 Okay. Good. Good morning everyone. Thanks for Joining the class today. Good morning, Arun, Dave. Thank you for joining. And we will pray and I'm sure the others will I'll join us soon and We get started Good. Good. One of us please pray. I've started the recording. So it's going on. Could one of us please pray and we'll get started? Okay, I'll pray. Father, we come here for you and we thank you Lord God for this day. We thank you for this opportunity. I think I'm having this class. Thank you, Father. And you are so loving and wonderful that you care for each one of us, so he just No matter how we go, what we're doing, you always love us and you have always shown us your mercy And you've always been so precious to us. So it's happy None from your world, Lord Jesus. I pray that your world Touch each one of us, Lord Jesus. Those who have already joined and those who are still yet to join Lord God, make your spirit work in each One of our hearts, Lord Jesus. Let our hearts be open and let our hearts be Accepted. Accepted, Lord Jesus. So that every word that our pastors is going to teach us today, Lord Jesus. Sleep those words, be alive in each one of us, Lord God. We thank you for this opportunity. Once again, Lord Jesus. And we submit this time in your hand. In the mighty name of Jesus, I pray. Amen. Thank you. Thanks. All right. Good morning once again. And we have a wonderful, are we going to have wonderful time in our study? We are in Romans chapter nine and We actually looked at, or we started off with the first few verses, so we will continue from there. Just a quick Maybe not a not a full recap, but just a quick mention Romans chapter nine, 10 and 11 The apostle Paul is Taking a little side trip To address What God is doing with Israel While at the same time he's continuing to work with the church So Like we said in the very beginning when he's writing to the Church at Rome, it's a mixed group. There are Gentiles, but there are also Jewish believers And so obviously There is a lot of concern or a lot of questions on If if the church is where you know what God is working in now, what about the Jewish people? What about all his promises right from the time of Abraham, you know, so Paul is addressing that in chapters nine 10 11 and then in chapter 12 he gets back to What do we talk about as the gentle, you know, gentle Christian life and so on? So these are very interesting chapters Also These are somewhat difficult chapters especially when from the point of God's purpose God's predetermined purpose So that's a big question that's being addressed and which we will see as we go forward in chapter nine You know and out of these chapters actually Have come two different Schools of thinking You could even say two different schools of theology In the Christian church There is this one side which is Calvinistic, which is you know, John Callan was a great theologian and He as we will see in chapter nine itself he He Basically if you want to summarize what his theology was He placed everything on the sovereignty of God on on the predetermined purpose of God To the point where human will became almost negligible so That's a Calvinistic school of thought theology On the other side, there is what is known as the Armenian armenianism which Takes into account. I mean it recognizes the sovereignty of God, but Takes into account The choice of man and it somehow makes an attempt to reconcile the two meaning God is sovereign but We make the final choice Whereas in Calvinistic theology, it's we don't have that I would it's almost like our choice has been predetermined by God So we will see as we go to Romans 9 why we have these two differing schools of thought in Christian theology So then there are a lot of traditional denominations and theologians who subscribe to the Calvinistic school of theology. I mean that way of thinking and that way of looking at scripture and understanding God And then there is I would say perhaps and I this We may not be able to quantify it, but perhaps the a larger group especially the a larger group that subscribes to armenianism which tries to reconcile the sovereignty of God with also keeping the free will of man intact It seems like a lot of the traditional denominations, especially the Baptist Mainline evangelical denominations would subscribe to a Calvinistic type of theology Out of that came what was known as a reformed theology, which is kind of branched out of Calvin's theology and trying to again, you know Be accommodate human will The role of human will so there's a you hear about reformed churches reformed, you know Those have come out of this and then trying to adapt to a lot of So a lot of the Pentecostal, charismatic, spirit-filled type of churches Most of them are probably all of them would subscribe to the school of thought that tries to reconcile both the sovereignty of God and the will of man Generally speaking right and then you have people somewhere in between who kind of go back and forth so on But you will see when you read Romans nine why that that whole area is so difficult to To come to a firm understanding Okay, anyway, let's get into it and then as we read scripture You will find out why this is so challenging Let's read again the first five verses. We did read it last week But let's pick up from where we paused Romans chapter nine versus one to five somebody could read that for us, please Romans nine one through five I feel the truth in Christ. I am not lying my conscience Also bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit that I have great sorrow And continual grief in my heart for I wish that I myself were accused for From Christ for my brethren my countrymen according to the flesh Who are Israelite to whom? pertain the adoption the glory the covenant Covenants the giving of the law the service of God and the promises Of whom are the fathers and from whom according to the flesh Christ came who is all over all the eternally blessed God amen So we just