned in the verses immediately above and below.
Galatians 3
Before this faith came, we were held prisoners by the law, locked up until faith should be revealed. So the law was put in charge to lead us to Christ that we might be justified by faith. Now that faith has come, we are no longer under the supervision of the law.
And, as Romans 11 clearly indicates, the Gentiles who believed the promise (the basis of God's election) are grafted into God’s people. This is why Paul could write to both Gentiles and Jews and call Abraham “our forefather” (4:1). Indeed, the failure of the Jews to believe in the promise (the basis of God’s election according, to His purpose) resulted in them being “broken off” of God’s people. They can be grafted in again, if they will believe in Christ .
God's word has not failed. It is fulfilled via his promises -as always- not fleshly descent. God's word is fulfilled in Christ, as promised to Abraham.
Believe and be grafted in. "You stand by faith."
