Paul knew God’s Word well enough, however, to know that God did not promise salvation to every physical descendant of Israel, but only to those who believe. Moreover, Paul knew God’s Word well enough to know that God had even foretold through the prophets that very few Jews would believe the gospel, while many Gentiles would embrace it. That is what the ninth chapter of Romans is all about.

True Israelites

Directly after Paul declares that God’s word has not failed, he states, “For they are not all Israel who are descended from Israel” (9:6). He can only mean that just because one is a physical descendant of Jacob/Israel does not mean that he is a true Israelite. No Jew should rely upon his physical lineage for his salvation, any more than he should rely upon his physical circumcision, as Paul had earlier warned (see 2:25–29).

Paul continues by expanding on that idea:

Neither are they all children because they are Abraham’s descendants, but: “Through Isaac your descendants will be named.” That is it is not the children of the flesh who are children of God, but the children of the promise are regarded as descendants. For this is the word of promise: “At this time I will come, and Sarah shall have a son” (9:7–9, emphasis added).

Again, the primary point is that physical lineage does not guarantee God’s favor, as proven by the case of Ishmael. Ishmael was a physical descendant of Abraham who did not receive the blessing given to Isaac.

Paul draws a further parallel with this example for his Jewish readers. They may be either like Isaac or like Ishmael in this respect: believing Jews are like Isaac, “children of the promise,” who receive the blessing by faith; unbelieving Jews are like Ishmael, “children of the flesh,” who are only physical descendants.

Obviously, like all comparisons, this one is imperfect, and there are many dissimilarities that could be mentioned between Isaac and believers and between Ishmael and unbelievers. Paul draws out only one similarity. His point is that God has chosen to bless only those who have faith in His promise. No Jew should rely on his physical lineage to obtain God’s blessing. Paul continues:

And not only this, but there was Rebekah also, when she had conceived twins by one man, our father Isaac; for though the twins were not yet born and had not done anything good or bad, so that God’s purpose according to His choice would stand, not because of works but because of Him who calls, it was said to her, “The older will serve the younger” (Rom. 9:10–12).

Ignoring eight chapters of context that contradict his claim, Piper says this passage teaches that God unconditionally elects individuals for salvation just as Jacob was unconditionally elected before his birth. But unless Paul was very confused and contradicted what he previously wrote, Piper must be wrong. Paul is simply using another example that proves one’s physical lineage does not guarantee blessing from God. Esau was a physical descendant of Isaac who did not receive the blessing given to Jacob.

Again Paul draws a parallel with this example for his Jewish opponents: God’s choosing of Jacob was obviously not based on his works since he was chosen before he was born. Similarly, God has chosen to show favor to sinful Gentiles apart from works. How could Jewish readers legitimately object to Paul’s doctrine that God had chosen to favor Gentiles apart from their works when God had similarly chosen to favor their revered forefather Jacob/Israel apart from his works?

Paul is not trying to convince his readers that the reason some individuals are saved and some are unsaved is that God has pre-selected only some for salvation. Neither Jacob nor Isaac was pre-selected to be saved, and there is no scriptural evidence that Ishmael or Esau died unsaved. Ishmael and Esau were simply not chosen to be in the messianic lineage. Paul is illustrating that God has the sovereign right to make His choices, and that He can make choices that are not based on people’s works, as He did with Jacob.

Again, like all comparisons, this one is imperfect. We must be cautious not to read more into it than Paul intended, and the context helps us avoid that error. Paul’s example cannot rightfully be interpreted to mean that God chose Jacob for salvation and Esau for damnation, or that God has done anything similar with any individual before or after them. Otherwise we take Paul’s words out of their context and make him contradict himself in his very next sentence, which says, “What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there? May it never be!” (9:14). If God chose Jacob for salvation and Esau for damnation before they were born, He is very unjust.

God’s Sovereign, Just Mercy

Paul is masterfully exposing the fallacy of his Jewish opponents’ argument. They claimed it was unjust for God to show saving mercy to the Gentiles that He withheld from His own people. Paul has just proved otherwise from their own history. If they say Paul’s message makes God unjust, then they must also admit that God was unjust in His choices of Isaac and Jacob over Ishmael and Esau.

An unjust God is an impossibility in Paul’s mind, and so it should be in everyone’s mind. Who can accuse God of injustice because He chose Jacob rather than Esau to be in the messianic lineage? God has such a right. Moreover, His choice of those two men had something to do with Him bringing salvation to all.

