In both chapters nine and ten, Paul speaks of his fellow Jewish brethren and his desire that they be saved. Certain contexts will use the word “brother” to refer to “kinsmen according to the flesh” (v. 3). Ananias calls Saul “brother Saul” when as yet he was not told what to do (Acts 9:17-18). Ananias was not referring their common faith in Christ, but their common lineage (cf. Acts 22:13). Paul identifies their blessings as having the adoption, the glory, the covenants, giving of the law, the worship, the promises, and the patriarchs (v. 4-5). But, the greatest contribution is that the Messiah came from their race.
Despite their privileged position as descendants of Israel, Paul states that just because they are physically connected does not mean they belong to Israel. He recognizes two connections to Israel (the people of God). First, there is the fleshly lineage, which he calls “children of the flesh,” and there are children of promise who are counted as offspring. Verse eight tells us that the children of the flesh are not the children of God. (There are still people claiming the physical descent of Abraham being the children of God).
The real question is whether the word of God has failed. Why would not all physical descendants of Israel belong to Israel? Fleshly Israel had rejected Jesus as the Christ, the Son of God. Yet, this fact does not prove that the promise to Abraham had failed because the Abrahamic promise assured that all flesh would be blessed through his seed and the seed is Christ (Gal. 3:16). Those who are of the faith of Abraham are children of Abraham and heirs according to promise. These are spiritual Israel. The promise to Abraham has been fulfilled. We are not to be waiting for this promise to be fulfilled in fleshly Israel because physical lineage does not entitle one to be his children and share in the promises (v. 7) .
The second topic of significance is applying God’s choice in executing His plan. In blessing the world through Abraham’s seed, God elected Isaac and rejected the other sons of Abraham. Then, when the twins were born, Jacob and Esau, God selected Jacob over Esau. Paul expresses His choice as not be based on their character or moral choices because the election was accomplished before the children were born. God, who knows the end from the beginning, chose the person to fulfill his own purpose. When He chose Jacob (whose name was changed to Israel), he chose his descendants, who gloried in that election. The election, however, was not an election to salvation. Of the blessings referenced in the early section of chapter nine, which described their salvation? God’s choice of selecting Abraham and his offspring after him had nothing to do with God’s election of their salvation but God’s election through whom the seed would come to offer salvation. Notice the reason given for God’s choice of Jacob before the twins were born was that the “purpose of God according to election might stand” or “continue.”
Consider that the natural selection of choice was given to the eldest son as heir of the promise. God, however, chose the younger in Jacob instead of the older. If personal salvation was what was elected, then no point needed to be made that the younger was selected instead of Esau. Whether the younger or the older, personal salvation is not based on the order of birth, and all other sons are rejected.
The selection of Jacob is a reference to him as a lineage of people through whom the seed (Christ) would come. Paul is neither discussing Jacob as an individual nor his salvation. Instead, we are reading about God’s selection of Jacob and his descendants, who were chosen through whom the seed would come. Further, if Paul is dealing with personal election to salvation, then Jacob and the nations descending from him were all elected to salvation, while Esau and his descendants were elected to damnation. When God spoke to Sarah, He said, “Two nations are in thy womb, and two peoples shall be separated from thy bowels: and the one people shall be stronger than he other people, and the elder shall serve the younger” (Gen. 25:23).
Furthermore, it is commonly quoted that “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.” In case you mistakenly connect the statement to the preceding statement about God’s choice of the fate of two individuals before they were born, several hundred years after Jacob and Esau, we are given this word of Jehovah to Malachi, “I have loved you, says the Lord. Yet you say, Wherein have you loved us? Was not Esau Jacob’s brother? says Jehovah: yet I loved Jacob, but Esau I hated, and made his mountains a desolation, and gave his heritage to the jackals of the wilderness… (Malachi 1:1-4). Again, this refers not to these brothers as individuals but as the fathers of two nations.
Once again, a question is raised and answered about God being unrighteous. If God selected Isaac and Jacob as the instruments of choice to work out His plan (plans which the Jews gloried in), why would they think it strange to reject the Jewish nation because of unbelief and accept the Gentiles who come to Him in faith? We have God’s choice of the nation of Israel to accomplish a divine purpose and His rejection of the same nation to accomplish another divine purpose. Yet, individually speaking, every person (Jew or Gentile) can become children of God.
Verse fifteen begins with God’s statement to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” To understand the statement, recall that Moses had become discouraged by the sinful behavior of the children of Israel and refused to continue unless God showed him some special favor. God chooses to show mercy to whomever He chooses to show mercy regardless of anyone else’s disapproval or objection. Consider Jonah and Ninevah or the Jews and the Gentiles. The whole scope of Paul’s logic is that He will carry through with his purposes regardless of anyone else.
The final example of God’s choice or election to accomplish His purpose, Paul uses Pharoah to show God’s choice of Pharoah that He might “show His power, and that His name might be published abroad in all the earth” (v.17). God hardened a hard-hearted heart by simply saying, “Let my people go.” The demand stirred in him to do as he pleased with Israel, regardless of God’s demands. Yet, this standoff would prove who has the greatest power in all the earth. If Pharoah had let the people go when demanded, there would have been no contest, and God’s purpose would not have been accomplished. Pharoah would have been credited for being merciful and kind to Israel.
Verses 20-21 have often been misapplied to teach that man has no freedom of will and no personal responsibility because God makes a man and nations the way they are; that God, like a potter, makes one a vessel of honor and another a vessel of dishonor, while they ask, “why have you made me thus?” Instead, Paul is discussing the use God makes of men and nations. 2 Timothy 2:20-21 reads, “Now in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and of silver, but also of wood and of earth; and some unto honor, and some unto dishonor. If a man, therefore, purges himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honor, sanctified, meet for the master’s use, prepared unto every good work” (cf. Isa. 45:9). This sounds like we have some choices regarding who and what we will be (Jer. 18:1-12, regarding nations). God uses the vessel that we are to accomplish His purposes. His purpose for human redemption has been fulfilled but all along the path to the last days of the Jewish era, He was using people and nations to fulfill his promises and accomplish His good pleasure. This is not to suggest that he no longer is doing this, but it is clear and unmistakable to the first century.
Verse 22 asks another question. It reads, “What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction,  in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory—  even us whom he has called, not from the Jews only but also from the Gentiles? Being “fitted for destruction” does not mean that God made them this way. It is illogical to suggest that God endured with much longsuffering any character that He made. All things that God made by His power were exactly as He wanted. How could He endure with much longsuffering people who are exactly what He wants them to be? In other words, there are certain classes of people who by nature are fit for destruction. God’s wrath is poured out against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men (Rom. 1:18).
Conversely, verses twenty-three and twenty-four describe another class of people who are objects of God’s mercy. They are fit for mercy and glory, which God has predetermined would fit that class. He called them, and thus, they are the “called-out.” They are the saved ones, heirs, and joint heirs with Christ from both Jews and Gentiles. However, this is determined by each individual soul who followed after the righteousness which is of faith. The physical Jews as a people rejected this plan of righteousness. They followed after righteousness but never arrived because they “sought it by works and not by faith (30-32).