started, you know looking at these this passage last week um We were at verse one where was one and two the Paul is saying You know my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit So we were talking about conscience we're talking about the witness The witness of the conscience and the witness of the Holy Spirit. So within all of us as people Every human person Has a conscience the conscience is basically the voice Of the human spirit So we are spirit soul and body In your in the human spirit. God has put the law like we saw in roman chapter two And the exact verses 15 Romans 2 15 the law written in their hearts Their conscience also bearing witness between themselves so Romans 2 15 so God has put the law within man's heart And as as it has a spirit speaks or his spirit bears witnesses telling him That's the conscience. It's the voice of the human spirit But what Paul is saying is about as believers We also have the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit in our spirit So we have a double witness The witness of our own conscience and the witness of what the Holy Spirit is telling us and that's what Paul is here saying look You know, uh, whatever i'm telling you my conscience is you know, it's a testing to it and the Holy Spirit himself But then me is also testing to this That you know, I have such great worse too, you know You can you can feel paul's burden He's continued grief and sorrow for his own people the jewish people So let me say it all the paul was an apostle to the Gentiles And was taking the gospel to the Gentiles. He's still at a great heart for his own people the jewish people To the point where he said in verse three, you know, I wish I could be cursed You know, almost I I could go to hell just for the sake of if my country meant if that would save my Uh countrymen according to the flesh that is all the jewish brethren that he was so concerned about so you see paul is setting things up For what he's going to say He's identifying himself as look. I am a preacher of the gospel. I'm a preacher of the christian faith but I actually was I am also a jew I You know, he was actually a Great person in Judaism So he says So he's kind of positioning himself saying look i'm in both sides meaning I am part of the church. I am an apostle of the church Of jesus christ But i'm also a jew And I have a great heart for my own people. It's not like Okay, I I've completely abandoned My connection with the jewish people And i'm only pursuing The church of the lord jesus christ. No I have a great heart For my own people So he's positioning himself Because he's going to talk now for the you know for three chapters now About jews and the church Right, so he's saying look I have a heart For my people And in verse four he recognizes What a great privilege god has given The jewish people people of israel, you know, he says to them Who are his lets to whom? Pertain the adoption that means, you know The adoption really means people who are brought in to be part of the family of god Right, so god chose these people And uh, he wanted them to be his own Uh, we see that in the old testament god had chosen them And the old testament you read off and you know, there's who who's like you There's no one other nor the nation like you under heaven To whom god has given his law and his commandments and he has blessed in such a measure Yeah, so they knew they were this chosen people who are brought to be god's own people Then secondly verse four They they experienced the glory of god They received the covenants of god It is they had the law that was given to them They had the service of god the whole ministry, you know the whole the priesthood That was given to them And the promises were given to them the promises of all that god was going to do was given to these people Of course, what paul is going to tell us later on is that through them. It's gone to the Gentiles That he's starting off from where god started Then god started with israel he started with the jewish people And he he blessed them with all of this he put it give all this to them first right He says and the promises were five and from them come the fathers From whom according to the flesh christ came so it says It was from this nation from the jewish people came the fathers. So that is abraham isek chakim They recognize david as a great patriarch of this entire nation So he says, you know, the fathers were all people of the of the israel And even jesus christ came In the natural according to the flesh he came from this nation Right, so what paul is saying is look the jewish people Have been so privileged I'm gonna say jews we can use the word israel interchangeably um At this point He says these people are so privileged god, you know started with them He gave them all these things and even jesus christ came from them in the natural right and uh Just want to point out there in verse five that when he talks about christ He calls jesus as The eternally blessed god So that's important because sometimes people ask, you know Of where does the bible say that jesus christ is god? You know, and especially and this question of course would come primarily from the Jehovah's witnesses Who don't believe that jesus is god? They they refer to jesus a great being so this where does the bible say jesus is god? And here's one of the places that there are the places as well verse five christ The eternally blessed god clear no doubt christ is also referred to as the son of god the son of man You know by different titles that um are specific to different things that he did But he's very clearly referred to as The eternally blessed god Here in romans nine was fine. Okay, so romans nine versus one two five paul is positioning him self Of his heart for the jewish people and also is very clear The jews are a very special people They are chosen people israel. It's a very special nation. So it's very clear about that. You know in no way is he Discounting all of that