And who can accuse God of injustice if He chooses to show grace to sinners who become humble believers and chooses to withhold His grace from proud sinners who attempt to earn their salvation? There is no injustice in that. But there is indeed injustice in God if He unconditionally elects some to salvation and some to damnation.

Paul continues:

For He says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy. For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “For this very purpose I raised you up, to demonstrate My power in you, and that My name might be proclaimed throughout the whole earth.” So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires (9:15–18).

God’s mercy and hardening, however, are not arbitrary, but just. If every person received the justice due him, every person would be condemned, because all have sinned—a point Paul had made earlier in this letter. So the only question is, To whom, if anyone, is God showing mercy in salvation? Paul’s answer is that God shows saving mercy to anyone who believes, Jew or Gentile. He will have mercy on whom He will have mercy, and no one has any right to find fault with Him for showing mercy to believing Gentiles.

Just as God has the right to show mercy to whomever He desires, He also has the right to harden whomever He desires. No one can rightfully find fault with Him for hardening anyone He desires. Thankfully, because God is righteous, He hardens only those who have repeatedly rejected His mercy. Paul points specifically to Pharaoh, to whom God showed incredible mercy over a period of time (and nobody can argue against that). On several occasions Scripture says that Pharaoh hardened his own heart, and thus God decided to justly harden his heart (see Ex. 7:13, 22; 8:15, 19, 32; 9:7, 12, 34–35; 10:1, 20, 27; 11:10; 14:8). Who can find fault with God for that?

Likewise, God had shown incredible mercy to the Jews, as Paul would soon say in 10:21, quoting Isaiah 65:2: “All the day long I have stretched out My hands to a disobedient and obstinate people.” God had the right to harden them now just as He did Pharaoh of old. Paul will soon show that the prophets predicted the Jews’ rejection of Christ and God’s hardening of them because of it (see 9:27–29, 33; 10:19–21; 11:7–10).

The Unjust Mercy of Calvinism

Calvinists misuse Paul’s words in this passage (and Piper is no exception), saying that God has compassion on some and hardens others for no other reason than His good pleasure. That makes God unjust—the very thing Paul is arguing against—and contradicts his summarizing statement to this entire section of Scripture: “For God has shut up all in disobedience so that He may show mercy to all” (11:32).

Anticipating another objection, Paul writes, “You will say to me then, ‘Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?’ On the contrary, who are you, O man, who answers back to God?” (Rom. 9:19–20).

If God actually hardens rebels, then why does He still find fault with them? The answer is that God righteously hardens rebels. He hardens them as a means of judgment upon them. Paul, however, does not mention that at this point, but sharply rebukes anyone who would dare find fault with God for hardening anyone. We are not the judge of God; He is our judge. Anyone who has been hardened by God cannot rightly point a finger of accusation against Him. God has the right to do whatever He desires with us, and thank God that He has shown us all incredible mercy in order that we might repent and be saved.

Paul continues defending God’s right to do what He pleases with what is His:

The thing molded will not say to the molder, “Why did you make me like this,” will it? Or does not the potter have a right over the clay, to make from the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for common use? What if God, although willing to demonstrate His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction? And He did so to make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory, even us, whom He also called, not from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles (9:20–24, emphasis added).

I italicized the last part of 9:24 simply to remind us that Paul is still writing about the Jewish controversy concerning the justice of God in saving believing Gentiles while rejecting unbelieving Jews.

Paul is not, and cannot be, attempting to persuade his readers that God pre-selects some to be “vessels of wrath” and others to be “vessels of mercy,” as that would contradict everything he has said about God’s justice. Rather, Paul is emphasizing that God has been extremely patient with those who were vessels of wrath prepared for destruction (9:22). These “vessels” were not “prepared sovereignly by God,” but simply “prepared,” or “ready,” for destruction because of their own sinfulness. Paul is not saying that only a certain percentage of people are “vessels of wrath.” All people are “vessels of wrath” prior to their repentance and regeneration, as Paul has made abundantly clear in earlier chapters.

Paul explains that the reason God was so patient with vessels that were so worthy of His judgment was so that He might “make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He prepared beforehand for glory [‘beforehand’ because He foreknew who would believe; see 8:29], even us, whom He also called, not from among Jews only, but also from among Gentiles” (9:23–24).

