There are some tough verses in this reading if you have questions regarding the God Sovereignty/our selection versus our free will/and the question of whether or not God love everyone...really. Verses like:
"...Rebekah's children had one and the same father, our father Isaac. Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad -- in order that God's purpose in election bight stand: not by works but by Him who calls -- she was told, 'The older will serve the younger.' Just as it is written: 'Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.'
What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! For he says to Moses,
'I will have mercy on whom I have mercy,
and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.'"
"It does not, therefore, depend on man's desire or effort, but on God's mercy. For the Scripture says to Pharaoh: 'I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.' Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden." [Romans 9:10-18]
The reading of this entire section in the Bible did more from my understanding than anything before. It was hard to read this passage and then later read in this same book by this same author:
"...if you confess with your mouth, 'Jesus is Lord,' and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved." [Romans 10:9]
"...the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, for, 'Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.'" [Romans 10:12-13]
"And if they do not persist in unbelief, they will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again." [Romans 11:23]
Wait a minute...so what is it? Does God elect the saved or are those that believe and call on Him are saved?
For me, the lightbulb went off when I realized this book was written to try and reconcile Gentile and Jewish Christians by trying to explain that God has extended his salvation beyond the Israelites. They, the Jews, were His chosen people before. Now he choses all people. Salvation has been extended to the Gentiles. God, the scriptures seem to argue, can save who He wants to. So who does He want to save? Obviously, both Jews and Gentiles. But there is something required of us. Acknowledgement. Acceptance. That's why, Paul explains that even though the Jews were hardened and so rejected and the joy of Christ was then extended to the Gentiles, the Jews can still be recovered. That's why Paul still preaches to Jews as well as Gentiles:
"I make much of my ministry in the hope that I may somehow arouse my own people to envy and save some of them. For if their rejection is the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance be but life from the dead?" [Romans 11:13-15]
"For God has bound all men over to disobedience so that He may have mercy on them all." [Romans 11:32]
Yes, God loves all, wants all and sent his son for all.
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