just because of the church. It's not doing that. Okay, so now we go from verses six through 13 and now we're beginning into this getting into the soul for knowledge of god the predetermined purpose of god that we're getting into that quite a quite difficult portion, okay So roman chapter nine, let's go from verses six to 13. Please somebody could read that for us But it is not that word of god has taken no effect for they are not all israel who are of israel Nor the nor are they all children because they are seed of abraham, but in Isaac your seed shall be called That is those who are the children of the flesh These are nor the children of god, but the children of the promise are Count as the seed for this is the word of the promise At this time I will come and Sarah shall Have a son and not only this but when rebecca also had conceived by one man Even by our father Isaac for the children not yet being born nor having done any good or even That the prom that the purpose of god according to election Might stand not of work, but of him who calls It was said to her the older self serve the younger As it is written jacob. I have loved but It's how I have hate hated Okay So now verse six to two six to thirteen So Paul is saying all right, but It is not that the word of god has taken no effect It's not like what god has spoken has Just fallen by the wayside. So so look this is a nation God has chosen them And he spoke wonderful things about them this nation is rough and he says but Of course in the back of the minds of the people the whom he's writing to they're all thinking about the church now You know the the church of jesus christ so he says wait What god spoke to them It's not that the word that he spoke to them has gone wasted It hasn't gone wasted So that's verse six. It is not that the word of god has taken No effect is this means god's word spoken about the jews and the nation visra has become ineffective. No, no, no So then he begins to explain he says you know Uh, not everybody who is a jew in the natural is Whom god was referring to What god was saying what so what what paul is bringing out is when god said in isek Will be your See your descendants. He was talking about children of promise He wasn't just talking about the natural children. He's talking about children of promise They are the ones who are the real descendants that god was speaking about That's in verse eight So the children of promise are counted as the seed. So really what he's Setting them up for is children of promise are basically people of faith or Believers who are jews and gentile believers. That's what he's referring to children of promise So what he's saying It's not those who are children the flesh And it's just just because they're born jewish or born of that nation That's god wasn't actually referring to just them He was referring to children of promise Meaning those who would be of faith believers. He's going to come to that So So he stated this And he says because god gave a promise and he said I will come and sarah will have a son So he's introduced this thought That the the real descendants that god was talking about for children of promise he's Given the thought brought the thought put the thought on the table so to speak And then he starts talking about something else He says verse 10 and Not only this that means i'm giving you one more thought so For So he's what he's supporting he's saying What god spoke that's verse six what god spoke to the nation of israel That word has not become in effect And it's god's promises to his people Are still there but first i want you to understand that God was when god said In isek your seed will be called Or when he told sarah I will come and Sarah will have a son. He was giving a promise And in effect he was saying That it's the children of the promise Not just natural born children in israel, but children of the promise Through whom all that he had the word he had given this nation of israel was going to be fulfilled first thought then Not only that But this also what does he say this is in verse 10 he says Think about this isek and rebecca Even before rebecca gave birth God said The older Shall serve the younger that is he saw i mean rebecca gave birth to twins Is on jakeb But because isek came out first he was considered the older so the older Will serve the younger and verse 13 jakeb i have loved he saw i have hated So he brings in the second um I should i shouldn't say idea, but i should say truth the second truth that Even before the children were born Even before they could do any you know Have any say in anything God already said The older will serve the younger I have loved one I've hated the other so this is what he Refers to in verse 11 so verse 11 is like the the big worse The big worse For the children not yet being born Not having done any good or evil that the purpose of god According to election That means God's predetermined purpose Through which he already selected In this case he already selected jakeb so The children had no part in this The people had no part in this god himself In order to carry out a purpose He selected or he elected The word elected can be you can use the the modern word election selection he selected and god selection Was not based on works That means he didn't select jakeb After jakeb had grown up and become a big man and And done all the good things then god said oh, yeah, yeah, he's a good man So let me select it does not based on works It is even before they were born even before they They're done any good or bad So not all works But of him who calls That means god Selected according to his purpose And according to his calling that means his choosing on the person so worse 11 is like a Big worse a pivotal worse now Like what we have to do with scripture all scripture Must be interpreted and understood in the light of the rest of scripture If we take just this worse By itself or the few verses that we read Or perhaps even what we