Clearly, in opposition to what some Jews wanted to believe, Paul believed that the vessels of mercy include Gentiles whom God has called through the gospel. That is still the primary point of this chapter. To buttress his point, Paul offers proof that God foretold through His prophets that He would save Gentiles but that only a remnant of Jews would be saved:

As He says also in Hosea, “I will call those who were not My people [Gentiles], ‘My people,’ and her who was not beloved, ‘beloved.’ And it shall be that in the place where it was said to them, ‘You are not My people,’ there they shall be called sons of the living God.” Isaiah cries out concerning Israel, “Though the number of the sons of Israel be like the sand of the sea, it is the remnant that will be saved; for the Lord will execute His word on the earth, thoroughly and quickly.” And just as Isaiah foretold, “Unless the Lord of Sabaoth had left to us a posterity, we would have become like Sodom, and would have resembled Gomorrah” (9:25–29).

Finally we arrive at Paul’s summary of this entire ninth chapter. Here it becomes even clearer that he has all along been refuting the Jewish objection to his doctrine that God was accepting believing Gentiles and rejecting unbelieving Jews:

What shall we say then? That Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, attained righteousness, even the righteousness which is by faith; but Israel, pursuing a law of righteousness, did not arrive at that law. Why? Because they did not pursue it by faith, but as though it were by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone, just as it is written, “Behold, I lay in Zion a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense, and he who believes in Him will not be disappointed” (9:30–33).

Paul’s point is so obvious that one wonders how any Calvinist can miss it. Many Gentiles attained righteousness while many Jews did not, because the Jews did not pursue it by faith as the Gentiles did. And God had foretold this would happen through Isaiah, saying that the Messiah would be a stumbling stone to some, but anyone who believes in Him will not be disappointed. Isaiah foretold a salvation that would be available to anyone by faith. Isaiah completely contradicted Calvinism’s unconditional election.

Chapters 10 and 11

Paul devotes two more chapters to the Jewish/Gentile issue, both of which stand in contradiction to Calvinistic doctrine. He begins chapter 10 by stating that his prayer to God is for the salvation of his fellow Jews (10:1). Had Paul been a Calvinist, he would never have prayed such a prayer, knowing that the salvation or damnation of every person was already determined before the foundation of the world. Thus there would be no reason to pray for anyone’s salvation. Any Calvinist who prays for the salvation of other people is inconsistent with his own theology. Even if he prays, “Lord, whenever it pleases You, bestow Your irresistible grace upon those whom You have predestined to be saved,” his prayer accomplishes nothing. God will do what He has predetermined regardless of the request.

In 10:4 Paul again affirms the universal opportunity of salvation: “For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes” (emphasis added). He then pulls out an arsenal of Scriptures to seal his case. In so doing he repeatedly declares that salvation is available to all in 10:11–13, quoting the prophets Isaiah and Joel:

For the Scripture says, “Whoever believes in Him will not be disappointed.” For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, abounding in riches for all who call on Him; for “Whoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved” (emphasis added).

The very word “whoever,” which Paul uses twice in this passage, contradicts Calvinistic theology, because it implies that individuals can make a choice. To Calvinists, totally depraved people cannot choose to repent or believe, and only those who are unconditionally elected, irresistibly drawn, and sovereignly regenerated will ever do so. Thus the concept implied by the word “whoever” does not exist in the Calvinist system.

Paul again places the blame on the Jews themselves for not being saved, quoting from the most well-known messianic chapter in the Old Testament, Isaiah 53: “Lord, who has believed our report?” (Isa. 53:1, emphasis added). Had they believed the report of the Messiah in Isaiah’s fifty-third chapter, any of them could have been saved.

Paul then quotes Deuteronomy 32:21, where God said that He would make His people jealous and angry by “a nation without understanding” (10:19). Paul reveals a few verses later that he was following God’s example in this (11:11, 14), attempting to “move to jealousy” some of his fellow countrymen and save some of them. Paul believed that it was possible for him (and for God) to do something that would motivate fellow Jews to believe and be saved. Calvinism’s doctrines of total depravity, irresistible grace, and unconditional election all melt in the light of such truth.

Paul again quotes Isaiah to prove that God planned to save Gentiles (10:20) and had extended His merciful hand to His own disobedient and obstinate people (10:21). Once more the implication is that God wanted Jews to be saved, but they would not repent.

A Gracious Choice of Those Who Made a Choice

Lest anyone think Paul thought that God had completely rejected the Jews, he begins the eleventh chapter by refuting that idea, first pointing to himself as proof that God had not rejected the descendants of Israel. Then he cites an Old Testament example of an ancient Israelite who thought he might be the only true follower of Jehovah remaining on the earth:

God has not rejected His people whom He foreknew. Or do you not know what the Scripture says in the passage about Elijah, how he pleads with God against Israel? “Lord, they have killed Your prophets, they have torn down Your altars, and I alone am left, and they are seeking my life.” But what is the divine response to him? “I have kept for Myself seven thousand men who have not bowed the knee to Baal” (11:2–4).

Notice that God said He had kept seven thousand men for Himself, but they were men who had made the decision not to bow their knee to Baal. God made a decision based upon their decision, not the other way around. Just like Elijah, who by his own free will had decided to serve God and not Baal, so there were seven thousand others like him.

Paul then makes an application of this story to his contemporary situation: “In the same way then, there has also come to be at the present time a remnant according to God’s gracious choice” (11:5). That is, just as in Elijah’s day, God had graciously chosen to keep for Himself a remnant of Jews. They consist of those who believe. Paul immediately emphasizes this condition of acceptance with God in his very next sentence: “But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works, otherwise grace is no longer grace” (11:6). His point again is that salvation is available to Gentiles just as much as Jews, because the basis of it is God’s grace.

Paul continues:

What then? What Israel is seeking, it has not obtained, but those who were chosen obtained it, and the rest were hardened; just as it is written, “God gave them a spirit of stupor, eyes to see not and ears to hear not, down to this very day.” And David says, “Let their table become a snare and a trap, and a stumbling block and a retribution to them. Let their eyes be darkened to see not, and bend their backs forever” (11:7–10).

The majority of Israelites had not obtained the salvation they were seeking, with the exception of those who were chosen. Ripped from its context and interpreted with a Calvinistic bias, one could use this Scripture as a proof-text for unconditional election. But when we read it within its greater context without a Calvinistic bias, we easily see that Paul is writing about a conditional election. That is, God has chosen to save those who believe—Jew and Gentile. They are His true chosen people.

Incidentally, note that Paul clearly stated that the Jews had been seeking salvation but had not obtained it, because, as we know, they had been seeking it by works. This, of course, contradicts Calvinism’s doctrine of total depravity. The unsaved Jews of whom Paul wrote were not so totally depraved that they could not attempt to obey God and seek salvation.

God’s Hardening of Rebels

Paul writes that those who are not among God’s chosen—that is, those who do not believe—God has hardened. This subject of God’s righteous hardening of rebels has already surfaced in 1:18–32 and 9:15–18. But has God hardened Christ-rejecting Jews to the point that it is now impossible for them to repent and believe? No, indeed, as Paul makes ever so clear in the very next paragraph:

I say then, they did not stumble so as to fall, did they? May it never be! But by their transgression salvation has come to the Gentiles, to make them jealous. Now if their transgression is riches for the world and their failure is riches for the Gentiles, how much more will their fulfillment be! But I am speaking to you who are Gentiles. Inasmuch then as I am an apostle of Gentiles, I magnify my ministry, if somehow I might move to jealousy my fellow countrymen 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? (11:11–15).

Far from stating that God has completely rejected the Jews, Paul declares that by saving Gentiles, God is attempting to move Jews to jealousy so that they might be motivated to receive His salvation. Again, this stands in direct contradiction to Calvinistic theology. If some Jews were predestined to be saved and others to be damned, God would have no reason to try to make Jews jealous by showing grace to Gentiles in hopes that Jews would be saved.

Paul also declares that if the Jewish rejection of Christ has resulted in spiritual riches for the Gentiles, what might happen when the Jews ultimately receive Christ, as the Scripture has foretold they will? Their future acceptance of Him will be “life from the dead” (11:15), probably a reference to the future resurrection and the beginning of Christ’s millennial reign on earth.

Paul develops this theme a little later in the chapter:

For I do not want you, brethren, to be uninformed of this mystery—so that you will not be wise in your own estimation—that a partial hardening has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in; and so all Israel will be saved; just as it is written, “The Deliverer will come from Zion, He will remove ungodliness from Jacob.” “This is My covenant with them, when I take away their sins.” From the standpoint of the gospel they are enemies for your sake, but from the standpoint of God’s choice they are beloved for the sake of the fathers; for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable (11:25–29).