are going to read in chapters 9 10 11 It may leave us with the impression that look We have no no say in all of this These two children even before they were born god already decided who was going to serve whom And Whom he allowed and whom he hated now we will talk about verse 13 why God said that we will explain it But I'm just trying to focus on verse 11 now You know if we just go by verse 11 or even what we are going to go through in verses chapters 9 10 11 We might come to this conclusion that hey Everything's already Determined by god He has already selected whom he wants to select It is all according to his purpose and He calls whomever he wants to And we just have no say in anything it might seem like that but Sorry all of scripture has to be understood In the light of the rest of scripture What do we see in the rest of scripture we see Clearly without a question The free Will of man We see very clearly So As you're going to go through chapter 9 10 11 We have to understand it and we have to interpret it Without discrediting The free moral agency of man Otherwise if I close my eyes, I mean, you know if I um Just put blinders on And I look only at chapters 9 10 11 It's very likely I will come away with this idea that God has already decided everything We are just like puppets God just uses us to fulfill his purpose And each one is already predetermined for something And uh, that's it but We shouldn't do that. We shouldn't lead with our blinders on We should say what is the rest of scripture teach right from Genesis? We know Man has a freedom to choose Adam made a choice God didn't stop it God didn't predetermine adam's choice God didn't dictate adam's choice adam's choice was adam's choice God had a plan That in spite of adam's wrong choice God had a plan But god did not determine adam's choice So And like that, you know, you read up all the men of god you read about moses You know God didn't predetermine that moses would strike the rock twice. No, that was what moses did And because of that moses the great man of god could not enter the land of promise God didn't predeterminate God knew it of course, but That was moses action and moses himself paid a price for that and like that, you know, we could go on through The old testament to go through the new testament when we can say look All these people great men and women of god, they Had a free will And they exercised it And some of them they were times when they made the right choices and some third times when they made the wrong choices But the purpose of god was not Derailed just because they made A wrong choice God ultimately fulfilled his purpose. He went on with it So With that in mind We need to understand this chapter So what is you know, and so what paul is saying? Look There was the purpose of god project of an iso and in gods predetermined purpose He already said The older will serve the younger but in stating that Or in giving forth the prophecy What we would you know today we call it the prophecy Because he spoke it before they were even born In stating that prophecy. He was not predetermining their choices He was only stating ahead of time what their choices were going to be and god was Equally open to both of them But because of their choices He declared ahead of time Whom he would love and whom he would hate In stating Jacob I have loved and iso I have hated He is not saying I already made up my mind about these two before they are born No, it is based on what they would be doing It was based on you know, what the choices they would eventually make But he declared it even before there was they were even born before they even had they could Make any choice make any of their Uh Do any of those things Even before they had any works to show He already For told it, but they were still free to make their choice But why did god Love Jacob and hate iso We read about this In hebrus 12. So if we go with me to hebrus 12 and we will get an understanding Of why this was the case. So let's just go to hebrus 12. I will I will Explain this then I will pause we'll take questions in case Things are Not clear, right? So let's go to hebrus 12 And let's read from verse 15 through 17 please hebrus 12 15 through 17 somebody could read it for us He was looking for 17 Yes, yes, looking carefully list anyone falsehood of the grace of god list any root of bitterness streaming of cause Trouble and by this many become defiled List there be any fornicator or profane person like iso Who for one Of food sold his birthright for you know that afterward when he wanted to inherit inherit the blessings He was rejected for he found no place for different things Though he sought it diligently with tears So here the writer of hebrus Is uh, you know referring to he saw with quite harsh words he says He refers to verse 16 He refers to him as a fornicator or profane person Like iso That's pretty harsh words But what was he says What did he saw do? What was the main problem? He sold his birthright Just because for the sake of one meal So we know the story like, you know, he had just come back from his hunting and he was very tired Very hungry And jacob said hey You give me your birthright as the first born All the blessings that you have as first born That's the birthright And i'll give you a meal And at that moment he saw, you know, he could have said no, I can't give him a birthright You know, he could have gone and fixed himself some food or you know, just I mean refused to do that But at that moment He gave up his birthright just for one meal And that's just representing a man of the flesh a man who was living for the immediate gratification of the flesh Whereas jacob on the other hand was not a perfect man Right, he we know he was He cheated his own brother. He cheated his own father And he ran away All of that. So jacob was not a perfect man, isn't it? You know in fact the name jacob means cheater or supplanter He was not a perfect man But yet in spite of all his imperfections