By these words Paul completes his refutation of the Jewish objection that God’s word had failed if his gospel were true (9:6). Paul believed that God’s promise of salvation to the Jews would ultimately be fulfilled when the fullness of the Gentiles had come in (11:25), when the Jews would finally believe in Jesus. For now, however, Paul said that a “partial hardening” had happened to Israel. This was not because God arbitrarily decided to harden certain Israelites simply because of His “good pleasure,” but because He had righteously hardened those who refused to believe in His Messiah. Again, He had not hardened them to the point of making it impossible for them to believe, because He was at the same time attempting to attract them to believe by making them jealous of the Gentiles who believed. If God had determined to harden certain Jews because they were not predestined to be saved, why would He attempt to motivate them to believe by making them jealous of Gentiles?

Moreover, why would God attempt to make anyone believe (in this case, by trying to make Jews jealous of Gentiles)? If people are saved only when God bestows a grace that is irresistible upon those pre-ordained to be saved, then God would make no such attempts that leave room for possible failure and that are inconsistent with His sole means of saving people. Making certain people jealous in order to motivate them to believe in Jesus is contradictory to the Calvinistic ideas of total depravity, irresistible grace, and unconditional election.

The Olive Tree Example

Further contradiction of Calvinistic doctrine is found in chapter 11. Drawing an analogy of a tree and its branches with God’s family tree of salvation, Paul writes:

But if some of the [Jewish] branches were broken off, and you, being a wild olive [a Gentile], were grafted in among them and became partaker with them of the rich root of the olive tree, do not be arrogant toward the branches; but if you are arrogant, remember that it is not you who supports the root, but the root supports you. You will say then, “Branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in.” Quite right, they were broken off for their unbelief, but you stand by your faith. Do not be conceited, but fear; for if God did not spare the natural branches, He will not spare you, either. Behold then the kindness and severity of God; to those who fell, severity, but to you, God’s kindness, if you continue in His kindness; otherwise you also will be cut off. And they also, if they do not continue in their unbelief, will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again. For if you were cut off from what is by nature a wild olive tree, and were grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these who are the natural branches be grafted into their own olive tree? (11:17–24, emphasis added).

Where are any Calvinistic doctrines found in this passage? Just the opposite!

Again we see that Paul believed God would graft individual Jews into the salvation tree if they would believe. It was up to them, not God. Had Paul been a Calvinist, he could not have written what he did. He could only have said that God will graft them in again if God wills for them to be grafted in and gives them the gift of faith.

Note also that Paul warned that genuinely saved Gentiles could forfeit their salvation if they stopped believing. Naturally, such a thing would not be possible if unconditional election were true. If God unconditionally elected a person to be saved, then once God’s irresistible grace had been bestowed upon that person, he would be permanently saved with no chance of forfeiting his salvation. One who is “grafted in” cannot be “cut off” in the Calvinistic system, yet Paul believed one “grafted in” could be “cut off.” Furthermore, according to Calvinism, one who was “grafted in” and then “cut off” could never have been “grafted in” in the first place. Paul believed otherwise.

In conclusion, if Paul was affirming the Calvinistic doctrine of unconditional election in Romans 9, then he was an idiot, because he contradicted his own doctrine repeatedly throughout the book of Romans, and we should thus toss his writings out with the rubbish.

Ephesians 1:3–6

The only other Scripture Piper uses to defend the idea of unconditional election is Ephesians 1:3–6, a passage that, like many others, refers to believers as being chosen before the foundation of the world. Calvinists often use such verses to prove their idea of unconditional election, but they fail to notice that Paul never says anything about God’s choice being unconditional. And they ignore the multitude of Scriptures that unequivocally say that God’s choice of people is conditional.

For example, Paul later writes in Ephesians that “by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works” (Eph. 2:8–9, emphasis added). The salvation God has so graciously offered to us is conditioned upon our faith, and not our works. What could be more obvious? In order to be chosen by God and saved, we must have faith. Because God foreknows what every person will do, He knows who will have faith and who will not. So those who have faith are chosen before the foundation of the world.

Thus we see how unscriptural the idea of an unconditional election is. Any person who takes the whole of Scripture into consideration will not conclude that God pre-selects some individuals for salvation and others for damnation. Only those who ignore the majority of what Scripture teaches and focus on certain out-of-context Calvinistic “proof texts” could arrive at such a conclusion.