he had a heart toward god He had a heart toward god So What was the difference between jacob and he saw? He saw Was willing to give up everything god had on his life That is the birthright just for the sake of meeting the need of the flesh Whereas jacob He In spite of all his weaknesses somehow sought god in everything Somehow sought god. He had weaknesses. He's not a perfect person, but he sought god and so Knowing that god is saying This is what's going to happen the older isa will serve the younger jacob jacob i've loved isa i've hated So god is not predetermining their choices and what they do in life But he's speaking ahead of time Saying this is how my purpose is going to unfold This is what i see them, you know, what i see their choices and this is The unfolding of my purpose and therefore These are the ones who would become deselected or elected of god These are ones would become the called of god And these are the ones through whom the purpose of god will be Fulfilled at this is how it's going to be fulfilled. So god speaks that ahead of time based on foreknowledge Not based on Predetermining our individual choices because if god had predetermined jacob's choice isa's choice Then isa can turn to god and say god i'm not to blame You determine my choice Which is something paul is going to, you know, kind of get into further on he's using the he's going to use the analogy Of the potter and the clay Right, so it's it's pretty Tough thing to understand Can the clay tell the potter You know, i want to be made like this No, the clay is in the hand of the potter and the potter decides But yet There's one big difference between the clay and us human beings There is a commonality Between the clay and us we are both made of dust But there's one big difference The clay does not have a free will we do So later on paul is going to use that analogy, but we need to keep in mind The fact that we have a free will So we have to understand it in the context of the free will Okay, so let me pause here and uh, you know We definitely need to read a little bit Read through this chapter to To understand how the full picture of what paul is saying In terms of God's purpose God's election God's calling And the place of free will So you can you can right away tell that i am Intensely interpreting it from this angle of trying to balance both the sovereign sovereignty of God While maintaining the integrity of free will And i'm not you know on this side where We just say everything is God's sovereign purpose and It was already predetermined And I didn't have any choice In the matter I didn't have any say in the matter so I'm not interpreting it from that perspective what I what do want to say is that there are people who would interpret it that way that He so had no choice Because God already predetermined He would serve Jacob And he would be hated But i'm trying to Intentionally maintain the free will That both Jacob and he so had in which they did exercise So i'm going to pause here I'll take up any questions. Then we go for a break and then we will come back and continue What are things clear or am I or are there Are there any questions at this time? I start I start quick one. Um, sure like a There's a certain definition of say, uh, this thing called the cult or a cult Is a concoct is anything that's moving away from the truth? I mean i'm just paraphrasing the definition, but um, so, uh, Calvinism, uh, and some of their beliefs, uh, is I think they have something called like the tulip or something that That they follow, right? And so is it is it isn't that isn't that moving away from the truth like as we are learning and So So, uh, say Some things about the cult a cult something that's very cultish is um that Um, so one one one What's a one sign of course is that they're going away from the truth But I think uh, but a second important sign is that people within a cult are controlled by a leader or Leaders or by the organization that choices and everything controlled by that Okay, uh saying so that so that's when we say hey That's cultist because the people are not allowed to you know, do their own thing It's all dictated for them Uh by the organization or by the people running the organization Now in Calvinism, I feel it's only uh We wouldn't call it Cultist or we would just say it's a different Perspective or a different interpretation Of a different theological understanding Of scripture But the core beliefs are the same meaning The core beliefs of jesus christ the cross The triune god the bible, you know those core beliefs are the same Just in in this aspect You know, there are different like I said schools of thought or different views and they spouse this view that God has said everything and uh so It just happens according to god's purpose But they don't uh, yeah So the other things that you know, they're generally covered the cult are not there. So we wouldn't you know call them that Just that the views or understanding are in this aspect is different Sure. Okay. Thank you mr Okay, I see your see others comments on the chat. Okay Things are fine Claire. I need some time to understand. Okay So, yeah, take some time to think about it. Uh, so I'm going a little slow In this chapter chapter nine, especially because as we read some more It's going to get a little bit more complicated But you know, we just As we journey through it, you know, it'll all come together Eventually what Paul is working towards is to give us an understanding on how God is still working both In the Jewish people and in the church And how God is going to bring these two together That's what he'll come to in chapter 11. He'll show us how Both this will come together. So it's a beautiful journey. It's a little complicated now, but he shows us how God will bring both His plan for Israel And his plan for the church bring them together. Okay, so let's take a quick terminal break and we'll be Back and we'll pick up with verse 14 Okay, thank you